Hi Ginny:

 

I want to jump in on your discussion.  You may not remember but we met at the Region 3 Leadership Meeting in Raleigh - in 92?  That was a fun weekend...

 

I have some time today so I would like to respond to this subject.  And to begin, I'll give Amy's disclaimer:  I'm a dirty, rotten, stinkin owner of a commercial records center...

 

I've been in the business more than 20 years and I believe that the big guys had already gone to the 1.2 size designation for their box before I opened for business.  When I began, I believe the only big guys (multiple cities) were Pierce Leahy, Bekins, Brambles and a couple of others.  We chose a different way to calculate the size of the box - basically the old way of doing it. 

 

Your calculation for cubic footage is correct (lxwxh divided by 1728), however, the term "occupiable space" probably appears in the records storage contract language.  This throws out the mathematical calculation for any box.  Basically, it means that you are charged for all of the space that a box occupies on the shelf.  (Hmmmm... Is this about the time that CRC's started running ads that said, "think outside the box?  Now I know why.") Joke!

 

For the letter/legal box, 10x12x15 is the inside dimension.  The outside dimension of my letter/legal box is  10 ½ x13x16 ½.  Run the numbers and you will see that the correct cubic footage on my box is 1.30 cubic feet.  We call it a 1.0 cube box at Richards & Richards.  Most commercial records centers settle on 1.2 though so you're .1 ahead on the letter/legal box if you are charged a 1.2.  

 

Where most commercial records centers go a little wacky is when you start to measure the other boxes.  For instance, the letter transfer case has inside dimensions of 10x12x24 which equals 1.66 cubic feet.  The outside dimension of my letter transfer case is 10x13x25 ½ which is 1.91 cubic feet.  The big guys call this box a 2.4 cube box.  We call it a 2.0 cube box.    

 

The legal transfer case, one of the most hated boxes in the industry, has inside dimensions of 10x15x24 and equals 2.08 cubic feet.  The outside dimensions of our box is 10 ½ x 16 ½ x 25 ¼ and the cubic footage is 2.53.  The big guys call this a 3.6 cube box.  We call it a 2.5   

 

These three boxes make up 93% of the boxes in my records center.  Of course, there are different sized check boxes, binder boxes and many others.  Pat Cunningham is correct in that you really need to run the numbers and ask a lot of questions when negotiating your contract.  For instance, if one of the big guys was going up against me, if my rate per cubic foot was .30 and the big buy's rate was .27 per cube, they could come in and say that their rate per cubic foot was cheaper than mine (which would be correct) - yet when the invoice arrived, they would actually pay them more money to store the same box.      

 

(.30 x 1.0 = .30 per month as opposed to .27 x 1.2 = .32 per month)  

 

It works this way with every box you have - all the way down. I would suggest that you know exactly which sized boxes you store, ask the commercial records center how they calculate the cubic footage of every box and then extend the numbers so that you know precisely how and what your are being charged for every sized box you have - for storage, for delivery and of course for permanent removal.  A good question is -  "tell me exactly what you are going to charge me to... (set up, deliver, store, pull, shred, permanently remove, etc.)" Every charge involved.  No surprises.

 

I hope this helps you further Ginny.

 

Have a good, safe Independence Day.

 

Steve

 

 

R. Stephen Richards

President & CEO

Richards & Richards

Nashville, TN  

 

615-242-9600

 

www.RichardsandRichards.com

 

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From: Records Management Program [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Jones, Virginia

Sent: Wednesday, July 02, 2008 11:12 AM

To: [log in to unmask]

Subject: Cubic Feet of Standard Records Box

 

In the course of a related project, I had to calculate the cubic feet of several box sizes.  In doing the cubic foot calculation I learned thousands of years ago in school (length times width times height) I was surprised to see that a standard records box contains 1.04 cubic feet.

Yet, most records storage companies list this box as 1.2 cubic feet.

Can someone from a CRC explain how the 1.2 cubic feet is calculated?

 

 

 

Ginny Jones

(Virginia A. Jones, CRM, FAI)

Records Manager

Information Technology Division

Newport News Dept. of Public Utilities

Newport News, VA

[log in to unmask]

 


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