Record Retention Guidelines

By Donna Herman
MGD Services

Have you ever grappled with what receipts and documents should you retain and for how long? This seems like a simple question, but depending on the document, the state you live in, the state you work in and your specific business, it can be an exhaustive process. So how do you know what records to retain, how long to retain them and when they can be discarded or destroyed.

For the purger and the packrat, here is a list from NJSCPA from their website moneymattersnj.com which provides some general guidelines you can follow.

Individual Records	Retention Period
Tax returns	Six years from filing
Medical bills	Six years from payment
Form 1099s	Six years from receipt
Keogh and IRA statements	Six years from purchase
Year-end brokerage statements	Six years from receipt
Schedule K-1s from partnerships or S corporations	Six years from disposition of interest
Insurance policies	Six years from expiration
Business Records	Retention Period
General:	.
Capital stock records	Indefinite
Corporate records and minutes	Indefinite
Tax returns	Indefinite
Accountant's audit reports	Indefinite
Monthly trial balances	7 years
Cash:	.
Cash receipts and disbursements	7 years
Bank statements, cancelled checks and deposit slips	7 years
Bank reconciliations	7 years
Petty cash vouchers	7 years
Inventories:	.
Perpetual inventory records	7 years
Physical inventory records	7 years
Sales and Receivables:	.
Sales journals	7 years
Shipping tickets	7 years
Accounts receivable ledgers and trial balances	7 years
Invoices	3 years
Expired contracts	7 years
Purchases and payables:	.
Purchase journals	7 years
Bills of lading	3 years
Accounts payable ledgers and trial balances	7 years
Purchase orders	3 years
Paid bills and vouchers	7 years
Expired purchase contracts	7 years
Payroll:	.
Payroll journals	7 years
Payroll reports	7 years
Form W-4	7 years
Time cards	7 years

Industry Specific Record Retention Guidelines

Work product and specific documentation produced by various companies and government agencies carry with them their own record retention guidelines. In order to illustrate this, I have included the following guidelines supplied by the CDC as an example of industry record retention requirements. These guidelines can be found publicly at:

http://www.cdc.gov/od/foia/policies/clearance.htm#FILING

CDC Record Retention Guidelines

Scientific and technical documents should be retained in accordance with the CDC Records Control Schedule, B-321 Item 2-33, which requires that a record copy be maintained permanently.

The following grid illustrates the general retention durations and locations for Record Copy, Supporting Material and Other Material as defined by CDC Records Control Schedule, B-321 Item 2-33.

Record Type	Retention Duration	Retention Location
Record Copy	0 - 5	CDC Office
Record Copy	5 - 20	Federal Records Center (FRC)
Record Copy	20 +	National Archives Permanent Retention
Supporting Material	0 – 2 years	CDC
Supporting Material	2 – 10 years	FRC
Supporting Material	10 years	DESTROY
Other Material	Until Project Completion	Project Office
Other Material	After Project Completion	DESTROY

Band of Babes Walk Again

Revlon Walk/Run for Women

Can you believe that almost a year has gone by since that rainy weekend when a bunch of MGD Services employees, friends and family walked (sloshed is more like it) through Times Square and into Central Park? Well it’s true. On April 29, 2005 we raised money to help fund research to find a cure for woman’s cancers, by walking 3.2 miles. The weather was less than desirable for the event, but it actually turned out to be a great day!

This year’s Walk/Run for the Cure is schedule for Saturday, May 6 and I’m already hearing from some of the folks who participated last year. Once again, we will be sponsoring the “Band of Babes” team at the event. You can sign up to walk or run as a team member click on Join our Team or make a donation to the team or any team member at Our Team Page.

For the last eight years, the Revlon Run/Walk For Women has been raising critically-needed funds to support cancer treatment and research. Since its inception, the Revlon Run/Walk For Women has distributed nearly 37 million dollars dedicated to the fight against women's cancers.

Resumes that produce Interviews

By Gretchen Gunn

Resume writing is a subjective process. While the only hard and fast rule is to ALWAYS tell the truth - just ask Mike Brown or Tyrone Willingham or any number of a growing list of people who have come under scrutiny for falsifying or “padding” their credentials. Don't lie. Never lie. You will be found out. However, truthfully rewriting your resume for a specific job opportunity is a very good idea.

“To successfully highlight your experiences for a position, you need to have a clear understanding of what is required of the position.”

Certain resume formats afford more interviews than others. This is based on observations I have made throughout my career working with candidates and clients. Here's what I've discovered:

¨ When we highlighted a candidate’s experience, relevant to the job, we were almost always able to get him or her an interview.
¨ When we did not highlight a candidate’s related experience, our chances of getting that person an interview decreased dramatically.

