Is Electronic Recordkeeping For You?

Electronic recordkeeping saves trees, office space, and maybe time, but security and retention issues come along with it. Let’s explore them.

We all know the advantages of electronic recordkeeping. You get quick, simultaneous access in as many places as there are computers; you can search by keyword; and you have the capacity to manipulate data for viewing or printing in any way you’d like (just to name a few). However, before you make the e-leap, understand that there are clear pitfalls. For example:

Security risks. It’s not likely that you could lose a whole filing cabinet’s worth of records in one fell swoop – but it’s possible to delete millions of records instantaneously with one erroneous keystroke.

Physical risks. Storage media can be damaged through mishandling or poor storage techniques.

Durability. Even with perfect storage, most media will wear out, some in as short as three years. That means you have to consider re-recording that data onto new media.

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Obsolescence. The longer you keep records, the more likely that the system used to access and maintain the records will become obsolete. Anyone out there remember Visicalc and Wordstar?

Some organizations have tried to store their records right on the old software and hardware. But it gets harder and harder to get service for obsolete equipment. For this reason, many eventually have to transfer, or “migrate,” data to newer technology.

Cost-Saving Ideas

If you do choose e-recordkeeping, Sean Doherty, a technology editor and lawyer blogging on networkcomputing.com, offers two main ways to cut costs:

First, he says, the biggest dent you can make is to not keep everything forever.Retain only the data that’s required for operational, historical, or legal reasons.

Second, you can use different levels of storage to manage costs, says Doherty. Frequently used data, including e-mail and corporate directories, for instance, are typically maintained on magnetic disks available to all users at all times. That’s expensive storage.

Data that’s accessed less frequently—for example, old payroll information—should be migrated to more cost-effective, near-line storage technologies such as “optical jukeboxes” or tape libraries. These data are available reasonably quickly (but not instantaneously) often through an automated system.

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Once near-line data is no longer accessed or becomes obsolete, it’s typically sent to offline status and becomes available only from an archived tape backup or other format. This level of storage is even less expensive, but obviously, more cumbersome to access.

You Need a Policy and a Plan

Electronic records management can’t be accomplished in a casual way, Doherty concludes. The data must be broken down into manageable document and record components to determine its value and retention period, and organizations must institute a detailed record-retention policy.

Fortunately, software tools are available to help manage document life cycles, from creation to deletion or permanent retention, including designated time frames for keeping documents so you can comply with the legal and regulatory limits for retention periods, he explains.

General Principles for Records Retention

One entity that’s faced the e-recordkeeping challenge, the state of Kansas, has put ideas such as Doherty’s to work in creating the following general e-recordkeeping principles. They’re good guidance for any organization.

Principle 1: Maintain ongoing accessibility of records throughout their period of retention.

• Refresh physical storage media periodically to compensate for media degradation.
• Either store the supporting application software with data or convert the data to new formats as systems change.

Principle 2: Ensure the accurate and consistent application of retention schedules.

• Maintain meta-data and documentation to identify appropriate retention periods.
• Use some combination of records management applications, user-based management, and extensions to existing applications and operating systems to both associate and apply retention schedules with the appropriate records.

In the next CED, we’ll list more of the Kansas principles and introduce a must-have recordkeeping desk reference, specifically for California employers.

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