• The entire process should be well-defined and planned in advance.
• Scannable content of the form should include ALL variables of interest.  People sometimes fail to include those by which reports will later be broken out.  For example, if crosscuts by state are going to be required, then a scannable state area should be on the form.
• A related comment is that your staff does not need to organize the forms into groups such as sessions, states, etc. if that variable is scannable because the computer can do the necessary sorting.  On the other hand, if a breakout variable has been inadvertantly omitted, you can organize your forms so that all forms of a group are in a sequential section, which we can mark with the proper variable after scanning.
• If the form will be accompanied by checks or other documents, give explicit instructions not to staple anything to the forms and not to cut the forms when opening envelopes containing them.
• Form marking instructions should be prominently displayed on the form.
• Let your staff know that Xerox copies of the scannable forms cannot be scanned.
• Forms should be protected at all stages, especially shipping to Infoscan.  Do not just throw them loosely in a box after a meeting, but pack them so they will travel without sloshing around.
• Attempt to minimize the number of scannable forms in order to minimize your printing and scanning costs.  For example, if you need to have an area for write-in comments, put all the scannable fields on one sheet and comment fields on another, non-scannable sheet.
• Forms should not be bent or stapled and should not have labels or sticky notes attached to them.  Also, there should be no extraneous marks placed on the forms.
• We receive some forms in an unscannable condition.  We try our best to scan them, but some are so mangled that they would damage our scanners if put through them.  In a very few cases, we have to return forms unscanned or enter the data manually.  A simple rule of thumb is that if you could put your forms through your copier, then we can scan them.  If they would hang up in your copier, then they may hang up in our scanners.  Our experience has been that most form damage results from careless packing of forms shipped to us.
• When we "program" how the scanner will interpret each question, there are sometimes several choices.  For example, people could mark more than one option of a multiple-choice question.  Sometimes, that wouldn't make sense, such as with age ranges or yes/no.  It might be logical, though, for some questions, like "What is your professional practice area?" which could include several specialties.  You need to let us know how we should interpret each question.
• If you plan to put the forms through some other process besides scanning, do it after the forms have been scanned.  That is, the process immediately after marking the forms should be scanning them.  For example, write-in comments could be collected from the forms after the scanning.  This assures that forms will go to the scanner without further handling and possible damage.

OMR FORM DEVELOPMENT GUIDELINES

• Companies which print OMR forms must have special software for this purpose.  They will normally provide a preliminary design from your draft form at no cost.  They will, of course, charge you for further iterations, printing, and shipping.
• OMR forms MUST contain several elements, including 1) a timing track along the side which defines the location of rows on the sheet, 2) "skunk" or ID marks at the leading edge of each sheet which identify the form, and 3) bubbles along each row at a specific pitch (normally 0.166in).
• OMR forms can contain only bubbles that can be marked, although the bubbles can represent many things, such as numbers, yes/no, selected or not, alphanumeric characters, and Likert scale numbers (such as 1 to 5).  Some OMR scanners can interpret specially placed barcodes.  None can interpret printed or handwritten characters.  For that, you need image-based technologies as discussed below.
• Plan your form carefully because OMR "grids" tend to take up a lot of space.  For example there has to be a bubble for every letter in the alphabet for each alphanumeric character to be entered.  (In contrast, an ICR form would only have a box in which could be written the character.)  This is one of the drawbacks of OMR forms, that they are not very efficient for collection of alphabetic information.  They are very good, however, for fields with just a few options, such as "yes" or "no", Likert scales, multiple choice questions, and even numbers.
• OMR forms MUST be printed by a company familiar with the specifications of the scanner that will be used; and, those specifications are very stringent concerning page registration, front and back registration, skewing, location of timing tracks and skunk marks, size of bubbles, and allowable colors for "pencil-read" and "ink-read" scanners.  There are a handful of printers qualified to print OMR forms.  You are putting your project at risk by using a commercial printer who doesn't actually work with OMR scanning equipment.
• There is software available to print OMR forms, but it is not recommended, even that from the scanner manufacturers.  The bubbles on these forms cannot be as densely packed and printing problems such as scaling frequently make the forms unscannable.
• If you are going to make the form into a foldable mailer (not recommended), keep the timing track and skunk marks clear of possible postage marks.
• It is good practice to test your OMR forms in advance of distributing them for marking.  We will do that a no charge.
• It is recommended to purchase OMR forms with one corner clipped to make the forms easier to align.
• OMR forms will not scan if extraneous marks are placed near the timing track or skunk mark areas.

IMAGE FORM DEVELOPMENT GUIDELINES

• Understand clearly what processing will be done after the images are scanned.  This should include specifying the data extraction method and software that will be used.  In fact, the software itself will normally be used to generate the printable forms.  With image-based OMR and ICR, you are almost guaranteed poor results if you design a form, print it, have it marked, and then attempt to interpret it without the initial design and testing.
• All printed forms should be nearly identical which normally means they should be printed at the same time on the same equipment and not in separate batches.  Printing on different copiers almost always results in enlarged or reduced images that don't match.
• Higher accuracy is attained by printing areas around bubbles and hand-written entry areas using "drop-out" colors that are invisible to the scanner.  That in turn means that a scanner type has to be specified in advance; special colors have to be used in the printing; and, like OMR, ICR forms need certain marks (determined by the processing software) that are used to align the page (deskew it) and designate data entry areas.
• Be careful about making fonts too small.  Generally, we find fonts under 10 points are not practical and lead to unacceptable error rates.
• Although true OMR forms printed by a printer knowledgeable about OMR can generally be used without preliminary testing, that is not the case with image-based forms.  They MUST be tested.
• Image-based data extraction is VERY sensitive to many factors, and the conversion accuracy will be quite low if almost extreme measures are not taken in form design and marking.  A sloppy form design, non-uniform printing, and careless marking of it can easily produce only a 50% accuracy level.  That is so bad that it would take less time to enter the data manually than trying to scan it.