My New Favorite Scanning App for Court Reporters

My new favorite scanning app for court reporters is Scannable by Evernote! The ease and intuitiveness of this app is amazing. I already use Evernote to keep track of my digitized world. With this new app, scanning is even faster and easier.

My smartphone is my number-one gadget that I take with me to every job. With so many app options available, it essentially means that I can leave the bulkier gadgets back at the office for the more heavy-duty production tasks.

Here is a list of some of the uses for scanning during a deposition or hearing:

The attorneys are retaining the exhibits and you need to check a quote on one of the docs.
A physical exhibit may be marked that cannot be attached to the transcript. Simply take a pic of the object, print the PDF scan, and slap an exhibit sticker on it.
A witness may be reading and quoting from a text and not marked as an exhibit. So during a break, ask to take a quick snap of the quoted text.
One of the participants in the deposition ran out of cards. Simply scan their contact information from a pleading.
Oftentimes an attorney might have only one business card left and doesn’t want to let it go. Ask him if you can scan his card and return it to him within seconds.
Business cards should always be scanned. I scan the cards at the time of the job. This one little step ensures that their contact information will never be lost in a drawer or at the bottom of your handbag.

The advantages of Scannable:

Faster to scan. Simply place the doc on a contrasting background and point the app at the document and it will auto-capture it. No more tweaking the edges or color.
Within the app, you may sign in to your Evernote and LinkedIn accounts. This means that once a business card is scanned, it takes that information and adds in details from that person’s LinkedIn profile, including a picture. If you’re like me, having a face attached to a name is an excellent memory tool.
Once the business card is scanned, you may also save it directly to your Contacts. My Contacts are synched across all my devices. What that means is that once it’s saved to my smartphone, I can go to my computer or iPad and have access to email addresses there, too. The information is entered once automatically, so I don’t ever have to type in the information on multiple devices.
You can also send or save documents and meeting notes from within the app: email, Evernote, Photos, text message, and more.
The app does give each scanned image the name Scannable Document. Edit the scanned document within the app and give it a name that you will remember later.