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Hi all - You may find this recommendation useful. I received it back in
June from a Special Webcast "Preparing Your Company for Litigation" by
Compliance Week and Iron Mountain. The Oversight Committee that I am
working with agrees with the approach recommended.
By defining a specific hold process for each of these four categories you
help ensure all relevant records are being preserved. Ownership and
accountability can be clearly assigned.
For onsite records - (such as the current contract documents filed in an
office area) identified as potentially relevant, the hold notification
should be communicated by Legal to the business unit managers. The business
unit managers are responsible for communicating the hold to all affected
employees in their department. They are also responsible for communicating
back to Legal that the hold has been put into effect and that the department
is fully complying with the hold requirements. It is a good idea for each
business manager to include in the communication to Legal a list of the
individuals in his or her unit who are believed to have relevant records,
and the type of records. This enables those administering the Hold and
collection of records to start a checklist of where to look for records.
For offsite physical records - (such as older contract documents), if
potentially relavant, Legal should communicate the hold notification to the
appropriate records manager. The records manager is responsible for ensuring
that the required records are put on hold. If the company uses an online
record management portal such as Iron Mountain Connect, the records manager
can quickly implement these hold rules. The records manager is also
responsible for communicating back to Legal that the requested items have
been put on hold. If the records manager has developed a list of the
specific records classes placed under the Hold, he should communicate that
list to the individual managing the Hold.
For online electronic records - (such as scanned contracts and recent e-mail
contractual correspondence) if potentially relavant, should be communicated
by Legal to the IT systems administrators. The IT administrators are
responsible for suspending the deletion of electronic records from the
servers, and for notifying individual employees to suspend deletion of
information from their PCs . Both the IT administrators and the individual
employees should be required to confirm back to Legal that they have
received the notification and that they have complied. IT administrators
should identify to the Hold administrator the names of the employees who
have been asked to suspend deletion of information.
For off-line electronic records - (such as email contractual correspondence
stored on backup tapes) if potentially relavant, should be communicated by
Legal to the Data Center managers. The Data Center managers are required to
identify the specific backup tapes and to ensure these tapes are removed
from the organization's normal tape rotation process so that the tapes are
not deleted or over-written. They should also be required to confirm receipt
of the hold notification and that they have executed the hold, including, if
practicable, a list of the tapes placed on hold, or the date ranges of tapes
placed on hold.
List archives at http://lists.ufl.edu/archives/recmgmt-l.html
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