What needs improvement with WorkFusion?

For non-technical users, it may be easy to use. It depends on what perspective we're talking about. From a business perspective, like manual tasks, it's good. However, it's all about what the developer builds. That said, if we're talking from a developer perspective, the task of actually building automation is not ideal. That's not their strong side. They are getting better. They've put some focus on it lately; however, we don't actually use that functionality, so it doesn't affect us to a huge degree. We have Java developers doing the development. The manual tasks and user interface need improvement. It needs ongoing work, and they have been improving it lately. There just needs to be more focus on it. We'd like to be able to build more application-like dashboards and GUIs that could enhance the user experience. With incoming new technology, such as LLMs and ChatGPT, needs better integration and a more seamless experience for the developer and business user.

I would like WorkFusion to improve the automation rate when evaluating unstructured text.

Machine learning models for document-heavy processes have room for improvement because they require significant effort to train and update. WorkFusion can be easy to use for non-technical people. It has two modules: a workspace for analysts to use on a daily basis, and an analytics module for tracking throughput, recall, precision, and other model metrics. The workspace is very easy to use, similar to any other case management tool. The analytics module, on the other hand, can be confusing at times and could benefit from some improvements. The biggest challenge I've had with WorkFusion is employee turnover. On both of my projects with them, the primary developer, the PMO, and some of the product SMEs have all turned over. There's been a lot of turnover in their organization over the past two years.

AI/ML is quite useful because it's built-in and helps us to predict our data. The AI is good, but it requires that the data be correct. Sometimes, it's quite challenging for us to provide good quality data for the AI-based bots to analyze and predict better. Because the data is coming from offline, paper-based invoices and sometimes from Excel, data accuracy is the main challenge. That's why the performance is impacted. One vendor has one format and another vendor has another format. Sometimes, WorkFusion has lacked the functionality for extracting the right information from the invoices and we have had to manually correct the format. Also, the overall system reports need improvement. There are some group reports that are required. Sometimes, the data extraction and the data recognition are quite slow. For example, when there is a large invoice or document that contains a lot of columns and rows, it is difficult for WorkFusion to identify all the records. In a document with 10 rows and 20 columns, what happens sometimes is that WorkFusion will process 15 columns instead of the 20 and we have to manually identify which five columns were left out, and that is a very tedious task.

For me, where it can be improved is the speed. I built two bots, one with WorkFusion and the same thing with Python. My feeling was that the speed at which Python did things, how fast it did them, was quite cool. It was faster. Sometimes, when WorkFusion is running, the way it triggers on its own, it takes time before it even launches the page. But once it launches the page, it moves. WorkFusion could improve how the tool itself triggers some of these bots on its own. I feel that it's slightly slow. They are all fast but the other one was a bit better than it was in WorkFusion. They are doing better when compared to the old versions they used to have. When I started, the tool was way worse. The more recent one I'm using is notably better in terms of its speed.

I've not worked with the OCR feature, but from what I hear, its accuracy is not that high. It depends on the type of documents you're processing, because if they are handwritten documents, it's very difficult to do optical character recognition. Maybe it is a matter of using the AI/ML features of the WorkFusion platform, which we haven't explored. But document processing with respect to OCR can be made better. Also, WorkFusion comes packed with certain libraries and .jars. At times, you understand that you're using a system in which a library or .jar is outdated and you need to upgrade it. At that moment there is a problem because the WorkFusion guys say that you cannot tinker with their basic product, despite the fact that we have encountered an issue with an existing library or .jar being either outdated or having some serious issues. And because of that, we are failing. They need to better manage quickly making changes in WorkFusion to accommodate a situation where other technologies are not supporting the platform. For example, WorkFusion uses a protocol for a file transfer protocol server. Now, some other systems we are using WorkFusion with have migrated to a higher protocol. WorkFusion doesn't support that higher protocol and the other technology doesn't support the lower protocol. We are in a Catch-22 situation. But if we were to go to WorkFusion, they would say we won't allow you to change our product. They can do better in managing changes customers need to make because of certain situations.

