Retention policies provide a structure for managing the record lifecycle, that is, from records center accession to ultimate disposition. It is common in legal environments for retention schedules to be created based on the Practice Areas of the firm. Therefore, retention schedules are applied to matters based on the designated Practice Area.
Note the following when configuring retention schedules:
Determine the Retention Start Date for a retention schedule. In some cases it isn't the Matter Close Date, but another date. For example, in a typical Trusts and Estates matter, record retention may not start until a minor becomes of age. So, an alternative Retention Start Date may need to be the trigger for this retention schedule instead of the Matter Close Date.
Retention schedules should be determined by a records management committee that includes the appropriate partners, attorneys, and records personnel. Legal analysis for each practice area should be performed by the committee, so that the responsible attorney for a matter is exempted from analyzing each matter as it becomes eligible for disposition. This avoids the possibility of applying retention in an unplanned manner, and the disposition approval process simply serves as a final check for any retention holds on a matter.
Such an application of the retention management process avoids workflow bottlenecks, and creates a systematic, repeatable, and auditable retention management process.
If specific retention events are still to be determined by the records management committee, ensure to apply retention schedules to all matters according to their Practice Area. Events can be entered and revised at a later date, as it is easier to update a retention schedule than apply it to numerous matters at a later date.
Create a retention event for all possible events in a records lifecycle, even rare events. For example, create a Return to Client event to manage files returned to the client. Create a Transferred event to manage files transferred with a departing attorney. In the unlikely event of losing records, create a Lost event to change a records status from Active to Lost.
The record type of a record can also be used to apply schedules. For example, at matter close, certain files (extra copies folders, drafts folders, and so on) may be discarded from the matter as part of a file consolidation process. If these non-record files are assigned a particular record type, and a retention schedule is created for this record type; at matter close, these files appear on destruction eligibility reports and are eligible for destruction.
During disposition processing, if a file part and its sub-items have different retention events, it's possible that the parent file part isn't processed if the sub-items can't be processed with it. For example, in archival and destruction activities, you can’t archive only some contents of a jacket. In such a situation, we recommend to archive or destroy only the top-level containers. Also, when performing an eligibility search, specifying the media type as a criteria enables you to focus on the types of object that get processed for a given retention event.
For information on configuring retention policies, refer to Manage Retention Policies.