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Suggest You - Compliance and Regulation: Impacting on the Global Business Community
But does it always come out to be true? Most of the time, but not always, there are times when you as a business person has been left in a situation where expenses and losses are more than your profits and soon you find out that you have incurred business debts.Business debts are normal for any business, but excess of anything is bad, in the same way, business debts when they cross the limits are bad for the business and your reputation. This is the time when you need to act rather than think. There are several services available which will reduce the amount of debt. You can get this business help from several online and offline business debt consolidation services which will do the job for you.Business debt consolidation is adding up of several debts which you have accumulated into a single debt amount and then deciding the repayment amount after negotiation with companies to which you owe the amount. This is the best way of taking charge of your business and business debts.You can then on be at ease about the repayments since you are going to pay off in a single amount. What’s more if you are in luck you can even get 100% reduction in interest amount. There are times when the interest amount adds up with the loan amount and makes repayment of the loan a difficult. With the interest amount gone repaying a loan becomes easier and manageable.Who carries out the process of business debt consolidation? Almost all the debt settlement and d
Consideration also needs to be given to how long documents should be stored. This depends on the type of document and industry-specific regulations.
This raises an interesting question. What is the legal position if the original document is electronic? This can best be answered in three steps.
• Civil Evidence Act 1995
o Authenticated copies will be accepted with equal weighting to the original
o Later revisions are given greater weight than superseded revisions
• Admissibility
o Does the court accept this evidence?
o With what weight?
• Appropriate procedures must be followed if documents are to be taken to court
Therefore, when considering compliance, the legal weight given to a document also needs to be taken into account. In addition to ensuring that documents and information are managed in accordance with compliance legislation, document management software also plays a key role in ensuring that optimised legal weighting is given to documents, should they be presented in a court.
Improving documents’ legal weighting depends on three key factors:
• Information management
o System management (duty of care, audits, etc.)
o Operational issues (good management practice)
• Legal issues
o General (e.g. Data Protection Act, invoice storage, etc.)
o Industry-specific (compliance/regulations etc.)
o Organisation-specific (internal regulations etc.)
• Need for clearance permissions
Companies therefore have a duty of care responsibility to ensure they are compliant with legislation. This is best described as information security and can be summarised with the following questions:
• Can a court be assured that information (evidence) has not been inadvertently or maliciously altered, or some of it lost?
o i.e. due care has been taken of the data
• Basic criteria can be met
o Confidentiality (who has had access?)
o Integrity (is it reliable?)
o Availability (can it be retrieved?)
Summary
Ensuring compliance with legislation is a responsibility shared between:
• The staff, following clearly defined document procedures
• The management enforcing these procedures
• The document management system policing and enforcing duty
Nowadays, everything seems to revolve around plastics. That is, more and more people are finding credit cards as the most convenient way to shopping, whether it is online or not.Hence, with the arrival of credit cards in the market today, most businesses have found its feasible ways when engaging into online business. It has continuously provided online businesses to accept their customer’s payment online. What’s more it makes them accept payments even through phone or fax.But there are still many businesses who kept on wondering what credit card merchant accounts is all about. They even kept on asking how other businesses get to accept credit card payments.There are only two ways how to accept credit cards. These are:1. Establish a merchant account with the credit card companies.It is a must for every business who wants to accept credit card online is to build a merchant account, especially to the credit card companies that the business will be receive credit card payments. The application for this one will vary from one bank to another. That is why it is a must that the company must first learn the primary services of a bank before committing to such service.Also, most banks do not allow new businesses and home businesses to get a new merchant account for fear of some frauds. And so, the best way to gain the bank’s trust is for the company to establish strong relationship with the bank and to maintain a good credit histo
The latest compliance standards focus on greater accountability and control in key business processes – most importantly document flows and data management.
There are two central aspects to enforcing compliance:
• The corporate duty of care in enforcing standards
• The need for legal protection in the event of litigation or a dispute
Non-compliance is not an option, companies risk stiff fines and executives can be held personally liable if information is not in order. Therefore, it is important that the business examines all regulations, not just those affecting their specific area of operation, but also generic legislation affecting general business activities.
The consequences of non-compliance are extremely serious; in December 2002 the SEC fined five Wall Street brokerages a total of $8.25m for improperly storing e-mail communications (Forrester Research).
