How To: Protect Your Paper Documents

By Morgan O'Mara | December 28, 2015 | 6 minutes

• Paper Shredding

It’s easy to overlook the importance of safeguarding your paper documents when you’ve already made them digital or simply have just forgotten about them. Yet, many of use still possess crucial paper records, such as birth certificates, passports, financial statements, irreplaceable family mementos, employee files, contracts, and more. These tangible pieces of our personal and professional lives deserve careful protection from threats like theft, fire, water damage, and general deterioration. Whether you’re organizing your office or managing important business files, knowing how to properly secure and preserve your paper documents is essential. In this guide, we’ll explore practical and effective methods on how to protect your paper documents to ensure they remain safe, accessible, and in pristine condition for years to come.

The Importance of Protecting Your Paper Documents

Protecting paper documents offers several important benefits for businesses and individuals alike. You will have peace of mind that your vital information will remain intact and accessible when needed. In addition, many industries have legal requirements for document retention and protection. Proper document security helps businesses stay compliant with these regulations and avoid potential fines or other legal issues.

Furthermore, implementing security protocols for paper documents helps protect sensitive business information from unauthorized access, reducing the risk of corporate espionage or data breaches. As for individuals, secure storage and proper disposal of their documents reduces the risk of personal information from falling into the wrong hands, preventing identity theft.

In case of disasters like fires or floods, protected documents are more likely to survive, ensuring business operations can continue with minimal disruption. Additionally, protecting important documents preserves their historical significance and sentimental value for generations. Proper storage conditions and protective materials slow down the deterioration process, maintaining the quality and legibility of important documents overtime.

Most important, knowing that important paper documents are securely protected provides peace of mind for both individuals and businesses. This allows you to focus on other priorities.

Effective Ways of Protecting Your Paper Documents

Businesses and individuals can protect their paper documents through several effective methods.

Create a Records Retention Plan

Organize documents by category and establish retention periods based on legal requirements or company policies. This helps manage document lifecycles and prevents unnecessary storage of outdated materials. Here is how to implement an effective records retention plan:

1. Know your federal and state regulations for how long to keep your records for.
2. Have an organized system for classifying your records. Classify by whatever makes sense for your business such as invoice number, patient name, or other category.
3. If you find any documents that are past their retention period, securely dispose of them. With the rest of your documents, create a regular schedule for disposing your documents based on their retention period. When you’re ready to purge your records, securely shred your paper documents or securely delete your digital files from your system.
4. Keep your records organized by deciding on a filing system that works best for you. This could be organizing your records by type and year, or hiring a document scanning company to scan and index your documents.
5. Update your retention schedule regularly and train your employees so they remain up-to-date with the procedures.

Establish Security Protocols

For valuable or fragile documents, use protective materials, such as acid-free, buffered boxes, folders, and sheet protectors to neutralize damaging acids and slow degradation. For documents that need extra protection, consider using synthetic waterproof paper or applying polyurethane coatings or acrylic sealers. Furthermore, restrict access to sensitive documents by implementing locked storage areas, monitoring who accesses files, and training staff to secure confidential materials properly. When creating digital versions of your paper documents, use password protection to restrict access and maintain confidentiality. 

Digitize Your Documents

Create digital backups of paper documents to ensure they survive in case of physical damage or loss. Use a Document Management System (DMS) for easy access and additional security.

Consider Off-Site Storage

For documents that aren’t needed for day-to-day operations but must be retained, use secure off-site storage facilities to protect against theft, fire, or other on-site risks. Secure off-site facilities also come with 24/7 security, physical security, simplified retention tracking, and on-demand retrieval services.

Shred Your Documents Securely and Regularly

By regularly shredding confidential documents you are protecting your company from a data breach. There are several options available to a business when considering a shredding program. Find out more about these options below:

Mobile Shredding

Mobile shredding is the most stress-free and convenient way to shred your documents. All in all, the entire shredding process takes about 20 minutes and you never even have to leave your office. The shredding contractor simply gives you or your business a secure container. Here, you will store any documents that need to be shredded. You can either set a schedule for the contractor to come by and empty the containers on a regular basis. Or, you can schedule pick up times as you go.

Mobile shredding is the best option for industries that require the highest level of security for their documents. Mobile shredding gets its name from the fact that the shredding machines are located within mobile trucks. This allows them to come to your location and shred the documents while you watch. You will receive a Certificate of Destruction as well. 

Offsite Shredding

Offsite shredding is intended for large volume shredding jobs. When the bins are full or you are ready to shred your documents, you call your shredding contractor to come pick up the containers. The difference with offsite shredding is that the containers are transport to a secure shredding plant. There, they go through an industrial-sized shredding machine. 

With offsite shredding, the security of your documents remains a top priority. To start, the contractor never comes into contact with your documents and you are still guaranteed a Certificate of Destruction.

Ship N Shred

If you have a small number of documents to shred, Ship N Shred provides a convenient solution. All you have to do is box your documents, schedule a pickup through FedEx, and they will be shipped to a secure shredding facility to be destroyed. In addition, you can protect your digital files because Ship N Shred also accepts electronics and hard drives. You will receive a Certificate of Destruction for your records when the process is complete for this method as well.

Protect Your Paper Documents with Shred Nations Today

Shred Nations specializes in helping you find the shredding contractor that’s right for your business regardless of the size of the job. If you’re looking for a quote on document shredding services, document scanning, or document storage, please fill out the form, or give us a call at (800) 747-3365. Within minutes of receiving your request, you will receive quotes from shredding contractors in your area.