Hiring managers are strapped for time. In most cases, an immediate need exists and they have an email in-box filled with candidate resumes. If they don't see the skills they are looking for within the first ten seconds, they move to the next resume. Therefore, the resume that gets attention is the one that tells the hiring manager that you can do their job. This should be immediately apparent in your summary. While most of your resume will be the same, you should always show your skills relevant to each position up front.

Good recruiters are also career advisors. They can help you position yourself for an opportunity. If they ask you to rewrite your resume, and you don't know what to change, ask for their help. When you are working with a consulting firm, you are part of a team. You have worked to build your career and be an expert in your field. The consulting firm has fostered a relationship with the client based on their ability to provide qualified candidates, in this case, you.

To successfully highlight your strengths for a position, you need to have a clear understanding of what the job requires. Once you know the requirements you can relate your previous work experience to the hiring manager. You are then well on your way to getting an interview.

Suggested Resume Guidelines

1. Resumes are no longer relegated to a single page.


2. Make it easier on the reader, and use a font large enough for anyone to easily read. 12 point font is a good size.


3. Start with a summary that clearly states your profession and your years of experience.


4. In the following summary sentences detail your skills that directly relate to the job description.


5. If applicable, follow the summary with a list of your technical skills.


6. The body of your resume should list your work chronologically. A chorological resume is easier for the hiring manager to read. Give specific examples of your responsibilities at each position.


7. End the resume with your education and any training.

Try these techniques the next time you submit your resume for consideration. Not only will you have a better shot at getting an interview, you will be better prepared for the actual interview. The energy spent on qualifying your experiences will help you stay focused on your specific strengths when you are actually speaking with the hiring manager.

Enterprise Content Management (ECM)

By Bob Turner

Corporate commitments that have been made through e-mails, instant messages or other uncontrolled document forms can lead to potential misunderstandings. Business owners have often envisioned managing their entire corporate structure in a way that allows decisions to be streamlined throughout departments. Enterprise Content Management (ECM) offers a solution. Within ECM, businesses can structure documents and use controls and identifiers for a wide number of tasks including security levels, documents preservation and document destruction.

“Not every ECM is the same. A full gap analysis should be performed to determine how each will fit into your current strategy before moving forward.”

ECM manages the creation and use of content and data throughout an entire corporation. Such content can include: documents, spreadsheets, diagrams, web pages, images and other data. By providing a single means to store and retrieve this data using an ECM system, it offers a powerful platform to share data and results between departments within an organization. ECM solutions not only offer streamlined communication between departments and decision makers, but can also reduce the cost of document management systems by eliminating the storage space needed for current database structures. This cost savings has been estimated by some professionals to be $30,000.00 per Tera bite.

Large vendors such as Microsoft and IBM have been creating ECM solutions based on what they believe a typical organization might need. A large part of their focus has been on establishing a central data information repository for storing and managing access to various forms of information. These companies have developed solutions using an integrated set of technologies that store and manage diverse types of data built on a unified architecture. These products can be used to:

¨ Perform document management to large-scale enterprise document repositories
¨ Perform content archival to policy-driven records management
¨ Create Web publishing to hi-fidelity Internet sites

ECM can be a positive step towards streamlining corporate communications while providing an estimated cost savings, however, every ECM solution is not the same. A full gap analysis should be performed to determine how each will fit into your current strategy before moving forward. A variety of questions need to be answered before committing to any particular solution, not every vendor product will meet all your particular needs. The equation of time, money and quality should be examined along with the company’s expectations and return on investment. The longevity and usefulness of existing systems should be considered when determining if a full or tiered ECM solution is the right fit for your organization.

Curriculum Vitae (CV)

By Mark Gunn
MGD Services

If a Software development project is for an FDA regulated industry, the application must be validated. In this article I will address the role of the Curriculum Vitae (CV) or resume, in the audit process. The importance of the CV and its role can often be overlooked. A CV of each project participant, whether employee or consultant, is required to be kept on file and be part of the validation library. More importantly all CVs must be kept up to date with a complete description of each project participant’s job responsibilities. Many people who work on FDA validated projects assume that having a CV for all project members is all that is required. While true, many forget to update them when project members change or gain responsibilities. The CV provides a trail for an auditor to follow when they are reviewing such essential details as whether the signatures they are reviewing have been made by someone who has the authority and skill required to approve and sign validated project documentation.

During an audit, an auditor will review the Project’s Organization Chart, Job Descriptions and all project participant CVs. The auditor is looking for the organization chart to list the following:

¨ A complete list of project participants and their titles
¨ Relationships between project participants and whether these are direct, indirect or dotted line relationships.

They will compare the person’s name and position on the organization chart to the job description for that position and compare those to the person’s CV. Again, they are checking to see that each person is qualified to perform the duties of their position and that their CV provides the proof of their qualifications. As you can see, consistency is critical. This is only one example of what happens when an auditor is hot on an audit trail… look forward to more examples in future articles.

