Lock Up Records Management - Risks & Challenges

Cleardata surveyed 100 UK businesses about their document management practices and uncovered that 44% of businesses are using offsite storage lock ups or self-storage facilities.

This can often be due to companies suddenly needing to move archives offsite e.g. to provide more office space for additional staff, an annual office clear-out of archived documents, or perhaps an office move.   Although lockups may appeal due to low monthly costs, organisations need to review the full risks and challenges.

Risks

• Security – Shared access means multiple staff having access to different types of confidential documents. Do you keep an audit of who’s accessing your information?

• Misfiled or lost information – If you don’t keep a record of access or retrievals you’re at risk of losing valuable data.

• Compliance – Are you meeting GDPR requirements? You may need to access information quickly to respond to a request for information. If documents are not managed efficiently it maybe difficult to respond to requests in a timely manner.

• Flood Risk – documents stored in lockups can become damp.

• Higher Costs – If you’re not managing destruction dates efficiently, you’re probably keeping records for longer than necessary which will ultimately mean higher storage costs.

Challenges

• High staff costs – How much time are your staff spending travelling per week to access and retrieve documents?

• Physical Access – Doors can be heavy for staff to contend with.

• Management – It can be difficult to access documents stored at the back of a lock up. Are your archives being managed efficiently?

Managed Archive Storage

Storing documents in a managed archive storage facility can reduce your annual costs, improve compliance and records management. Benefits and features include:-

• Reduce wasted travelling time through digital file retrieval.  Request archives via our online solution and documents will be retrieved, scanned and returned straight to your desktop.

• Manage archives online – secure portal providing a statement of your records stored offsite. Manage authorised users, retention periods, request collections, retrieval and destruction, order more archive boxes and provide regular management reports for your archives.

• Limit document access to authorised staff only for specific boxes/information

• Receive a full audit trail – any physical access/retrieval recorded by user, date and time

• Managed destruction dates enabling businesses to only keep information for the required time

• Secure destruction services available.

For further details about how Cleardata can help with managed archive storage, contact our team on 800 046 8081">0800 046 8081.