Distributing documents for approval, whether in hard copy or electronic form, raises security issues. Who is authorised to access documents, and what information can they access within them? This is particularly important to ensure compliance with legislation such as the Sarbanes Oxley Act, which applies to US companies and their foreign subsidiaries; and in the UK, the Data Protection Act and the Freedom of Information Act.
Document processing software such as Tokairo’s TokOpen system addresses these challenges and automatically enforces compliance. Every action relating to individual document access is audited, access is limited to specified personnel, and actions they can undertake are also controlled. Software can also restrict access to different information within a document, to different specified users or groups within an organisation.
This ability to allow different information in a document to be seen by different users means that the divergent needs of the Data Protection Act and the Freedom of Information Act can both be met automatically, without the need to make copies of documents.
This flexibility can also extend to the hierarchy of approval based on the value of an invoice. So if a member of staff is not allowed to approve payment of an invoice of over ?500 for example, it can still be checked by them, but then can automatically be escalated to a superior for payment sign-off.
The following are some of the most recent regulations, and the effects they can have on corporate document management strategies:
Sarbanes Oxley Act 2002
This is a key driver of compliant corporate document management systems. In the US non-compliance is now a Federal offence, carrying a penalty of up to 20 years in prison. US subsidiaries in the UK are also required to comply with this legislation. The European Union is expected to introduce similar rulings for member countries.
Under section 302, the CEO and CFO must certify that reports accurately show the company’s financial condition and results. In addition, they must certify that they have established and evaluated internal controls to ensure accurate recording and reporting of performance. Any deficiencies in these controls as well as any fraud at management level must be reported.
Section 404 requires annual reports to detail internal controls that are in place to ensure accurate financial reporting, as well as an assessment of their effectiveness.
This can have a significant impact on a document management system. For example, a company without clear control and visibility of approving invoices for payment could be in breach of the Sarbanes Oxley Act.
Data Protection Act 1998
Regardless of what document management system may be in place, personal information for business use needs to be handled in compliance with the Data Protection Act 1998. A secure document management system such as TokOpen can help with compliance, as it reduces the scope for theft or accidental loss of personal and confidential data. It can also facilitate the execution of valid requests for such data.
The Act enshrines eight principles:
1. Personal data shall be processed fairly and lawfully.
2. It shall be obtained only for specified lawful purposes, and shall not be further processed in any manner incompatible with those purposes.
3. It shall be adequate, relevant and not excessive in relation to the purposes for which it is being processed.
4. It shall be accurate and, where necessary, kept up to date.
5. It shall not be kept for longer than is necessary.
6. It shall be processed in accordance with the rights of data subjects under the Act.
7. Appropriate technical and organisational measures shall be taken to prevent unauthorised or unlawful processing of personal data, and to prevent accidental loss, destruction or damage to personal data.
8. Personal data shall not be transferred to a country or territory outside the EU unless an adequate level of protection for the rights and freedoms of data subjects is ensured.
Freedom of Information Act
This gives people a general right of access to information held by, or on behalf of, public authorities. It is intended to promote a culture of openness and accountability amongst public sector bodies, and to increase public understanding of how public authorities work, why they make the decisions they do, and how they spend public money.
Good document management should be a key objective for all organisations, public and private, in the drive to achieve business efficiency, and ensure that information is easily retrievable and properly documented. As a result of this, public authorities will then be able to comply more easily with legislation that affects them, such as the Freedom of Information Act.
The principles underlying records management – creation, retention, identification and retrieval – apply equally to both electronic and paper media. This means that procedures for e-mail and other information held on shared and personal hard drives have to be as robust and detailed as those for other records.
Conflictions in Compliance
Document management systems are challenged when different data in the same document relates to both the Data Protection Act and the Freedom of Information Act, since one is geared for confidentiality, the other for accessibility.
Leading document management systems such as TokOpen, control who can view different parts of a document, meeting the conflicting needs of both pieces of legislation.
In a typical document, such as a Wire Transfer Application form, some of the information falls under the Freedom of Information Act, and other parts of the document are private meaning access must be restricted and audited in accordance with the Data Protection Act. Certain data must not be disclosed to anyone outside the bank as it is private and for internal use only.
Document management software overcomes this problem by hiding the internal information when the document is viewed by someone outside the bank. Users with authorised access are still able to view the whole document.
In the same example, the applicant’s name and address are protected by the Data Protection Act, and should therefore only be seen by the staff members dealing with that client, such as HR or Accounts. Remaining staff do not have access to these specific document details. TokOpen document management software can ensure compliance with this.
