retention schedules
Document keeping timelines
Retention schedules are official documents that specify how long an organization must keep different types of records before disposing of them.
They serve as policy guides for records management, typically listing categories of documents alongside their required retention periods, which may be determined by legal requirements, regulatory compliance, or business needs.
The company's retention schedule requires personnel files to be kept for seven years after termination.
Organizations use retention schedules to manage storage costs, ensure legal compliance, and maintain orderly disposal of outdated records.
- shreddingCutting into thin pieces
- statuteEnacted written rule
- metadataDescriptive information about content
- preservationMaintaining something's condition
- vital recordsOfficial life event documentation
e-discovery · chain of custody · indexing · regulation · lifecycle · subpoena · digitization · disposition · access control · recordkeeping · compliance · GDPR · historical records · audit · paper trail · HIPAA · microfilm · classification
- records managementrecordkeeping, record keeping, document management, file management, document storage
- archivesnational archives, state archives, archivist, archive box, national archive
- corporate recordsannual reports, meeting minutes, contracts, financial records, board minutes
- data destructionshredding, shredder, incineration, degaussing, overwriting