The Corporate Records Retention Schedule

THE CORPORATE RECORDS RETENTION SCHEDULE

INTRODUCTION

What is it?

In this context, a record is any information created, received and maintained as evidence by the local authority to document its activities and decisions.

What constitutes a record is independent of its format: records can be either paper, electronic or any other format which allows them to be shared.

The Retention Schedule prescribes the period for which different types of records should be retained by the authority. It indicates whether the records should be either reviewed or destroyed at the end of the retention period, and in certain cases prescribes where records should be retained indefinitely by the service area or passed to Archives.

This document forms an important part of the Council’s strategy for maintaining control over its records and information. It creates a consistent and clear approach across the local authority to records retention and destruction.

Why do we need a Retention Schedule?

Storage space costs money

This is an obvious point to make when faced with a row of filing cabinets or a records storage area in an office. Less obvious is the fact that an electronic record also takes up space on a server somewhere out of sight.

We need to comply with UK legislation on records retention and Internal Audit requirements

The Schedule draws upon legislative requirements and recommendations for best practice in all local authorities with regard to records retention.

You will frequently see in the ‘Rationale’ field in the database the abbreviation ‘RGLA’: this refers to a document entitled Retention Guidelines for Local Authorities drawn up by the Records Management Society of Great Britain. In this document, records managers from across the UK have agreed common retention periods and, where a guideline exists, it has been incorporated into the Corporate Retention Schedule with an RGLA section reference number. The most up-to-date version is not published, but the 2002 edition which was published can be viewed from here.

Where no such external guidelines exist, a manager or records and information officer within the authority has decided a retention period, generally based on existing practice or Internal Audit recommendation. These entries are marked ‘CCS policy’ in the Rationale column to show they are internally derived.

It provides you with the necessary authority for the destruction of records and helps you answer FOI and DP enquiries

The Retention Schedule ensures that records are neither destroyed prematurely when they are still needed nor retained long beyond their destruction date because of uncertainty about how long they should be kept. Should an FOI or DP query require a reason why records have been destroyed, the Retention Schedule can be used as justification.

How was it created?

The Retention Schedule has been drawn together by the Records Management Service in co-ordination with officers based in each service unit and in some cases in each service area within the unit.

It was created with the directorate, service unit and service area (or section) as the principal means of arrangement so that you can navigate through it to find your own service unit. Please note that, while you can run and save a report for your service unit, currently you cannot run a report for your service area. This functionality will be added in the near future.

For minor changes, if you wish to add, query or change any entry or group of entries, please contact either the author of the document Kim Collis or the Records Management Service, preferably by email ( or ).

What is not covered by the Retention Schedule?

The Retention Schedule covers classes of records created in the course of the Authority’s business which are to be kept for financial, operational and legal reasons. There are however two types of record in particular that are not covered by this document.

Ephemeral information

A large part of the information gathered and created by the authority in the course of its business is ephemeral, information not designed to be stored but to be absorbed and further disseminated to the relevant people, whether they be employees or public. Once this type of material has served its purpose, it can be destroyed.

Unstructured records

While some sections in the authority generate records of a particular type which are easily assigned a destruction date, others deal in more unstructured records and information. Most service areas will hold structured and unstructured records. For example, while within Economic Regeneration and Planning there is a set of records relating to building control to which it is relatively easy to assign a retention period (i.e. planning applications), the type of project files created and kept by Economic Regeneration are unique and may require individual review with possible transfer to Archives (e.g. the Boulevard scheme).

On what basis are retention periods allocated?

The table below gives some of the issues taken into consideration when judging how long to keep records:

Operational requirements / Are the records still needed to carry out the work of the Service unit or has their operational purpose come to an end?
Legal or regulatory requirements / Are there legal reasons for retaining the records?
Are there any standards or codes of practice issued by professional bodies that specify retention periods?
Accountability and transparency / Are the records required to support accountability and transparency? Do they preserve an audit trail that is still required?
Long-term reference or evidential value / Some documents may have outlived their original administrative purpose, but still have long-term evidential or historical value.
Do they create a precedent or describe how to deal with a particular situation that is likely to occur again?
Data Protection Act 1998 / The fifth principle of the Data Protection Act states 'personal data processed for any purpose or purposes shall not be kept for longer than is necessary'. Do the records contain personal data and have they served the purpose for which they were created?
Duplication / Are these records the definitive versions/originals or simply copies of information held by another service area or unit?
Relationship with other records / Are the records needed in order to understand or use other records? If so, the retention periods of all sets of related records should tally.
Risk / What would the consequences be if these records were to be discarded? Would there be any legal, financial or political implications?

How do I destroy my records?

When you destroy either paper or electronic records, you should keep a log of what is being destroyed which includes both what records you destroyed and the date of destruction.

With the destruction of electronic records, ideally your records system should already be set up to deal with the routine destruction of records. If it isn’t, contact your ICT business officer for advice about this.

With the destruction of paper records, there are facilities for paper recycling in all civic offices. With records containing personal information or which are otherwise sensitive, there are facilities for confidential waste destruction at Civic Centre. You should retain the certificate of destruction if you are arranging for the destruction of confidential waste from your premises as part of the audit trail.

If records are to be destroyed, back-up copies stored on alternative media (e.g. digitised copies of paper records) should also be destroyed, not kept as a ‘just in case’ alternative source.

If your records are marked down as ‘offer to archives’, the Archive Service can be contacted by email () or by phone on 01792 636760/6801 (6760/6801 internal).

FAQs

Here are the answers to some frequently asked questions about records found in all service areas across the authority:

Financial records: all financial records (financial transactions, from purchases to invoices, P-card receipts to petty cash) should be retained in case they are required for audit. The rule here is CURRENT FINANCIAL YEAR PLUS SIX YEARS THEN DESTROY.

Here is an example of how to calculate this

Current financial year / 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6
2013/14 / 2012/13 / 2011/12 / 2010/11 / 2009/10 / 2008/9 / 2007/8

So in this calculation, records for financial year 2006/7 and before can be destroyed.

Records relating to staff: most sections will store records relating to their staff in addition to those kept by HR. Here are HR’s guidelines on destruction periods for the most commonly held records:

• Absence monitoring records (Return to Work interviews etc) 2 years
• Accident reporting3 years
• Appraisals of performance7 years after staff’s termination of employment
• Disciplinary warnings 6 months for copies of oral warnings

(excluding issues of conduct towards children 12 months for copies of first written warnings

and vulnerable people) 18 months for copies of final warnings

Where an investigation proves an allegation is completely unfounded, destroy records immediately

• Equality and diversity investigations5 years
• Equipment monitoring6 years after equipment is decommissioned
• Job descriptions2 years after they are superseded

• Leave records (including applications for special leave etc)2 years
• Recruitment (documents relating to the recruitment process)6 months after recruitment finalised
• Trades Union liaison (routine records)2 years

• Training records for staff7 years after staff’s termination of employment
• Training course files2 years

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