Keeping Your Paperwork

Retention of Documents

The European Commission Regulations require all documentation associated with European Structural Funds supported projects to be retained for longer than most organisations are accustomed to for audit and tax purposes.

The general rule is that all documentation should be retained for three years following the final payment made under each Programme. To date this has meant all documentation in original hard copy. The European Commission has now indicated that documentation may be stored on a recognised data carrier such as microfiche or CD-ROM. However, all documentation transferred must be certified as copies of originals.

The Scottish Executive has recently provided the document retention dates for all the European Structural Funds Programmes in Scotland. For the 2004-2005 Scottish Innovative Actions Programme, this date is currently anticipated to be 31 December 2010.

Retention periods of other Programmes managed by SEP Ltd can be found here.

For further advice on the type and format of documentation to be retained please contact Alan.Bain@wsep.co.uk, tel 0141 572 4463.