Meet Evolve Document Solution’s very own Phil Ritchie, the unsung Evolve hero who is here to keep your office moving.
Phil, a long-time engineer at Evolve, has seen it all, from the clunky analogue beasts of the 90s to today’s sleek, multi-functional devices that scan, fax and email. In this interview, Phil reflects on a career spent fine-tuning the machines we rely on – and often take for granted.
We met up with Phil in the Evolve workshop. He talks us through how the tech has evolved, why going fully paperless might not be as simple as it sounds, and what’s really behind the dreaded paper jam. (Spoiler: it’s usually a rogue staple or someone trying to scan a napkin.)
He also shares his journey from curious apprentice to seasoned expert – and why he’s passionate about mentoring the next generation of engineers.
What are the biggest changes in the technology during your career?
The biggest changes – obviously, when it changed all to digital- were probably the biggest changes because, at the beginning, it was analogue. So, every time a piece of paper came out of the machine, the machine had to scan that every single time – it was scanned individually. So if you did 800 copies, that scanned it 800 times!
When the digital age came, it scanned it once and produced it as many times as you want. So it cuts down on moving parts, cuts down on jams. Yeah, it makes things more efficient rather than the machine all working at the same time.
And everything’s networked now as well, isn’t it?
That’s right. And obviously, we don’t call them photocopiers anymore – they’re called multi-functional devices because they don’t just do photocopying. They scan, fax, and email – you can go on the internet with them. So you’ve got your web browsers and everything. You can do all that; then, all the software also bolts down. So you’ve got all the different types of document management systems, storage systems, and security systems – all of which are also bolted on.
So it’s not a copier anymore. And you can’t call it a copier. If you ever go to Konica Minolta and you call it a photocopier, you get frowned upon. It’s not a photocopier – we buried them 20 years ago! So yeah, it’s – yeah, massively – as we are called Evolve. It has evolved over the years.
How did you get into it in the first place? Why did you choose photocopiers – or did photocopiers choose you?
I studied IT when I left school. I did an IT YTS scheme. And I did a computer course including word processing, spreadsheets, databases, accounting – did all that. But my main thing is basically stripping things down, repairing them, unscrewing them, screwing them back together.
That was my passion. I did it all through when I was a little kid – everything. Anything I owned at home, I took apart and rebuilt again. And then, obviously, I used to work on cars since I was about five years old.
My Dad was a mechanic. So we took things apart – I’ve just generally been taking things apart and rebuilding them all my life. So when the job came up to be an apprentice or a trainee copier engineer, the same company that Daniel [Evolve owner] worked for – that’s where I started.
I went there as a trainee, and within a year, I had one of the biggest areas to cover. The company was bought out. I stayed, but Daniel moved on to start Evolve.
Four years later, in 2013, I was at Winckley Square doing a call, and I bumped into Daniell. He told me he was busy and asked me to give him a call. That’s what I did, and I started in November of the same year.
So what does the future look like for photocopy.. – sorry – multi-function copying devices?
Well, the next phase is hard to tell. We’ve been moving towards paper light for probably 10 or 15 years. It’s better for the environment and sustainability. There have also been changes in document management systems. With digital documents, it means you’re getting rid of piles and piles of this because it’s been scanned into a digital form. So it can be retrieved, edited, re-saved or resent.
So this is the next thing that’s changed a lot for us. But it’s important that people think about the future.
What are the most common problems you solve?
The most common problem is document jams. Document feeder jams. They’re scanning not just for photocopy; they’re scanning for archiving as well.
So, the feeder on top is doing three or four times more work than it would normally have been. These document feeders have rollers all the way down. The more you scan in, some can wear down.
Or they’re scanning old documents, which have been in archives, basements – covered in dust. Over time, paper deteriorates, loses its stability, and breaks down.
So if you’re scanning all that through your machine, all those little fibres and bits of paper stay inside the machine.
That’s what causes them to jam. So that’s the biggest problem. That is the biggest problem we have. Although our call rate is low, I think if you look at our call rate for a month, you’ll probably find 70% of them are paper jams.
If you could give one piece of advice to people who use multi-functional printing devices to have a trouble-free experience, what would that advice be?
Make sure, if you’re doing a lot of scanning and archiving, that your documents have been separated. If they’ve been stapled or paper clipped, make sure that’s been removed. And even if you’ve removed it, you need to fan it.
When you put a staple through a piece of paper, it nips the other pages together. Nobody wants to separate them, but even if you just fan it or shake it a bit to separate the pages, that’ll probably cut down 20-30% of the paper jams.
It’s not a massive amount, but anything helps these days.
Can you help colleagues with advice?
All the time. And I love it. I love giving people help. I like the job I do. That’s not just working here in the workshop. I’m on the end of the phone. Like I had a phone call this morning from Akith; he needed some advice. He sent me a quick picture. And he’d done a great job, to be fair.
It’s giving that reassurance to them out there, so then they get confident. I’ve been doing it a lot longer. And there are things they’ll know that I don’t. So we all share information. We’re all here to help each other. There’s none of this “I keep it all to myself” business.
The one thing you’ve got to understand about this job is that you’re never going to know it all. There’s always someone who knows a bit more. There’s always someone who knows a bit less. It depends on your experiences.
