Cleaning out the clerks' office

So as a relatively newly called clerk, one of the things that I wanted to do is clean out the clerks' office. I started doing that the other day but ran into a few questions. I thought I would open it up here to see what other clerks / wards do.

1. I assume that there is an official retention policy for official documents and forms and such. Can anybody point me to where that is?

2. What do you guys do about all the other "stuff". Old manuals, pamphlets, general old stuff from past years that might be useful as part of a ward history, etc. Just curious as to how other people do it.

3. Any other organization tips and tricks you'd like to share?

thanks,
dan.

From MLS's Help screen:

"Keep records for the length of time required by national and local laws for financial records. The area office can tell you what this length of time is."

(In the U.S. that's the current year plus three years. So come Jan 1 you can shred 2005.)

"Do not discard or destroy records that may have historical value. Contact the Church’s Family and Church History Department about such records, and they will decide the disposition of them. Destroy other records that are no longer needed in such a way that they cannot be reconstructed."

So there's no set guideline for old Membership information. Things will come up where older information will be useful. I'd keep between a year's worth to 3 year's worth to start with. Most of the questions have to do with move in/outs so you can probably thin the information down.

As for manuals and pamphlets - at one time the PH/RS manuals were to be on a 4/5 year plan, but that seems to have changed. Many wards just set up a table with a "free" sign.

RussellHltn wrote:As for manuals and pamphlets - at one time the PH/RS manuals were to be on a 4/5 year plan, but that seems to have changed. Many wards just set up a table with a "free" sign.

Some manuals and materials should be destroyed. I'm specifically thinking of old forms like Bishop's Orders. I'm also thinking about old handbooks,

I don't think a discard/destroy guideline has been given for some of these materials. But, if someone could rummage through the trash and use a recovered item to commit fraud or to hurt a member of the church, then that item should be destroyed (i.e., shredded or incinerated).

Thanks,
Dennis

Attached are the ward and stake retention policies - there is some information listed about membership. Hopefully these will assist in your clean-up.

13thfloorrocks wrote:Attached are the ward and stake retention policies - there is some information listed about membership. Hopefully these will assist in your clean-up.

Thank you for posting these -- they are very helpful!

I would note that these documents, while they seem to be the latest official versions, are out of date in regard to the confidential reports and applications in the last section. These reports are now generated in MLS, not requested from the Office of the First Presidency or Distribution Services.

I would also note that these documents are for the United States. The financial retention period is 3 years plus the current year in the US, but it is 5 years in Canada, 7 years in Australia, and who knows how long in other countries.

By the way, where exactly are stake clerks supposed to find these very useful documents? I believe these documents are shipped with curriculum orders to wards (at least that is what this post says), but our stake doesn't place a curriculum order, so we have never received these documents. I logged into the Units section of ldscatalog.com, and I can't find them there.

13thfloorrocks wrote:Attached are the ward and stake retention policies - there is some information listed about membership. Hopefully these will assist in your clean-up.

Can't the Church re-publish these wonderful resource for 2009 (with a version for international units)???

We have a new stake clerk at our stake and it will help us so much... Thanks for this post!

Alan_Brown wrote:By the way, where exactly are stake clerks supposed to find these very useful documents? I believe these documents are shipped with curriculum orders to wards (at least that is what this post says), but our stake doesn't place a curriculum order, so we have never received these documents. I logged into the Units section of ldscatalog.com, and I can't find them there.

They used to be online (ldscatalog.com), but I have not been able to find an updated version for 2 years. It would be nice to have updated ones, that also tells you what to do with MLS printouts.

Alan_Brown wrote:By the way, where exactly are stake clerks supposed to find these very useful documents?

I think they should be placed in the "Policy and Letter" section of Clerk and Technology Support of lds.org.

For the time traveler, there is now a wiki page on the matter:
http://tech.lds.org/wiki/Record_retention