It is difficult for non-technical users to use WorkFusion. If we really want to build automation, we definitely need Java developers. Their RPA is not for non-technical people. If I look at competing products, like Automation Anywhere, UiPath, Blue Prism, or even Power Automate, a non-technical person can build basic automations and deploy them. Since non-technical people can easily build basic automations, they can be deployed in no time. With WorkFusion, there isn't a similar feature that works well. One needs to write code from scratch to build automation. That is definitely a deterrent if we really want to do quick, dirty automation. I would not rate WorkFusion very high on their no-code, low-code paradigm. In this area, I would definitely expect them to improve. From an AI engine perspective, they are currently focused on document processing. They should provide the capabilities to integrate ML models. which are just outside document processing. In the world of machine learning, there are several such models available. They should give that capability or provide those capabilities within the platform. That would go a long way.

Where I think there is room for improvement is in the areas where I have suggested enhancements. There is enhanced functionality I would like to see, things that would further enhance the user experience, deliver greater efficiencies, and further mitigate risk.

We only have our engineering team writing code and developing business processes since it is very technical. In terms of data extraction and training the ML models, we deployed that to our accounts payable department, which has fewer technical users than our engineering team. After a handful of training sessions, they were able to get in there and use it with decent accuracy. It could be better, but it is definitely better than nothing. One of the big upgrades that I know is happening in version 10 is an improvement to their tagging interface. That is definitely something that I am excited about to sort of reinvigorate our more non-technical users in information extraction from our documents. There could be better version control through their web platform. That is something that could be improved on. Integration from the IDE, e.g., from WorkFusion Studio directly into Control Tower, would be nice to have too.

Non-code and further ML capabilities would be usefull.

The most common issue we have is with the OCR, but that also depends on the quality of the documents your scanning. Still, I would say the OCR is comparable to other solutions. I wouldn't say it's better or worse than other OCR engines. WorkFusion entered the market early, and we see some newer providers that run on different technology in the background, so I'm not sure if WorkFusion's platform is always the most advanced. At the same time, I'm confident that WorkFusion is also working on releasing a new generation platform when they see fit. WorkFusion is constantly developing. However, we've had use cases where we decided not to employ WorkFusion because it lacked capabilities that were important for the business processes in our company. We discussed this with WorkFusion, and they were open about these functions not being one of their primary capabilities. In these cases, we chose another provider. WorkFusion is willing to listen to new requirements and look for solutions. They're also forthright enough to say when a specific capability may not be the best fit, and they're able to admit that. This is also something I appreciate because other providers claim to do everything, but when we do the POC, we find out the solution falls short of our expectations. It's very possible that WorkFusion can address the internal RPA tool issues. But in terms of RPA, it depends. If you identify the need for an external solution, then you can do an RFI with WorkFusion. WorkFusion will give you a truthful reply to your requirements about whether they can help you out or not. We have RPA internally, and we do most of it internally. When we don't need WorkFusion, we prefer to do things in-house. We can solve most of the processes we have with our internal capabilities.

This is a Java-based application that takes up a lot of space and when it runs, consumes a lot of memory. This affects the reliability because it gets to a point where it hangs. There are some basic features missing in the Excel activities. For example, you cannot delete a row or a column, which are some of the things that I would like to be able to do. An example of something that is difficult to do is get yesterday's date. There is a lot of scripting that has to be done. It's not direct because you can't simply use a date variable and then subtract one day. Instead, you have to do some coding to get it. That was a problem for our deployment because reconciliations are done for the previous day, and when you're naming files with yesterday's date or creating folders according to date, you have to do a lot of manipulation in the code.

One thing we didn't like was their OCR solution. We felt it's somewhat inefficient. And on the cloud setup, I would like to see more OCR-related features because other solutions integrate various tools into their services. For example, a few RPA solution providers have dynamic services for Workfront and some other services. They can dynamically pick services from NLP or various other areas on a case-to-case basis. So depending on the scenario, the product itself will pick those services to create consistent efficiency. It's similar to the service AWS or Azure uses. All these individual services are efficient in specific scenarios, so these bot platforms can identify which one to use and dynamically switch among them. It has produced exceptional results. So that is one recommendation I would make to WorkFusion. This one feature could significantly simplify things. However, it might be already available on CloudFront. I'm not sure.

The solution is not user-friendly, this is something they should improve.

We have had some problems in the past with the Inspector tool that looks at the elements on the screen. Replacing it or improving it is needed.

Throughput monitoring and database bottlenecks are areas that we are working on that need some improvement.

The user experience could be better both from an RPA perspective and from a business perspective. When we compared it to the other RPA platforms, we could not give it as high a mark for user experience. Not everybody can just start using it.

