Document Retention Aided by MS Outlook Rules

Speed up the task and comply with federal regulations.

As of October 1, 2006, the federal government requires that emails be available in pre-trial discovery in federal courts. The failure to retain transaction emails could be cause for action against you. Let's look at how we can automate processes that will help us with filing and archiving of emails by transaction.

Set up an Outlook file folder for the transaction. Name it for easy identification, perhaps "Seller to Buyer", as in "Smith to Jones." {flash video how-to}

Decide how you'll capture and file random emails. We'll set up rules for capturing emails to and from the principals, but we need to capture random ones to and from appraisers, surveyors, etc. whenever possible. One good way is to inform all in an email to use the MLS number in the subject or the body of the email. Note that Outlook will place "Re:" in front of your subject for their replies, so you should also use it in the subject when sending out emails about the transaction. That way they won't have to think about it when replying. Then just create a rule to file a copy in the transaction file of any email containing the MLS number in the subject or body {flash video how-to}. You might have a separate rule for a transaction number used in title company emails.

Create a rule to file emails to and from your principal. Again, we want a copy of the email to be filed, though there will also be one in the "Sent" folder. If there are others, such as multiple principals, make sure that you have rules to file for all of them.

At the end of the transaction, we'll be placing all of these emails into an Adobe Acrobat.pdf file for long-term archiving in a format recognized as accessible by almost every computer out there.