Document Management: the Way Forward
The increasingly complex demands of legislation underline the need for businesses to implement document capture and document management systems. However, even though a document management system is an important component, alone it will not ensure compliance. A wider view is needed to ensure businesses maintain their compliance with changing legislation.
In a court of law, the judge will consider the evidence based on several criteria:
• Are procedures clear and consistent, with a requirement to document procedures? This is often referred to as a document policy.
• Are the procedures enforced? This is a shared responsibility between management and the selected document management system's access and privilege controls.
• Can the claims be substantiated? This relies heavily on the document management system’s audit trail.
Compiling a Document Policy
After establishing which regulations have to be complied with, a document policy is required covering the following:
o Scope of information covered
o Security classifications
o Storage media
o File format and version control
o Standards (compliance and regulations)
o Retention and destruction
o Responsibilities
A document policy defines how information is stored, and is therefore central to ensuring compliance. It should serve these main purposes:
o Ensure everyone knows what they can do
o Define the business practice at the time
o Demonstrate why a given action was undertaken, e.g. explains why a document was destroyed
o Reinforce documents’ evidential weight
o Help authenticate documents to increase legal weighting
o Improve the court’s view of the evidence presented
Consideration also needs to be given to how long documents should be stored. This depends on the type of document and industry-specific regulations.
This raises an interesting question. What is the legal position if the original document is electronic? This can best be answered in three steps.
• Civil Evidence Act 1995
o Authenticated copies will be accepted with equal weighting to the original
o Later revisions are given greater weight than superseded revisions
• Admissibility
o Does the court accept this evidence?
o With what weight?
• Appropriate procedures must be followed if documents are to be taken to court
Therefore, when considering compliance, the legal weight given to a document also needs to be taken into account. In addition to ensuring that documents and information are managed in accordance with compliance legislation, document management software also plays a key role in ensuring that optimised legal weighting is given to documents, should they be presented in a court.
Improving documents’ legal weighting depends on three key factors:
• Information management
o System management (duty of care, audits, etc.)
o Operational issues (good management practice)
• Legal issues
o General (e.g. Data Protection Act, invoice storage, etc.)
o Industry-specific (compliance/regulations etc.)
o Organisation-specific (internal regulations etc.)
• Need for clearance permissions
Companies therefore have a duty of care responsibility to ensure they are compliant with legislation. This is best described as information security and can be summarised with the following questions:
• Can a court be assured that information (evidence) has not been inadvertently or maliciously altered, or some of it lost?
o i.e. due care has been taken of the data
• Basic criteria can be met
o Confidentiality (who has had access?)
o Integrity (is it reliable?)
o Availability (can it be retrieved?)
Summary
Ensuring compliance with legislation is a responsibility shared between:
• The staff, following clearly defined document procedures
• The management enforcing these procedures
• The document management system policing and enforcing duty
If you stay in business long enough you will witness the good side and the bad side of business life. It is an unfortunate fact of life that things never run smoothly all of the time, in fact they have a way of turning bad when least expected.One of the most difficult decisions a business owner can face, is deciding if their businesses worth recovering? To find the true answer to this question it is sometimes worth employing the opinion of an outside agency. This agency will carry out a complete audit and report their finding to you, the good thing about employing an outside agency is they are devoid of emotion towards the business and deal purely with facts and figures.If the company is deemed recoverable a recovery package can be put in place, generally this comes in the form of a long term loan. Most recovery loans come with stipulations; the reason is to prevent the business failing in the future. Businesses the world over will come across difficult times, for various reasons, the one factor that separates successful businessmen from their peers is lessons are learned by their mistakes and errors of judgement.Administrators are usually called in for large or PLC’s (Public Limited Company) that find themselves in financial trouble. This normally happens after financial support for the company is withdrawn. News that the Administrators have been called in usually result in the mass ‘sell off’ of company shares; this compounds the problems ev
The following are some of the most recent regulations, and the effects they can have on corporate document management strategies:
Sarbanes Oxley Act 2002
This is a key driver of compliant corporate document management systems. In the US non-compliance is now a Federal offence, carrying a penalty of up to 20 years in prison. US subsidiaries in the UK are also required to comply with this legislation. The European Union is expected to introduce similar rulings for member countries.
Under section 302, the CEO and CFO must certify that reports accurately show the company’s financial condition and results. In addition, they must certify that they have established and evaluated internal controls to ensure accurate recording and reporting of performance. Any deficiencies in these controls as well as any fraud at management level must be reported.
