Email archiving: What companies need to know

A statutory regulation regarding the archiving of emails has now existed for some time. Emails must be archived on a legally-compliant and audit-proof basis. Even though, many myths continue to circulate around the topic of email archiving. In this article, we want to clear up the most common of these and to clarify what really applies.

Myth 1: Archiving emails regarding invoices and receipts is sufficient

Companies are required to archive every form of business correspondence for six to ten years starting from the end of the calendar year. Although invoices and receipts are an important part of such correspondence, various other business records are also affected which are relevant to the taxation, for example:

• Inquiries
• Quotations
• Orders placed
• Cases of warranty
• Cancellations, etc.

This means that emails relating to the entire business process have to be archived.

Myth 2: All emails have to be archived

There is no question that emails are an important format in the area of business correspondence today. Which emails actually have to be archived as email, however? In principle, not every email is subject to archiving, but only those which fulfill the function of a commercial or business letter or an accounting document.

In this respect, it is important to distinguish between the function that an email has. Newsletters or spam mails, for example, are exempt from the archiving requirement. And if an email only serves the purpose of sending an attachment such as a digital invoice, and does not itself contain any tax-related information, it is not the email, but only the attachment that has to be archived. The email then has a comparable function to an envelope.

In addition, companies may not indiscriminately store every email automatically. An important exception is the private emails of the employees. This becomes particularly relevant if employees are allowed to use their business email address privately. The storage is then only permitted if the employees have given their consent. In many companies, the private use of the email account is not therefore permitted.

Myth 3: Printing the emails out is sufficient

The idea of simply printing out and filing all the emails that need to be archived may seem like a pragmatic solution.

However, the GoBD stipulates that all documentation has to be archived in its original form. An email printout would only be a copy, and would therefore not meet the requirements. Emails must be kept in their original format – i.e. in electronic form.

Moreover, in view of the flood of emails that companies receive every day, printing them out would be far from an adequate solution in terms of environmental protection or the space requirements.

Myth 4: Small businesses do not need any email archiving

Unfortunately, this assumption is also a misconception, as the question of who is required to archive emails can be answered quickly: The obligation to keep records applies to any company with a profit-making intention, regardless of its size, i.e. also to the smallest companies or sole traders.

Small companies, in particular, often struggle to comply with the numerous laws and regulations in force, as they quite simply lack the manpower. The digitalization and automation of business processes can help them to speed up and save valuable working time.

Myth 5: Email archiving is not compatible with the GDPR and data protection

The protection of personal data has been a key priority at least since the entry into effect of the GDPR in May 2018.
At first glance, the requirements of the GoBD do not appear to be compatible with the GDPR, as the storage of personal data as regards email archiving conflicts with the data protection regulations, which fundamentally prohibit the collection, processing and storage of such data.

However, the archiving obligation provides a relevant reason for storage of emails that contain personal data. With emails that do not fall under the archiving obligation, data protection takes top priority if there is no other important reason for storage. Emails from applicants who have been rejected must therefore be erased immediately.

To maintain an overview in this case, rule-based erasure is recommended, whereby emails can be selected according to certain criteria and erased automatically after a defined period of time.

Myth 6: I can archive my emails myself in Outlook

Those who work with email applications like Outlook are probably familiar with their archiving feature. The idea of archiving emails directly using this feature appears to be as obvious as it is straightforward. However, a closer look quickly reveals that emails are not archived here in the way which is required by the GoBD. The biggest problem surrounds the requirement that emails must be kept in original and audit-proof form, i.e. unchangeable. This cannot be guaranteed with archiving in the email application. It is also difficult to log any changes.

The GoBD also stipulates that emails must be archived in an orderly and retrievable way. The necessary structure is not usually available in email applications. Moreover, email servers are not designed to store ever-increasing volumes of emails over the long term, which would result in a significant fall in their performance.

Myth 7: Emails are archived anyway during backups

Backups and archiving have different goals: While the goal of the archiving is the long-term storage of data for documentation purposes, backups only store data over the short to medium term. The main purpose of a backup is to secure the data and to provide for a source of recovery in the case of data loss. The relevant data is backed up at regular intervals, and older backups are overwritten after defined periods of time.

