Dear All,
I have been intrigued by the response to this question and it raise the following question/hypothesis for me.
Are authorities that are also public record repositories/depositories more likely to have an in house records storage function? On one level, this should be a strong positive
correlation. However, there could be strong negative correlation because they can be seen as two distinction functions within an organisation.
I would be interested in the experience of those organisations that are public record repositories/depositories. Do you have both in house, or do you have your business records
(day to day storage requirements) externally provided? I am working on the crude assumption and definition that what is in the repository/depository is "archived" non-active business records as well as other items of historical interest/need. By contrast,
the semi-permanent "active" business records need to managed for access and control purposes.
If the two are strongly correlated, organisations that have the "archive" responsibility also have an in-house storage, are they more cost effective or efficient than for those
who keep them separate? If they are negatively correlated, so that "archive" responsibility is in house and "active" documents are managed externally, are the more cost effective and efficient than those who join them together?
I would be interested to know, if only anecdotally, the experience of others as it would be a good business case for in house or external business records depending on if they
are strongly positively or negatively correlated *and* if the provide (or fail to provide) efficiencies and cost effectiveness in their respective usage.
Best,
Lawrence
P.S. If this is an obvious question upon which there have been voluminous research, please let me know so I can find it and apologies the list if this is an obvious question.
:)