A TIME investigation reveals discrepancies in the FEMA chief's official biographies

By DAREN FONDA AND RITA HEALY

Posted Thursday, Sep. 08, 2005

When President Bush nominated Michael Brown to head the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in 2003, Brown's boss at the time, Joe Allbaugh, declared, "the President couldn't have chosen a better man to help...prepare and protect the nation." But how well was he prepared for the job? Since Hurricane Katrina, the FEMA director has come under heavy criticism for his performance and scrutiny of his background. Now, an investigation by TIME has found discrepancies in his online legal profile and official bio, including a description of Brown released by the White House at the time of his nomination in 2001 to the job as deputy chief of FEMA. On Friday, Brown, who became director of FEMA in 2003, was relieved of his duties handling the Katrina response and was replaced in that role by Coast Guard Vice Adm. Thad W. Allen.

Before joining FEMA, his only previous stint in emergency management, according to his bio posted on FEMA's website, was "serving as an assistant city manager with emergency services oversight." The White House press release from 2001 stated that Brown worked for the city of Edmond, Okla., from 1975 to 1978 "overseeing the emergency services division." In fact, according to Claudia Deakins, head of public relations for the city of Edmond, Brown was an "assistant to the city manager" from 1977 to 1980, not a manager himself, and had no authority over other employees. "The assistant is more like an intern," she told TIME. "Department heads did not report to him." Brown did do a good job at his humble position, however, according to his boss. "Yes. Mike Brown worked for me. He was my administrative assistant. He was a student at Central State University," recalls former city manager Bill Dashner. "Mike used to handle a lot of details. Every now and again I'd ask him to write me a speech. He was very loyal. He was always on time. He always had on a suit and a starched white shirt."

In response, Nicol Andrews, deputy strategic director in FEMA's office of public affairs, insists that while Brown began as an intern, he became an "assistant city manager" with a distinguished record of service. "According to Mike Brown," she says, "a large portion [of the points raised by TIME] is very inaccurate."

Brown's lack of experience in emergency management isn't the only apparent bit of padding on his resume, which raises questions about how rigorously the White House vetted him before putting him in charge of FEMA. Under the "honors and awards" section of his profile at FindLaw.com — which is information on the legal website provided by lawyers or their offices—he lists "Outstanding Political Science Professor, Central State University". However, Brown "wasn't a professor here, he was only a student here," says Charles Johnson, News Bureau Director in the University Relations office at the University of Central Oklahoma (formerly named Central State University). "He may have been an adjunct instructor," says Johnson, but that title is very different from that of "professor." Carl Reherman, a former political science professor at the University through the '70s and '80s, says that Brown "was not on the faculty." As for the honor of "Outstanding Political Science Professor," Johnson says, "I spoke with the department chair yesterday and he's not aware of it." Johnson could not confirm that Brown made the Dean's list or was an "Outstanding Political Science Senior," as is stated on his online profile.

Speaking for Brown, Andrews says that Brown has never claimed to be a political science professor, in spite of what his profile in FindLaw indicates. "He was named the outstanding political science senior at Central State, and was an adjunct professor at Oklahoma City School of Law."

Under the heading of "Professional Associations and Memberships" on FindLaw, Brown states that from 1983 to the present he has been director of the Oklahoma Christian Home, a nursing home in Edmond. But an administrator with the Home told TIME that Brown is "not a person that anyone here is familiar with." She says there was a board of directors until a couple of years ago, but she couldn't find anyone who recalled him being on it. According to FEMA's Andrews, Brown said "he's never claimed to be the director of the home. He was on the board of directors, or governors of the nursing home." However, a veteran employee at the center since 1981 says Brown "was never director here, was never on the board of directors, was never executive director. He was never here in any capacity. I never heard his name mentioned here."

The FindLaw profile for Brown was amended on Thursday to remove a reference to his tenure at the International Arabian Horse Association, which has become a contested point.

Brown's FindLaw profile lists a wide range of areas of legal practice, from estate planning to family law to sports. However, one former colleague does not remember Brown's work as sterling. Stephen Jones, a prominent Oklahoma lawyer who was lead defense attorney on the Timothy McVeigh case, was Brown's boss for two-and-a-half years in the early '80s. "He did mainly transactional work, not litigation," says Jones. "There was a feeling that he was not serious and somewhat shallow." Jones says when his law firm split, Brown was one of two staffers who was let go.

— With reporting by Jeremy Caplan and Carolina A. Miranda/New York; Nathan Thornburgh/Baton Rouge; Levi Clark/Edmond; Massimo Calabresi and Mark Thompson/Washington