More on Archiving Business Documents

We wrote not too long ago about archiving business documents and what needs to be considered to use self storage as an effective archiving process. We found it was the ideal solution to get boxes of paper out of the office and into an organised filing system. With a bit of thoughtful organisation and judicious use of labelling, you could make archiving more beneficial than simply dumping documents and hoping they are never needed. Retrieving a document from archives ought to be relatively straightforward, not a bad thing if you have pressing enquiries from taxmen and auditors taking up your time.

For small businesses that have been running for a while, this isn’t a bad solution as long as you have a damp-free climate controlled solution in place. However for larger businesses with a bustling body of paperwork, some which rears its ugly head more often than not, investigation into applying for an archiving service might not be a bad idea. Here the concept is a collection service for documents, sent off to a high security archiving centre for you, and you can put an order in whenever you require a particular box to be temporarily returned to you. Collections can be undertaken at regular intervals or on an ad hoc basis, it is essentially up to you and the archiving service to discuss the best arrangement.

This truly is a dream if you need to retain reams of historical information but likewise it does mean, of course, that you will need to put some planning into what goes into each archiving box, and keep a meticulous log of what documents are in what box, otherwise the process falls apart pretty quickly. On the other hand you can be assured that you are working with a company that archives documents to make their living, and ought to know what they are doing when it comes to keeping papers in good condition, organised and secure. As with all external contractors, do your fact finding about the quality of their work, speak to references they can provide, learn about their processes and risk management, and get a second opinion from colleagues that all this satisfies the requirements of your business, before putting ink to paper.

Posted in: Business