Document Retention

[BrianG]

After the last flooding I got, I started thinking about ways to mitigate losses. I have a couple of those "fire-resistant" safes to hold important documents (taxes, receipts, pictures, etc). I also have been scanning those documents as PDFs and storing on external harddrives (two of them; one at work and one at home). I was wondering if these PDFs would be suitable as the only source of these documents (could reprint them if necessary) instead of keeping all this paper. It takes much less room to store them as 1's and 0's than the physical papers, but not sure if they can be legally used is lieu of the originals?

[reno911]

I do the same and have never had a problem with anyone asking for an original. The only real originals I keep are, birth cert, marriage lic, as well as ss card, titles, and a few other more important docs. Everything else gets scanned and shredded. I recommend this, http://www.iosafe.com/products-solo-overview, I have a 1tb. My dad turned me on to them, they are supposedly fire, and waterproof. He has a 2tb to back up every computer in his house.

[BrianG]

That iosafe thing is a little more than I do. I have batch files set up to automatically create dated backups of various things (one for pics, one for vids, one for docs, etc) scheduled as weekly jobs that run late at night, and then I just copy them to regular external drives when I feel like it. For things that change on a semi-daily basis (like accounting stuff), I have a batch file I manually fire off that automatically collects, compresses (with strong password), and secure FTPs to a protected directory online.

I would definitely keep hard copies of certain docs like SSN cards, birth/marriage certificates, etc. I was just curious about the use of soft-copies for things like receipts, tax docs, etc. I'm thinking about shredding older tax stuff that is just taking up room in my fire safe. Ideally, I want to combine the really important stuff from both fire safes into one so I only need to grab one thing in case of a fire or other disaster.

[reno911]

Yes copies work fine for tax prep, I do my own though and have never been audited, knock on wood. Besides as long as you never get audited you never even have to show documentation for your deductions. Only if you get your taxes done by a third party do they want a copy of your receipts, etc. To save their ass if they are audited for a prep.

I have had to go back a few years into my pay stubs and retrieve a few things for my life insurance and they accepted the copies.

I would assume that copies would work with just about everything, so as long as it is an obvious copy, not some spreadsheet you just created.

If you think about it most of that stuff is already a copy of a copy.

[nitrostarter]

I work at a CPA firm. We prefer originals but copies are acceptable as long as they are legible and not doctored.

How many years of tax documents do you have? Ideally 5-7 yrs is all that is require to be kept.

[PBO]

I imagine there's some variation in our countries laws & certification needs however most 'legal' documentation is sent & retained as PDF files in Aus

The company I work for performs work for the Commonwealth & our document retention is cataloged through PDF also. Many of these files are 15yr + in age. The accepted archive method is a robust indexing system

I'd say liberate the paper, let it be recycled, store 1's & 0's & keep the essential orginals

[JERRY2KONE]

Yes soft copies are acceptable for just about anything. Even where they say no copies if you have a lagitimate reason like you suffered a flood and all was lost, then it would be hard for them to argue the point.

My suggestion would be to purchase a few of the larger thumb drives to put your personal documents on and keep them in the portable safe for quick retreaval in an emergency. The only issue with any of this is setting up a periodic schedule for updating your back up files. Thats the problem for most people, because they set things up and then forget to do updates. Using a thumb drive keeps things simple and makes it easy to get copies whenever you need them and you can retreave them on any PC with a USB connection.

We have all of our photos on a 32gig thumb drive, and all of our personal docs on another 32gig drive. So far we have never had to retreave any info from them, but we know they are there is one of our PCs should suffer a catastrophy of some kind.

[reno911]

Blue screen of death. Gotta love PC.

I have everything set up through Time Machine / Automater on Mac. It cycles through every night and sees if certain things where added/changed, like Doc or Docx files, pdf's, downloads, etc. and puts a copy on the drive for me. I have a timer set to remind me to go through it all every two weeks. I absolutely love Time Machine, it allows me to basically go back into what I was doing and fix, see where, or what I screwed up. It takes up tons of space though, so I have the settings to low, but it still helps. I haven't completely configured it yet, but I know there is a way to get it to run on a higher setting for certain programs, like Adobe programs, or iMovie.

I guess if you run PC you have to back up for other concerns, like blue screens, viruses, stupid nonsense crashes. I am more or less protecting from catastrophic stuff, like fire, or theft. That is unless they find the iosafe, which I hope they would look at and think it is just some funny weird box and leave it.

Brian,
I think you are more than safe to keep everything electronically. The CPAs I have worked for were all moving to this and my wife's law firm just this summer scanned everything, then shredded the originals. Helped them cut cost by letting the lease expire on their second location where old files were stored. I am in VA and most everything like that even with the government is electronic...taxes, court fillings, etc....And my wife says the Federal Court requires things to be filled electronically as well.

[JERRY2KONE]

Even the County and State run agencies are all keeping things in electronic form now. If you go the courthouse in any major City or Town and ask to see official documnets they are on some kind of cyber storage system, and if you wish certified or official copies you will receive an electronically printed form that is stamped as certified or official. So I think from all of the posts here you have received your answer sir.

Like I suggested I believe your best bet is to copy all IMPORTANT docs to a thumb drive and store it in the fireproof safe. Floor safes are great for just such things, because they can be fireproof and hidden from plain sight for security reasons. You can also use one of those pocket size PASSPORT HDDs which are small enough to fit in just about any small space and for a drive the size of your wallet you can store a terrabite of info on them. I have seen these passport drives of 1t selling for about $125. Well worth it for such security.

[Overdriven]

Assuming you are concerned about more than just taxes and such for retaining reciepts. Because store reciepts are printed on photo sensitive paper that fades rather wuickly, I usually make a copy of them for big ticket items or warranty purposes. I've had a few instances where I had to use the copy and the store accepted the copy no problem. For anyone thinking about this, crumple the reciept up a little and then copy it. The crumples show up on the copy and help prove its not doctored as the crumples would make it more difficult. Most stores don't care as long the copy scans though.