Obviously, the WorkFusion Enterprise product is very technical. You have got to be Java proficient and otherwise technically oriented. I guess what could be an improvement in the product is moving towards more "codeless" coding. That would be using things like a drag-and-drop interface to build solutions with premade components. These components would have set functions to simplify using the coding portion of the product for the business user. Instead of keeping the product in use with only the more technically inclined users, they might create a way for the business user to assemble what they need and enhance development opportunities. I think a move towards that sort of codeless coding would be a great step in creating more utility for more end users. Maybe API calls or other creative components could be worked in. The express version does not do API calls and the Enterprise version does not do codeless coding. It would be nice to have a solution somewhere in the middle. WorkFusion has got the very easy, light version covered and the very technical, heavy one covered. There seems to me to be a gray area or gap in the middle where a whole set of potential users is not addressed.

The product needs to be "simple and easy" to use. A good example of this is the use of Python code to perform automations. It is free and the skills transfer is able to happen quickly and the operation and initiation of the completed automation are easy to execute. The primary focus of the Robotics Process Automation software should be to enable business users to perform "codeless" automations that will still fall within the strict governance and compliance structures within which we are required to operate.

When it comes to the artificial intelligence part, WorkFusion is demanding in terms of having extra skills. You need to be a bit of an expert. If you look at Automation Anywhere, IQ Bot is a business-friendly tool. To develop applications in WorkFusion, it's much more time consuming, and much more expensive in terms of the additional skills and resources that are needed. WorkFusion is time-consuming in terms of development. Especially when compared to UiPath and Automation Anywhere. The inspector elements have a separate window, and that's something that takes extra time, in terms of developing WorkFusion. The installation and the software required for WorkFusion is really massive. You need a professional IT administrator to actually do all the installations. That makes it very expensive, to get the infrastructure up and running. It involves Tableau, and other items. There are many third parties you will need to bring up the ecosystem,which further adds to the expense. They should have a simplistic infrastructure. They are built for huge enterprise-scale companies of 1,000 or 10,000 or more. You don't see that kind of RPA implementation very often. They should have a simplistic version of implementation for smaller enterprises without all of that extra software. It would be great if they offered both a very basic installation, plus their already existing enterprise edition. They should work on stripping down the amount of software and the amount of hardware required. The technical support can be improved.

One of the issues that we are facing here in China, is that we cannot access the material for training because it is on YouTube. In China, we do not have access to YouTube. Some websites are blocked by China. It is difficult to access, which is one of the biggest concerns. In the next release, I would like to see more documentation and videos available and accessible in China and Regional.

UiPath and Blue Prism have certain features that I'd like WorkFusion to implement in which we can see a connection to the email. I'd like for WorkFusion to provide that type of input or provide that information to a restricted email and to extract the email and do the processing. This kind of feature would make it more efficient. I would also like for it to be NLP-based. The OCR capability should also be improved. In the next release, I would like to see NLP processing, OCR capabilities, and for them to make the email connections quicker. We don't like to write in a lot of scripts. You should be able to write a little script and then it will connect to it. Those kinds of features are easy to implement but should be there in the system.

Areas for improvement are totally dependent on each company and how they are going to use it. It's completely dependent on their operations, so I cannot comment on what needs to be improved. However, it could be much more process-oriented - that could be upgraded. And they could give me a little bit more flexibility to make the modifications I need. There are elements in the access control circuits that could be recyclable. There are features we are looking at where we'll be putting our FPS spreadsheets where we want them.

Everything has room for improvement, and the product continues to evolve. One area of improvement would be the ability to run headless on their Express product. This would allow one to run the automation on their local machine, but still be able to work in other applications using mouse and keyboard while the automation runs headless in a minimized window in the background. A single-server version of the product that will work for a mid-range mid-size company would also be good to see. Finally, working in partnership with software companies like SAP to improve their interface interactions would be a good advantage.

For my customers, I don't see much to improve. The problem with the solution is that it is agnostic, so it's not made for banks. Sometimes we are challenged because of this. We have to make everything from scratch to make it work for our clients.

A better graphical user interface that allows business users to perform automation would make this solution number one in the market. I would like to see improvements made with regard to tagging documents in the machine learning stage. They have an overlay document, which is great, but it would be helpful to be able to re-tag a document in a superior way.

It should integrate with more ERP solutions like SAP. It doesn't currently have that ability. In the next release, I would like the ability to create dynamic selectors on web pages and web controls.