Chapter 2: Official Record Responsibility
Anchor: #i1008538Section 1: Managing Electronic Records
Anchor: #i1008549Official Record
“Official Record” means any written, photographic, machine-readable, or other recorded information created or received by or on behalf of a state agency or an elected state official that documents activities in the conduct of the state business or use of public resources. The official record must be retained to fulfill legal, operational, and statutory retention requirements as it is the official record.
Anchor: #i1008564Characteristics of an Official Record
An official record or file is a complete, true, unaltered and accurate record when it is the original file.
Official records:
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- May or may not bear an original signature. Anchor: #BJFIAXEB
- Originates or is retained at one or more Office(s) of Primary Responsibility for the operation or function of the record. Anchor: #SJMJGSBF
- Was originally a convenience, information, or other non-record to which significant annotations or added signatures have been made. Anchor: #MXGANQFF
- Was originally a convenience or information copy but has been retained past the destruction of the original record becoming by default the record. Anchor: #RMLCYDCS
- When in doubt about the status of a record, it is safest to handle it as an official record.
Convenience Copies or Non-Records
Convenience copies or non-records are exact duplicates of a record. They are not subject to retention requirements and may be destroyed without formality of a 1420 Records Destruction Form when they are no longer needed.
CAUTION: Copies or non-records retained beyond the retention period become the official record by default and remain subject to legal and open records requests.
Anchor: #i1008637Transitory Information
Records of temporary usefulness that are not an integral part of a records series of an agency and are not essential to the fulfillment of statutory obligations or to the documentation of agency functions. Some examples of transitory information, which can be in any media (instant messaging, voice mail, fax, email, hard copy, etc.) are routine messages; telephone message notifications; internal meeting notices; routing slips; incoming letters or memoranda of transmittal that add nothing of substance to enclosures; and similar routine information used for communication, but not for the documentation, of a specific agency transaction.
Anchor: #i1008652Electronic Official Records and the Official Record Concept
Official records may be created and maintained electronically without ever being produced in hard copy. It is important to determine the final content of the official electronic record and to institute procedures to dispose of working copies, drafts, and duplicates when the final record is complete. Because of the ease with which electronic records can be copied and shared, the presence of copies represents a vulnerability to the organization.
The use of an Enterprise Content Management (ECM) system addresses the following:
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- Records retention. Anchor: #RHMUTGPN
- Document sharing. Anchor: #KPWOPUDO
- Version control. Anchor: #BPTIKJRF
- Access management and security. Anchor: #OGDEAIRW
- Reduces storage space, equipment, and associated costs. Anchor: #YGLCRQEP
- Enforces the use of metadata to improve the ease of searchability.
When implementing and developing an Enterprise Content Management system, it is critical to determine and coordinate the official record responsibility.
NOTE: Chapter 4, File Management, and Chapter 5, Electronic Records offers procedures that support management electronic records.