Paper has forever been the universal proof of compliance.  

After the advent of electronic record keeping and digitized business processes, the natural evolution for companies was to support electronic signatures.  The technological requirements to support this feature have been around for some time but the laws and regulations had to catch up.  Today, electronic signatures are very common and legally accepted in numerous industries to meet a wide variety of use cases and regulations. There are also many online signature tools like DocuSign and Adobe Sign (formerly EchoSign) that have become standard for applications in real estate, contracts, and insurance transactions.

Over the past few years, businesses around the world, regardless of scope and industry, have made the move to paperless, which includes documents such as contracts and invoices as well as automated business processes required for digital transactions, approvals, and eSignatures. While no business may be 100% paperless, there are many advantages to making the transition. Of course, if your business has been using and relying on hard copies of documents for several years, a change in practice will take time. To convince you of its importance, here is a look at why it is crucial that your business go paperless: