Documents form the basis for identifying and recording transactions. These include agreements, statements, legal notices and invoices. A coherent and consistent system to file and retrieve these documents needs to be maintained.
Best practices which ensure a sound document storage, management and retrieval process are:
- Record file of master storage is created. Access to it is granted to personnel as deemed necessary
- Important files are digitized with a standard file naming convention that includes the date of the statement or document
- All digitally and physically stored files have an auditable access log
- Acknowledgement is taken from respective users on email, after assigning or recollecting the respective files
- Administrator gets the respective files back and re-files them properly
- Whenever any files are added or scrapped, unique file numbers are assigned
- System is audited periodically to ensure that it is in proper order.
The following diagram depicts best practices for compliance-related documentation:
