Tips for Selecting a Photo Scanning Service

Photo Scanning Services: Think Long-Term

You know how important it is to preserve your old photos, which is why you find yourself in the market for a photo scanning services company that is equipped to scan your photos and restore them to their original luster. Our suggestion when considering photo scanning services is to think long-term: Do it now and do it right the first time.

The key criteria for selecting a photo scanning service are: quality, price, trust, ease of use, and customer service.

Quality

When we say "do it right the first time", we have photo scanning quality at the top of our mind. Technology will continue to improve so go with the highest quality service you can find, this way your scans don’t become obsolete by some future hot product or service.

You should check to see if your photo scanning provider uses top of the line flat bed scanners for photos. At ScanCafe, we use the highly rated Epson 4490 photo scanners for prints.

Photo scanning quality can most easily be defined by the resolution or dpi. At 600 dpi, you can create re-prints of the photo scanned, but you can also enlarge the image to make poster sized re-prints. You will see services on the market that offer 150 dpi, but the quality will be poor. We have provided some quality comparisons for you to review.

Beyond dpi resolution, you should find out what post-scan services are offered. For example, ScanCafe is the only service that provides free color correction, red eye removal, cropping, and dust-scratch removal for photo scanning as well as slide scanning and negative scanning. ScanCafe's free services are very unique. Our highly trained technicians spend 4-5 minutes on each image to make sure we are providing the highest quality. You will not find this anywhere else at these prices.

Finally, if your photos are extremely damaged, ScanCafe provides first-class photo restoration services.

Price

The average household has about 500-1,000 images to scan. Therefore, price does matter. At 600 dpi, ScanCafe provides the highest quality at the best price. You will find lower prices when scanning at lower dpi levels, but the scanning quality is really low and, frankly, the end product is poor. In addition, you do not get our free photo scanning services like color correction and cropping.

Trust

You need to trust your precious images with a great company. A critical step in selecting a photo scanning service is to review the management team and feel comfortable with their ethics and business sense. ScanCafe's management team is the most experienced in the industry, and our primary goal is to provide superior quality, service, and value to our customers. You should also review the testimonials of other individuals who have had their photos scanned. At ScanCafe, we have successfully scanned over 2,000,000 images and our commitment to first class service is unmatched.

Ease of Use

This is a pretty simple problem: you have a ton of pictures stored in shoe boxes and you want to bring those pictures back to life through scanning technologies. You don’t have the time to do it yourself. The rub has been that you still need to invest a large amount of time sifting through the photos to determine which ones you want to get scanned – lots of people in your shoes just shove the box back in the closet. Well – welcome to the ScanCafe Revolution, where a simple problem is met with a simple answer. With the ScanCafe service, you simply estimate the number of pictures you have, place an order online, and print out the completed UPS label, affix it to your box, and drop the box off at any UPS location. ScanCafe removes the labor from you – you then go online, review your scans, and delete up to 50% of the images you sent us. ScanCafe is the ONLY service that allows such freedom of choice and ease of use.

Customer Service

Chances are you don’t know a lot about paper scanning – which is why you visited ScanCafe in the first place. We want to be the partner in your scanning and digitization efforts. We firmly believe that efficient and responsive Customer Service is critical to success. At ScanCafe, our California based customer support team can walk you through the entire service and answer any questions you have about the scanning or ordering process. We believe that we have made it easy for you to place an order on your own, but sometimes it is nice to hear a voice on the other end of the line so feel free to call us if you need to. You can also refer to our testimonials which speak about our stellar Customer Support team. So, if you have any questions or comments you can email us at admin@scancafe.com or call us at  1-866-745-0392. If you miss us live, we'll get back to you with a clear and concise answer, usually within hours of receipt of the message.