Section 404 requires annual reports to detail internal controls that are in place to ensure accurate financial reporting, as well as an assessment of their effectiveness.
This can have a significant impact on a document management system. For example, a company without clear control and visibility of approving invoices for payment could be in breach of the Sarbanes Oxley Act.
Data Protection Act 1998
Regardless of what document management system may be in place, personal information for business use needs to be handled in compliance with the Data Protection Act 1998. A secure document management system such as TokOpen can help with compliance, as it reduces the scope for theft or accidental loss of personal and confidential data. It can also facilitate the execution of valid requests for such data.
The Act enshrines eight principles:
1. Personal data shall be processed fairly and lawfully.
2. It shall be obtained only for specified lawful purposes, and shall not be further processed in any manner incompatible with those purposes.
3. It shall be adequate, relevant and not excessive in relation to the purposes for which it is being processed.
4. It shall be accurate and, where necessary, kept up to date.
5. It shall not be kept for longer than is necessary.
6. It shall be processed in accordance with the rights of data subjects under the Act.
7. Appropriate technical and organisational measures shall be taken to prevent unauthorised or unlawful processing of personal data, and to prevent accidental loss, destruction or damage to personal data.
8. Personal data shall not be transferred to a country or territory outside the EU unless an adequate level of protection for the rights and freedoms of data subjects is ensured.
Freedom of Information Act
This gives people a general right of access to information held by, or on behalf of, public authorities. It is intended to promote a culture of openness and accountability amongst public sector bodies, and to increase public understanding of how public authorities work, why they make the decisions they do, and how they spend public money.
Good document management should be a key objective for all organisations, public and private, in the drive to achieve business efficiency, and ensure that information is easily retrievable and properly documented. As a result of this, public authorities will then be able to comply more easily with legislation that affects them, such as the Freedom of Information Act.
The principles underlying records management – creation, retention, identification and retrieval – apply equally to both electronic and paper media. This means that procedures for e-mail and other information held on shared and personal hard drives have to be as robust and detailed as those for other records.
Conflictions in Compliance
Document management systems are challenged when different data in the same document relates to both the Data Protection Act and the Freedom of Information Act, since one is geared for confidentiality, the other for accessibility.
Leading document management systems such as TokOpen, control who can view different parts of a document, meeting the conflicting needs of both pieces of legislation.
In a typical document, such as a Wire Transfer Application form, some of the information falls under the Freedom of Information Act, and other parts of the document are private meaning access must be restricted and audited in accordance with the Data Protection Act. Certain data must not be disclosed to anyone outside the bank as it is private and for internal use only.
Document management software overcomes this problem by hiding the internal information when the document is viewed by someone outside the bank. Users with authorised access are still able to view the whole document.
In the same example, the applicant’s name and address are protected by the Data Protection Act, and should therefore only be seen by the staff members dealing with that client, such as HR or Accounts. Remaining staff do not have access to these specific document details. TokOpen document management software can ensure compliance with this.
Document Management: the Way Forward
The increasingly complex demands of legislation underline the need for businesses to implement document capture and document management systems. However, even though a document management system is an important component, alone it will not ensure compliance. A wider view is needed to ensure businesses maintain their compliance with changing legislation.
In a court of law, the judge will consider the evidence based on several criteria:
• Are procedures clear and consistent, with a requirement to document procedures? This is often referred to as a document policy.
• Are the procedures enforced? This is a shared responsibility between management and the selected document management system's access and privilege controls.
• Can the claims be substantiated? This relies heavily on the document management system’s audit trail.
Compiling a Document Policy
After establishing which regulations have to be complied with, a document policy is required covering the following:
o Scope of information covered
o Security classifications
o Storage media
o File format and version control
o Standards (compliance and regulations)
o Retention and destruction
o Responsibilities
A document policy defines how information is stored, and is therefore central to ensuring compliance. It should serve these main purposes:
o Ensure everyone knows what they can do
o Define the business practice at the time
o Demonstrate why a given action was undertaken, e.g. explains why a document was destroyed
o Reinforce documents’ evidential weight
o Help authenticate documents to increase legal weighting
o Improve the court’s view of the evidence presented
Consideration also needs to be given to how long documents should be stored. This depends on the type of document and industry-specific regulations.
