Many modern companies find themselves buried in mounds of records. Even a small start-up organization with a dozen employees can quickly become overwhelmed with piles of paperwork. It is easy to let this problem build until it reaches a critical state and then make a hasty decision about the records. Poor decision-making can threaten compliance with both legal and business requirements. As such, it’s best practice to create and implement a document retention plan.

In an age where more and more companies are creating and storing their documents electronically, document retention has become more important than ever. More than 99 percent of all company documents are created and stored electronically. Each day there are 60 billion emails alone that are created and sent. It’s much easier to store electronic data than physical data, but that doesn’t mean that you should hold on to it forever.

Each year a legal firm builds up hundreds upon hundreds of files pertaining to their clients. You want to do right by your clients and keep appropriate documentation on hand. However, you also don’t want to get buried under mounds of old paperwork. The following guidelines will help you determine what to keep, how long to keep it, and how to dispose of it properly.

Medical offices have hundreds and hundreds of patient records. Even in a digital age where more records are stored online each year, the storage needs can get out of hand very quickly. What do you do with all of this paperwork? How do you know when it’s okay to get rid of old documents? Medical practices are careful to keep detailed patient records and don’t want to get in trouble by getting rid of them sooner than they should.