Document retention requirements for company that is closing
Good afternoon, the company I am working for is closing for good May 7, 2021. The owner is planning to destroy all documentation except for employee related records. The production and quality related records will be gone. What liability will I have as the QA Manager if these documents are destroyed and not maintained until at minimum the product shelf life is expired? Thank you!
Who as an entity is maintaining the documents? Where will they be stored?
I would under the FSMA for instances where criminal charges against the company officiers past/present , owners, etc. would be filed.
The owner and you have exposure.
So, if your owner insists on doing this - you go to an attorney and inquire if it would be a good idea to file a lawsuit against the owner for destruction of documents that could cause you loss in days and monetary loss, you will need to put a $$$ on the lawsuit.
The lawyer will then inform the owner that a lawsuit will be filed against them and information may be made public if documentation is burned, shredded, etc.
No, I am not an attorney, but I talked with an attorney about this one day and he gave me the routing on it, I told two QA Managers about it and they did the run-up with their respective owners.
Both stopped the destruction for a period of 3 years each.
Who as an entity is maintaining the documents? Where will they be stored?
He is storing all of the HR/employee information at his home. I was informed by the office manager he wants us to destroy everything else because he doesn't believe he needs it.
He is storing all of the HR/employee information at his home. I was informed by the office manager he wants us to destroy everything else because he doesn't believe he needs it.
Can somebody dig up the FDA regulation on document retention? If he simply doesn't believe he needs it then a review of the ol' FDA legalese should help.
Maybe you can pack it all up in some pretty boxes for him and shoot an email about his plan for retaining the documents.
Typically required to keep records for 2 years minimum. In some cases, I believe process authority like acidified foods, canning, etc. it is 3 year minimum. Organic is 5 year minimum.
FDA Record Retention: https://www.accessda....cfm?fr=117.315
FDA Process Authority Record Retention: https://www.accessda...ied in part 114
Organic Record Retention: https://eorganic.org/node/744
If I were him I would pay someone to scan them all in if I didn't want to keep the hard copies. I'm sure it would be cheaper than paying for storage.
Another reason to keep all the documents for the prescribed amount of time:
https://www.foodsafe...od Safety News)
First recall was in 2015..............if that isn't reason enough to keep documents, i don't know what is
Just because the business is closing doesn't mean he cannot be sued personally
Thank you everyone. He has agreed to keep our QA records for two years. I am boxing it all up and will take a picture of what is written on the boxes so I have proof it was sent with him. Obviously I have no way of knowing that he will keep them for the required time frame or not.