This raises an interesting question. What is the legal position if the original document is electronic? This can best be answered in three steps.
• Civil Evidence Act 1995
o Authenticated copies will be accepted with equal weighting to the original
o Later revisions are given greater weight than superseded revisions
• Admissibility
o Does the court accept this evidence?
o With what weight?
• Appropriate procedures must be followed if documents are to be taken to court
Therefore, when considering compliance, the legal weight given to a document also needs to be taken into account. In addition to ensuring that documents and information are managed in accordance with compliance legislation, document management software also plays a key role in ensuring that optimised legal weighting is given to documents, should they be presented in a court.
Improving documents’ legal weighting depends on three key factors:
• Information management
o System management (duty of care, audits, etc.)
o Operational issues (good management practice)
• Legal issues
o General (e.g. Data Protection Act, invoice storage, etc.)
o Industry-specific (compliance/regulations etc.)
o Organisation-specific (internal regulations etc.)
• Need for clearance permissions
Companies therefore have a duty of care responsibility to ensure they are compliant with legislation. This is best described as information security and can be summarised with the following questions:
• Can a court be assured that information (evidence) has not been inadvertently or maliciously altered, or some of it lost?
o i.e. due care has been taken of the data
• Basic criteria can be met
o Confidentiality (who has had access?)
o Integrity (is it reliable?)
o Availability (can it be retrieved?)
Summary
Ensuring compliance with legislation is a responsibility shared between:
• The staff, following clearly defined document procedures
• The management enforcing these procedures
• The document management system policing and enforcing duty
The world of internet is excruciatingly more complex than we can imagine. Net surfing, internet-aided messaging, and transactions appear very easy, but the rigors and complexities behind how the internet runs are hidden and unknown to most of us.In an attempt to systematize internet governance, former US President Bill Clinton established the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)in the 1990s. ICANN is a very technical body mandated with ensuring that the net function in a stable and secure manner by managing the net's domain name system. It is the organization responsible for designating domain names like .com, .net, and .org.In 2000, the ICANN approved the registering of seven more domain names like .biz and .info after receiving massive request and prodding for more domain names from the net community. Even up to this day, there is still much pressure for ICANN to approve the creation of additional domain name extensions. The pressure is high since the domain name registry business presents a very lucrative opportunity to collect annual registration fees for potentially millions of new domain names. Domain name registrars demand for more domains to accommodate the increasing influx of new products and service being sold through the internet.ICANN has been hard on this demand, fearing that the existence of new top-level domains and extensions will drastically affect the reliability of the internet. And this relu
6. It shall be processed in accordance with the rights of data subjects under the Act.
7. Appropriate technical and organisational measures shall be taken to prevent unauthorised or unlawful processing of personal data, and to prevent accidental loss, destruction or damage to personal data.
8. Personal data shall not be transferred to a country or territory outside the EU unless an adequate level of protection for the rights and freedoms of data subjects is ensured.
Freedom of Information Act
This gives people a general right of access to information held by, or on behalf of, public authorities. It is intended to promote a culture of openness and accountability amongst public sector bodies, and to increase public understanding of how public authorities work, why they make the decisions they do, and how they spend public money.
Good document management should be a key objective for all organisations, public and private, in the drive to achieve business efficiency, and ensure that information is easily retrievable and properly documented. As a result of this, public authorities will then be able to comply more easily with legislation that affects them, such as the Freedom of Information Act.
The principles underlying records management – creation, retention, identification and retrieval – apply equally to both electronic and paper media. This means that procedures for e-mail and other information held on shared and personal hard drives have to be as robust and detailed as those for other records.
Conflictions in Compliance
Document management systems are challenged when different data in the same document relates to both the Data Protection Act and the Freedom of Information Act, since one is geared for confidentiality, the other for accessibility.
Leading document management systems such as TokOpen, control who can view different parts of a document, meeting the conflicting needs of both pieces of legislation.
In a typical document, such as a Wire Transfer Application form, some of the information falls under the Freedom of Information Act, and other parts of the document are private meaning access must be restricted and audited in accordance with the Data Protection Act. Certain data must not be disclosed to anyone outside the bank as it is private and for internal use only.
Document management software overcomes this problem by hiding the internal information when the document is viewed by someone outside the bank. Users with authorised access are still able to view the whole document.
In the same example, the applicant’s name and address are protected by the Data Protection Act, and should therefore only be seen by the staff members dealing with that client, such as HR or Accounts. Remaining staff do not have access to these specific document details. TokOpen document management software can ensure compliance with this.
