Mobile printing and the cloud

Printing from your mobile device, is it really necessary? We now live in an information age, where workers demand info on the go and key access to information regardless of location. So, it’s more important than ever for businesses to consider what technology they will need to create productive work environments as the traditional office evolves

By empowering their workforce, businesses benefit from increased productivity, improved efficiency, greater flexibility and a contented team. Combining the right mix of technology and working practices, means mobile working can become an achievable goal for many organisations regardless of size or sector and mobile print capability is one of the tools that can assist.

While there has long been the debate about the paperless office and if this can ever be realised, the reality is that while automation can play its part, this ideal is still far from achievable and workers need to be able to print documents on the go or from remote sites, as part of their job role. Mobile print offers a cost-effective solution to enable access to documents anytime, anywhere, while still retaining security to ensure documents are kept safe.

How does it work?

Users submit jobs either directly to the printer or to a secure print queue regardless of their choice of device or where they are located - either inside or outside the organisation’s network. The system allows users to submit jobs from outside the office, using either an internet printer driver or by uploading the file to be printed to a web portal.

As mobile devices become essential in the workplace, simply being able to print from a PC or Mac computer is no longer enough. Mobile users can send a job to the printer via email. Alternatively, a link to a document held in a cloud-based storage system can be emailed.

Users can be identified by multiple identities, ensuring that the correct user and budget are charged for the print job and that each user only appears once in reports, regardless of how many different ways they have chosen to submit documents. Administrators can allow unknown users or guests to send jobs to their print devices. An email can be sent back to the new user containing a unique code to be able to release their job on the device.

All jobs, whether they are submitted from a PC on the network or a mobile device from another building, are shown to the user in the same secure print queue. The user can see a thumbnail preview of the job and add any finishing options such as duplex or staple before the job is printed. Users can also use their smartphones to select and release their jobs by using its web browser or native smartphone app, without the need for embedded multi-function device (MFD) software.

Advantages of mobile and cloud printing:

• Real-time access to their files, reports and documents.
• Uncompromised security, ensuring your confidential documents remain in safe hands.
• Documents printed as they are needed, reducing waste and improving sustainability.
• Send jobs to a secure queue via email, upload via a website or directly from a cloud-based system.
• The flexibility to allow guest users to submit print jobs.
• Comprehensive job tracking to individual user accounts for consistent reporting.
• Still benefit from budget control to ensure costs can be managed.
• The ability to print and release jobs without being connected to the internal network.
• Range of ways to print on the-the go, whether from the user’s smartphone and tablet via the web, browser or an app.