Legal & Compliance

Business plans and sector-specific factors, like those found in health or social care, further influence these requirements by introducing standards and expectations unique to each environment. For example, health records are subject to stricter confidentiality and retention rules due to patient privacy concerns. 

Understanding this context is fundamental because it enables records managers to identify which laws and guidelines apply to their organisation. This knowledge is the foundation for developing local procedures and ensuring compliance, whether that involves adapting retention schedules, implementing secure storage solutions, or training staff on sector-specific requirements. By considering the organisational context, records managers can proactively safeguard information and support their institution’s legal and ethical responsibilities. 

• Authenticity: Records must be proven to be what they are claimed to be. This means their origin, authorship, and context must be verifiable, ensuring that the record genuinely represents the event, transaction, or decision it purports to document. 

• Reliability: A reliable record accurately reflects the process or activity it documents. It must be created at the time of the event, or shortly thereafter, and must provide an accurate and trustworthy account of what occurred. 

• Integrity: Integrity refers to the completeness and unaltered nature of a record. Once created, a record should not be changed, and any modifications must be clearly documented, preserving the original information and preventing unauthorised alterations. 

• Immutability: Closely related to integrity, immutability means records remain unchanged through time. This property ensures records are not tampered with, maintaining their evidential value. 

• Usability: Records must be usable by those who need to access them. This includes being readable, comprehensible, and retrievable in a timely manner, as well as being presented in a format suitable for their intended purpose. 

• Compliance: Records must be managed in accordance with relevant legal, regulatory, and policy requirements. This ensures that records meet obligations for evidence, privacy, and retention. 

• Accessibility: Records must be accessible to authorised users when required. Secure and efficient retrieval processes are essential to provide timely access for audits, investigations, or operational needs. 

• Retention: Records must be retained for the appropriate length of time, as defined by statutory, regulatory, or organisational requirements, after which they may be securely disposed of. 

• Confidentiality: Records must be protected against unauthorised access. Appropriate security measures should be in place to ensure only those with legitimate rights can access sensitive information. 

• Traceability: The history of a record—including its creation, modifications, access, and transfer—should be documented, so that the record’s journey can be reconstructed if needed. 

Understanding and implementing these properties enables records managers to ensure records serve as robust evidence and audit trails, meeting local and international standards, and supporting the organisation’s needs for accountability, transparency, and compliance. 

While records managers themselves may not directly manage or enforce information rights, their role is crucial in supporting these rights. By organising, maintaining, and classifying records accurately and systematically, records managers make it possible for organisations to efficiently retrieve information when individuals exercise their rights under GDPR or FOI. This retrieval can include locating personal data for access or correction requests, or finding records  containing the information required for public disclosure under FOI. 

Records management, therefore, underpins the successful fulfilment of information rights. Effective records management ensures that information is stored securely, is easily accessible when needed, and can be released or amended in line with legal requirements. By maintaining clear, comprehensive, and well-structured records, records managers support both transparency and privacy, helping their organisation meet its obligations while respecting the rights of individuals. 

When a legal hold is initiated, it temporarily overrides the normal lifecycle of records. Records that would otherwise be scheduled for deletion or routine disposal must instead be retained, regardless of their age or standard retention period. This means that automated processes or manual procedures for destroying records are suspended for any items subject to the hold. Once the legal matter is resolved and the hold is lifted, records managers resume regular lifecycle activities, allowing records to be disposed of according to established schedules and policies. The legal hold thus acts as a safeguard, ensuring that potentially important information remains available throughout the duration of the legal proceedings. 

It ensures that records and data which could be important in resolving legal matters are not deleted or altered. For records managers, understanding legal holds is crucial, as it requires not only coordination with legal teams but also the development of clear policies and procedures. 

It is vital that organisations clearly define who has the authority to implement a legal hold. Typically, this responsibility falls to a senior member of the legal team or a designated compliance officer. By explicitly stating who is empowered to initiate a legal hold, organisations reduce confusion and ensure timely action, which is essential for meeting legal obligations and preventing accidental loss or destruction of information. 

Equally important is the process for deciding what information is subject to the legal hold. This is generally determined through close consultation between the legal team and records managers, assessing the specifics of each case to identify any records, emails, or data that might be relevant. Well-defined procedures should also address how records subject to a legal hold are communicated to relevant staff, and how the organisation documents what is covered. 

Another crucial aspect is the removal of a legal hold once the matter has concluded. Policies should make clear who is responsible for formally lifting the hold and how affected staff are notified. This helps ensure that normal records retention and disposal schedules can resume and mitigates the risk of either premature destruction or unnecessary retention of information. 

In some situations, such as internal investigations or sensitive inquiries, organisations may need to implement what are known as covert holds. These are legal holds placed without informing all affected staff, in order to preserve evidence without alerting individuals who may be involved in the investigation. Covert holds require particular care in policy and practice to ensure that relevant information is preserved while maintaining confidentiality and minimising disruption.