Document Management: the Way Forward
The increasingly complex demands of legislation underline the need for businesses to implement document capture and document management systems. However, even though a document management system is an important component, alone it will not ensure compliance. A wider view is needed to ensure businesses maintain their compliance with changing legislation.
In a court of law, the judge will consider the evidence based on several criteria:
• Are procedures clear and consistent, with a requirement to document procedures? This is often referred to as a document policy.
• Are the procedures enforced? This is a shared responsibility between management and the selected document management system's access and privilege controls.
• Can the claims be substantiated? This relies heavily on the document management system’s audit trail.
Compiling a Document Policy
After establishing which regulations have to be complied with, a document policy is required covering the following:
o Scope of information covered
o Security classifications
o Storage media
o File format and version control
o Standards (compliance and regulations)
o Retention and destruction
o Responsibilities
A document policy defines how information is stored, and is therefore central to ensuring compliance. It should serve these main purposes:
o Ensure everyone knows what they can do
o Define the business practice at the time
o Demonstrate why a given action was undertaken, e.g. explains why a document was destroyed
o Reinforce documents’ evidential weight
o Help authenticate documents to increase legal weighting
o Improve the court’s view of the evidence presented
Consideration also needs to be given to how long documents should be stored. This depends on the type of document and industry-specific regulations.
This raises an interesting question. What is the legal position if the original document is electronic? This can best be answered in three steps.
• Civil Evidence Act 1995
o Authenticated copies will be accepted with equal weighting to the original
o Later revisions are given greater weight than superseded revisions
• Admissibility
o Does the court accept this evidence?
o With what weight?
• Appropriate procedures must be followed if documents are to be taken to court
Therefore, when considering compliance, the legal weight given to a document also needs to be taken into account. In addition to ensuring that documents and information are managed in accordance with compliance legislation, document management software also plays a key role in ensuring that optimised legal weighting is given to documents, should they be presented in a court.
Improving documents’ legal weighting depends on three key factors:
• Information management
o System management (duty of care, audits, etc.)
o Operational issues (good management practice)
• Legal issues
o General (e.g. Data Protection Act, invoice storage, etc.)
o Industry-specific (compliance/regulations etc.)
o Organisation-specific (internal regulations etc.)
• Need for clearance permissions
Companies therefore have a duty of care responsibility to ensure they are compliant with legislation. This is best described as information security and can be summarised with the following questions:
• Can a court be assured that information (evidence) has not been inadvertently or maliciously altered, or some of it lost?
o i.e. due care has been taken of the data
• Basic criteria can be met
o Confidentiality (who has had access?)
o Integrity (is it reliable?)
o Availability (can it be retrieved?)
Summary
Ensuring compliance with legislation is a responsibility shared between:
• The staff, following clearly defined document procedures
• The management enforcing these procedures
• The document management system policing and enforcing duty
When selling your own business, it is critical that you understand the points in the deal process when your attorney and CPA should get involved. The first point to make is that both of these parties must be involved in your selling process. You should think of them as a part of your “Exit Strategy Team.”Your CPAYour primary goal with your CPA is to minimize the tax impact of your sale. Small changes in deal structure can make large differences in your after-tax cash from the sale, or be the difference in whether or not a deal gets done at all. A seller can save literally hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxes as a result of deal structure and asset allocation decisions. If you have a small business that won’t sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars, don’t think there isn’t a role for a quality CPA. There is.A typical CPA is going to charge you somewhere between $100 and $200 for a one hour consultation. For a smaller business, a good CPA should take no more than thirty minutes to give you an intelligent assessment of your tax exposure based on likely deal structures. Spending $100 to save $1,000 on a small business sale, or to make sure you simply didn’t miss an opportunity, is a good deal.When to Meet with Your CPAMeet with your CPA at two critical junctures: after you first decide to sell, and when you are evaluating an offer that includes any agreement on the structure of the de
Document management software overcomes this problem by hiding the internal information when the document is viewed by someone outside the bank. Users with authorised access are still able to view the whole document.
In the same example, the applicant’s name and address are protected by the Data Protection Act, and should therefore only be seen by the staff members dealing with that client, such as HR or Accounts. Remaining staff do not have access to these specific document details. TokOpen document management software can ensure compliance with this.
