I'm not aware of anything specific, but typically I have always applied the
current retention schedule to legacy records that wander in. The records
exist in the present and are in the custody of your company, so the current
retention schedule should apply. You do want to be very careful about legal
and tax holds. I would hope that records from 20 years ago can be
dispositioned, but you never know. One area that can be flaky are corporate
minutes and some of the other "retain for the life of the corporation"
records. You may need to get a legal opinion there. In financial services,
the only other long term records that can be problematic are certain loan /
promissory notes that sometimes need to be returned to the borrower upon
payment in full in certain jurisdictions. I'd hope that those were put into
active records along the way, but if you see activity involving these
records, you should make sure you chat with the folks requesting records.

For other organizations, watch out for things like patents and trademarks
and be aware of environmental and safety documentation (all of which should
have lengthy retention periods). Real estate and facilities files are also
things that you need to keep an eye out for, particularly if you have real
estate that belonged to the defunct organization. Hanging on to blueprints
is a lot cheaper than redrawing them.

Lastly, put on an archivist's hat and look for things that might be of
historical value. Years ago, I was rummaging through a collection of legacy
unidentified boxes and came across a box relating to a failed venture in
Japan. Interestingly, the box had a post-mortem on the failure, which
proved to be useful at the time because the company was thinking about
moving back in to that market. Was complete serendipity, but was good for
an "attaboy", if nothing else.

Patrick Cunningham, CISM, FAI

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