How long should I keep financial records?

I have hard copy financial records (reimbursement receipts and month-end statements) dating back over a decade and I would like to free up cabinet space. How many years worth of records should I keep?

dwpepper wrote:I have hard copy financial records (reimbursement receipts and month-end statements) dating back over a decade and I would like to free up cabinet space. How many years worth of records should I keep?

You should keep them for the retention period. For the US, that is three years plus the current year. For other countries, consult your administrative office.

See the attachment in this post.

crislapi wrote:See the attachment in this post.

Do not see that attachment. That retention policy is out of date.

In fact, there is no longer any version of that document that is official. Instead, the record retention policy is very simply stated in the wiki under Retention guidelines. That's all you need.

aebrown wrote:Do not see that attachment. That retention policy is out of date.

In fact, there is no longer any version of that document that is official. Instead, the record retention policy is very simply stated in the wiki under Retention guidelines. That's all you need.

What is the source for the wiki version of the record retention policy?

mlh78 wrote:What is the source for the wiki version of the record retention policy?

It was entered by a Church employee at the direction of the director over the record retention policy.

aebrown wrote:It was entered by a Church employee at the direction of the director over the record retention policy.

Assuming a new clerk doesn't know about the Wiki (despite MLS messages) and doesn't frequent the forum, how does he learn the 2008 Retention Policy has been superseded or is out of date? Was there a publication that sets out the record retention policy?

allenjpl wrote:Assuming a new clerk doesn't know about the Wiki (despite MLS messages) and doesn't frequent the forum, how does he learn the 2008 Retention Policy has been superseded or is out of date? Was there a publication that sets out the record retention policy?

When I heard of this change, I begged the person I was speaking with to publish the new policy in an MLS message, for precisely the reasons you noted. But all I got was a noncommittal statement that he would see if that might be possible -- I guess there are a lot of steps involved in getting such messages approved.

That was back at the end of August, so either it's taking a long time to get a message composed and approved, or it's not happening.

Any objection to someone like us editing the policy in the wiki to make it more correct?
For example, the removable media can be kept in the filing cabinet in the clerk's office. It does not have to be kept in the bishop or stake president's office. I'd clarify #2 to say 3 years plus current year in the USA. I'd remove the "Once you've reconciled December) bit from filing recommendations, and would consider rewording the "box and store all records" since technically the records should be kept in the locked filing cabinet and not stored in a box.

crislapi wrote:Any objection to someone like us editing the policy in the wiki to make it more correct?
For example, the removable media can be kept in the filing cabinet in the clerk's office. It does not have to be kept in the bishop or stake president's office. I'd clarify #2 to say 3 years plus current year in the USA. I'd remove the "Once you've reconciled December) bit from filing recommendations, and would consider rewording the "box and store all records" since technically the records should be kept in the locked filing cabinet and not stored in a box.

I'd recommend that you stay away from the Retention Guidelines section at the top; that is the actual policy that was put there by a Church employee. But the rest is simply community-contributed suggestions, and some of it is clearly out of date or inaccurate. So I say go for it -- give it a nice overhaul.

zabalex wrote:Hello,

You might want to check your records, but as of several years ago, in the US, records must be kept for 7 years. It used to be 3, but that no longer applies.

IRS will have more on that. I'm just trying to help.

Best regards,

Sasha

Thanks for trying to help, but I'm certain Church HQ has a pretty good handle on what is required and will let us know if there are any changes.

aebrown wrote:I'd recommend that you stay away from the Retention Guidelines section at the top; that is the actual policy that was put there by a Church employee. But the rest is simply community-contributed suggestions, and some of it is clearly out of date or inaccurate. So I say go for it -- give it a nice overhaul.

I think the wiki is great, but I don't think it is effective to disseminate policy changes through wiki entries lacking citations to official documents. How is an average clerk to know which portions of the wiki represent the official position of the church and which are the helpful thoughts of other clerks? In my mind, an official document always trumps the wiki. Although I have the highest confidence in your report of your conversations with church employees, I don't think that is sufficient basis for me to tell clerks in my stake to disregard the 2008 policy. Perhaps I am missing something or am otherwise off base.

mlh78 wrote:I think the wiki is great, but I don't think it is effective to disseminate policy changes through wiki entries lacking citations to official documents. How is an average clerk to know which portions of the wiki represent the official position of the church and which are the helpful thoughts of other clerks? In my mind, an official document always trumps the wiki. Although I have the highest confidence in your report of your conversations with church employees, I don't think that is sufficient basis for me to tell clerks in my stake to disregard the 2008 policy. Perhaps I am missing something or am otherwise off base.

I agree -- I also tend not to believe second-hand reports (or even if I believe them, I have a hard time acting on them with 100% confidence). That's why I argued for an MLS message.

I'll see if I can dig up any notes on exactly who it was I spoke with, and make a renewed plea for an official announcement.

mlh78 wrote: Although I have the highest confidence in your report of your conversations with church employees, I don't think that is sufficient basis for me to tell clerks in my stake to disregard the 2008 policy. Perhaps I am missing something or am otherwise off base.

I'm not sure there's a need to tell them to disregard the 2008 policy (except that you can't get a new copy from CHQ, store.lds.org, or anywhere else besides this forum that I can tell), because, unless I'm missing something, there is no conflict between the Wiki's retention guidelines and the 2008 policy. As far as financial records go, you keep all of them for the current year and the part 3 years in the US. That's the same in both the 2008 policy and the guidelines. Records of ordinations are kept for 1 year: Same in both. Is there something I'm not noticing?

allenjpl wrote:Same in both. Is there something I'm not noticing?

As far as I am aware, nothing has been disseminated through official channels since the 2008 policy. I would continue to use it, along with a lot of common sense.

There is much good in the wiki. And when the wiki cites official policy with appropriate references, it is an outstanding and viable resource, because diligent clerks can take those references to their priesthood leaders and use them.

Most priesthood leaders do not even know the wiki exists, nor have they been told to seek official information from that source. Therefore, to priesthood leaders, the wiki is not a source of official policy and information. To clerks, however, it is a wonderful resource of knowledge and help with procedural matters.

I have seen that many clerks keep records much longer then they need to mainly because it takes time to shred. I talked to our Stake President about contracting with a "shred-it" type truck to come to the church parking lot sometime in January and then announcing to every clerk in the stake that they could get rid of everything outside of the retention period at once. He decided that instead of that expense, we would just collect old records from the wards in the stake clerks office then haul them out to a members home out in the country and hold a bonfire, the records are locked up when they are in the building and transported by a stake presidency member then the fire is watched then ashes looked through to make sure everything is gone. Last year it was quite a blaze because we also destroyed old handbooks.