Importing Documents

  • 14/10/2021
  • 6 minutes to read

Before you can start working with documents in Continia Document Capture, the documents must be imported into the system. There are several different ways of doing this, as explained below.

Via email

You can import documents into Document Capture by attaching them as PDF or XML files to an email and then sending that email to a dedicated email address monitored by Document Capture. There are different document categories in Document Capture – such as Purchase for purchase documents and Sales for sales documents – and each document category has a dedicated email address, so be sure to send your documents to the right document category. You can either forward the documents you receive to the dedicated email address yourself or ask the original senders (often your vendors) to send them directly to that email address.

Note

A popular choice when importing documents into Document Capture is to set up an email address in your own domain and then have all emails that are sent to this address automatically forwarded to the system-generated email address monitored by Document Capture.

To import a document via email, follow these steps:

  1. In the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central Role Center, under Continia Document Capture Activities, go to Actions and select Submit Document.
  2. On the How-to Submit Documents page, under E-Mail Address, your dedicated Document Capture addresses are displayed for each document category. Copy the relevant email address – for example the one from the Invoices and Credit Memos category if you want to import an invoice.
  3. Using any external email service, create a new email, attach a document (in this case a purchase invoice) in PDF format, and send the email to the address you copied in step 2 above. Note that the email must meet a number of requirements.
  4. In Business Central, close the How-to Submit Documents page to return to the Role Center.
  5. The document you sent is now OCR-processed automatically by Continia and will appear in the Continia Document Capture Activities section of your Role Center, in the Pending OCR cue.
  6. Once it’s been OCR-processed, the document appears in the Ready to Import cue. From here, you can import the document and see how many other files have been OCR-processed and are ready for import.
  7. To import your document (along with any other OCR-processed documents), go to Actions and choose Import Files.
  8. When the import is complete, a message will show the number of files that have been imported. Select OK.

The document is now ready to be registered and available in the Ready to Register cue.

Note

Files submitted for OCR processing are queued in the order they’re received in Continia Online (Cloud OCR). During peak periods, processing time may be a little longer than usual. You may want to refresh the page to find out if a file has been processed.

Using a network scanner (multi-function printer, MFP)

Most network scanners can be set up to scan and send documents as PDF files to a predefined email address. You simply set up your scanner to send all scanned files in PDF format to the email address that’s monitored by Document Capture, as described above. No additional configuration is required, as Document Capture automatically reads all incoming emails and their attachments as outlined in the above section.

Using a desktop scanner

Document Capture supports the scanning of documents using a desktop scanner connected directly to each end user’s PC. Document Capture can communicate with the scanner and start the scanning directly from Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central. To learn more about how to connect desktop scanners, see Connecting a Desktop Scanner.

Once you’ve connected your desktop scanner, you can start scanning documents by following these steps:

  1. Place the document that you want to scan onto the scanner glass, or load it into the document feeder, depending on your type of scanner. Follow any other relevant instructions provided by your scanner manufacturer.
  2. In Business Central, choose the Search icon, enter Scanning & OCR, and then choose the related link.
  3. In the Scanning & OCR window that opens, go to Scanner and select your scanner in the box.
  4. In the action bar, select Scan to scan the document.

Via the Continia Delivery Network

The Continia Delivery Network connects you to the global PEPPOL eDelivery Network, which enables you to import PEPPOL documents directly into Business Central. To learn more about the Continia Delivery Network, see Understanding the Continia Delivery Network.

See also

Technical email requirements
OCR-Processing a Document
Connecting a Desktop Scanner
Understanding the Continia Delivery Network