Document Management: the Way Forward
The increasingly complex demands of legislation underline the need for businesses to implement document capture and document management systems. However, even though a document management system is an important component, alone it will not ensure compliance. A wider view is needed to ensure businesses maintain their compliance with changing legislation.
In a court of law, the judge will consider the evidence based on several criteria:
• Are procedures clear and consistent, with a requirement to document procedures? This is often referred to as a document policy.
• Are the procedures enforced? This is a shared responsibility between management and the selected document management system's access and privilege controls.
• Can the claims be substantiated? This relies heavily on the document management system’s audit trail.
Compiling a Document Policy
After establishing which regulations have to be complied with, a document policy is required covering the following:
o Scope of information covered
o Security classifications
o Storage media
o File format and version control
o Standards (compliance and regulations)
o Retention and destruction
o Responsibilities
A document policy defines how information is stored, and is therefore central to ensuring compliance. It should serve these main purposes:
o Ensure everyone knows what they can do
o Define the business practice at the time
o Demonstrate why a given action was undertaken, e.g. explains why a document was destroyed
o Reinforce documents’ evidential weight
o Help authenticate documents to increase legal weighting
o Improve the court’s view of the evidence presented
Consideration also needs to be given to how long documents should be stored. This depends on the type of document and industry-specific regulations.
This raises an interesting question. What is the legal position if the original document is electronic? This can best be answered in three steps.
• Civil Evidence Act 1995
o Authenticated copies will be accepted with equal weighting to the original
o Later revisions are given greater weight than superseded revisions
• Admissibility
o Does the court accept this evidence?
o With what weight?
• Appropriate procedures must be followed if documents are to be taken to court
Therefore, when considering compliance, the legal weight given to a document also needs to be taken into account. In addition to ensuring that documents and information are managed in accordance with compliance legislation, document management software also plays a key role in ensuring that optimised legal weighting is given to documents, should they be presented in a court.
Improving documents’ legal weighting depends on three key factors:
• Information management
o System management (duty of care, audits, etc.)
o Operational issues (good management practice)
• Legal issues
o General (e.g. Data Protection Act, invoice storage, etc.)
o Industry-specific (compliance/regulations etc.)
o Organisation-specific (internal regulations etc.)
• Need for clearance permissions
Companies therefore have a duty of care responsibility to ensure they are compliant with legislation. This is best described as information security and can be summarised with the following questions:
• Can a court be assured that information (evidence) has not been inadvertently or maliciously altered, or some of it lost?
o i.e. due care has been taken of the data
• Basic criteria can be met
o Confidentiality (who has had access?)
o Integrity (is it reliable?)
o Availability (can it be retrieved?)
Summary
Ensuring compliance with legislation is a responsibility shared between:
• The staff, following clearly defined document procedures
• The management enforcing these procedures
• The document management system policing and enforcing duty
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Consideration also needs to be given to how long documents should be stored. This depends on the type of document and industry-specific regulations.
This raises an interesting question. What is the legal position if the original document is electronic? This can best be answered in three steps.
• Civil Evidence Act 1995
o Authenticated copies will be accepted with equal weighting to the original
o Later revisions are given greater weight than superseded revisions
• Admissibility
o Does the court accept this evidence?
o With what weight?
• Appropriate procedures must be followed if documents are to be taken to court
Therefore, when considering compliance, the legal weight given to a document also needs to be taken into account. In addition to ensuring that documents and information are managed in accordance with compliance legislation, document management software also plays a key role in ensuring that optimised legal weighting is given to documents, should they be presented in a court.
Improving documents’ legal weighting depends on three key factors:
• Information management
o System management (duty of care, audits, etc.)
o Operational issues (good management practice)
• Legal issues
o General (e.g. Data Protection Act, invoice storage, etc.)
o Industry-specific (compliance/regulations etc.)
o Organisation-specific (internal regulations etc.)
• Need for clearance permissions
Companies therefore have a duty of care responsibility to ensure they are compliant with legislation. This is best described as information security and can be summarised with the following questions:
• Can a court be assured that information (evidence) has not been inadvertently or maliciously altered, or some of it lost?
o i.e. due care has been taken of the data
• Basic criteria can be met
o Confidentiality (who has had access?)
o Integrity (is it reliable?)
o Availability (can it be retrieved?)
Summary
Ensuring compliance with legislation is a responsibility shared between:
• The staff, following clearly defined document procedures
• The management enforcing these procedures
• The document management system policing and enforcing duty of care responsibilities
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