The AODocs Retention Module lets you automate the retention and disposal of the documents stored in your AODocs libraries.

The AODocs Retention Module is a feature of the AODocs Document Management Platform. It is included with the AODocs Application Platform license.

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What are retention policies?

A retention policy is also called a deletion policy.

A retention policy is a set of rules defined for specific documents. It specifies how long documents are retained once they are controlled by the AODocs Retention Module, before being deleted. This period is called the retention period.

Companies and organizations may need to implement retention policies on their documents. This can help them meet business requirements – for example, for legal reasons or to save storage space. Different policies can apply to different document types.

Managing retention policies with AODocs

Retention schedules

When you use the AODocs Retention Module, each retention policy is associated with a retention schedule. This retention schedule applies all the characteristics of the retention policy.

In your AODocs libraries, you can define retention schedules:

• at the root level
• at any folder level
• based on one or more property (metadata) values – these retention schedules are always assigned at the library level and are applied to all document classes with retention properties defined

Using one or more retention schedules in an AODocs library

As a library administrator, you can define which types of retention schedules to use in the AODocs libraries you manage.

Within the same library, you can use:

• several retention schedules at the root level – but only one that isn't based on property values
• a mixture of retention schedules – some are assigned to the root level or folders, and others are based on property values

If you assign a retention schedule to the root level or to a folder, it manages the lifecycle of all the subfolders and documents at root level or in the folder. 

Note: If you assign a retention schedule to the root level or to a folder in your library, all the document classes in the library must have a folder structure defined.

To assign several retention schedules to different folders in your library, organize your folder structure appropriately.

Below is an example of several retention policies at different levels in a library.

Note: If you use retention in a library, you must assign at least one retention schedule at the library level. This can be a retention schedule assigned to the root folder or a retention schedule based on property values.

If there are conflicts between retention schedules within your library, the retention schedules with the latest deletion dates are applied. For example, in the example above, RP4 and RP5 are applied only if their deletion dates are later than those defined by RP1, RP2 and RP3. 

Learn more: What happens when you use retention in AODocs libraries?