Buying a shredder VS Using a Shredding Service: Which is Right for You?

If you are a business that requires a large quantity of paper shredding, you surely have considered calling a shredding service or buying a high yield shredder. Investing in a paper shredder for your office is the safest and smartest paper solution when you are dealing with the confidentiality of your clients, your employees, and your company. This article will discuss some critical points to think about before you choose a paper shredding service instead of buying a shredder for your business.

Consider the Costs

With our current global economic situation, it can be a difficult choice for any company to purchase a large piece of office equipment. Unfortunately, the security of the information on the documents at your business is not something you can afford to take lightly. With varieties of shredders available from personal use to industrial shredding machines that will even shred media, there is a paper shredding solution accessible that is right for you.

Typically, most services that shred documents for you charge four times what it costs them to destroy the papers or media. Why allow these expensive services to take advantage of you when you can buy a shredder and use the money you would be paying a service to help pay off your new office equipment. With the amounts that services typically charge, your new shredder would be paid for in just a few months.

All the Added Fees

While off-site shredding companies can seem affordable at first glance, you will want to look at a list of itemized costs. Though a company may state a specific price for their services, there are often hidden fees. Here are just a few things these type of paper shredding services will charge you above the quoted price.

• Fuel costs
• Amount of paper or material removed from your site by the pound
• Time by the hour spent at your location
• Number of paper bins removed
• On-site destruction

There have been many cases where these additional costs have totaled to be more than the originally quoted prices. In these extreme cases, the business owners using the shredding services found themselves paying more than twice what the initial estimate would have cost them.

Beyond the Monetary Costs

Another issue that most businesses fail to realize is that when you are using a shredding service, you do have to have space to store the materials that will need to be shredded. That space will be occupied until that service can pick up or destroy the contents for you. By purchasing a shredder or two, you can save space. Once you have a proper shredder for your documents, you should be able to contact a recycling service near you. They will be able to help you recycle the paper pieces in an ecological and earth-friendly way.

The Security of the Matter

One of the most crucial facts to think about is that most shredding services are not as secure as shredding the documents yourself. Typically speaking, most services that shred documents utilize lower security level shredding units due to their need to meet higher compacity levels as quickly and affordable as possible. Unfortunately, this leaves the materials that you are getting destroyed being shredded into sometimes less than 35 pieces. That might sound like a lot of pieces, but as far as paper shredding security goes, 35 strips can be put back together relatively easily.

Another security issue to consider is, if you are not paying the company extra for their on-site shredding services, you cannot be sure that they are destroying your documents and not just storing them. Even if they are taking the items you have entrusted them with for shredding, how can they prove that they are shredding the materials immediately? 

It Comes Down to the Bottom Line

The only way to be sure you are protecting your company’s assets and the bottom line is to protect that confidential information yourself. The best way for your business to do just that is to buy and use your own paper shredder. This option allows you financial freedom, more office space, and the peace of mind that things are being handled as securely as possible. You will be able to save money and know that the documents are safe until they are being destroyed right in front of you.

PBS Office and Your Paper Shredding Solutions

Here at PBS Office, we have experienced, friendly, and knowledgeable staff that will help you to select a paper shredder that will be perfect for your needs. We will go over the volume, security level, and all of the various items that may need to be destroyed for your business. With our selections, we are sure to find a paper handling solution that will be perfect for you and your company today.