HR Record Retention: Document Management and Destruction Schedules

Human resources departments manage extensive repositories of sensitive employee documentation subject to complex retention requirements spanning federal regulations, state statutes, industry-specific mandates, and litigation considerations. Failure to maintain required records exposes organizations to regulatory penalties, evidentiary sanctions, and liability risks, while over-retention creates unnecessary storage costs, privacy vulnerabilities, and discovery burdens during legal proceedings.

Effective record retention programs balance competing objectives: preserving documents long enough to satisfy legal obligations and organizational needs while destroying records systematically once retention periods expire to minimize risk exposure and operational costs. Organizations lacking formalized retention schedules face average compliance violations costing $125,000-$450,000 in regulatory penalties, plus discovery sanctions averaging $280,000 in employment litigation when critical documents are missing or improperly destroyed.