Therefore, a backup is not able to encompass the archiving of emails for the following reasons:

• The time period for which the data is stored may not be long enough for the backup.
• A backup is not able to ensure that all emails are saved on a complete and unchanged basis, as this usually only takes place at fixed times, such as once a day. Emails may have already been changed or deleted in the meantime. They are not, therefore, audit proof.
• Archived emails must be retrievable. This would theoretically be possible in the case of a backup, but with a high workload.

Software solutions for email archiving – audit-proof and straightforward

The way in which emails should be archived is a complex issue. A good organization of this task is essential to be on the safe side from the legal perspective and to avoid spending unnecessary time on the subject. Email archiving software such as easy for Exchange can help automate these tasks, allowing the archiving to take place directly from Microsoft Outlook – so that you don’t have to transfer anything manually. In our webinar, you will learn how to archive emails in your company easily and on a legally-compliant basis using easy for Exchange.

The volume of email in companies is growing. But the larger the databases, the slower the system becomes. Users are also often forced to archive their email on their local computer, for example as a local PST file. At the same time, email contains information which the company needs to access and which also must be archived revision-proof – such as email invoices. More and more IT decision makers are wondering:

• How does legally compliant email archiving work?
• And how do you ensure access to archived email at any time?

The answer is with the email archiving from easy software. Because easy’s email management enhances Microsoft Exchange with powerful and legally compliant email archiving. Email can be archived immediately with the touch of a button and just as easily searched for and viewed.

6 reasons for email archiving

What can automatic email archiving do for you? The answer: give you security and a performance boost. At least, when the provider of the email archiving system is easy software. With our automatic email archiving, you keep an overview, take the strain off of your systems, and don’t need to worry if you are archiving your emails in accordance with legal regulations.

• Archiving directly from Microsoft Outlook and IBM Notes is possible
• Emails can be linked to other information regarding the transaction at the touch of a button
• Revision-proof, long-term archiving

How significant are business emails today? What information and data can they contain and how should they be dealt with? In this blog, you’ll learn how to meet the daily flood of business emails and how to process and archive the information relevant to your company in a legally-compliant way. Here are 6 reasons for email archiving. 

More and more emails at work

Every day, employees receive more and more emails in their day-to-day work. Employees received an average of 21 emails per day – and the trend is growing.

• 21 emails received by employees each day
• 306 million emails sent throughout the world in 2020

Of course, some of these business emails contain information that is relevant for the entire company. This information must be made available and archived as it can influence corporate decisions. In addition, the legal situation is clear in Germany: in order to meet the statutory requirements, it isn’t enough to secure business emails on an external hard drive or to set up email forwarding.  

So, what reasons should you consider when it comes to email archiving? 

• Legal security and compliance 
• Use of information for business processes  
• Controlling data 
• Increase in productivity 
• Reduction of internal IT costs 
• Easing the burden on the email servers  

1. Legal security through audit-proof filing

The main reason for archiving emails is to maintain compliance and to adhere with legal provisions. Nowadays, the overwhelming majority of business correspondence is by email. To put it another way, the overwhelming majority of emails have business relevance – e.g. when an invoice arrives by email. The logical consequence of this is that emails must be managed in a similar way to business-relevant paper documents, such as invoices, orders, delivery notes, etc. In accordance with the GoBD, all these documents – and emails – are subject to the retention obligation and must be archived accordingly. 

GoBD is a German acronym that stands for the principles for properly maintaining, keeping and storing books, records and documents in electronic form and for data access, as stipulated by the German tax authorities. Here, the requirements according to which the books and records of business transactions are to be properly maintained are extended to the IT systems which are used for this purpose. That also includes emails. In short: the management of business-relevant emails must ensure that the required retention period – in most cases, 10 years – is complied with. 

It should be noted that this is a mix of software usage (keyword archiving) and procedure documentation. It should also be mentioned that employers need to issue clear instructions regarding the use of private emails in the business mailbox.  

2. Use of information in business processes

The documents, data and information received in emails may be valuable beyond legal reasons, e.g. for data-based decisions in the company. The advantage is that this information is already available in a digital format and can be read and analyzed using digital processes. This can yield valuable insights for companies. You can also automate decisions on a complete basis within processes with the use of artificial intelligence. An example of this would be a complaint email; AI recognizes its content and not only categorizes it, but also triggers an automated follow-up.  

3. Controlling all data

In addition to the aspects related to finance law, controlling data is also about protecting against data loss and immutability. It’s easy to quickly lose track with high volumes of emails, and it’s difficult to manually ensure the consistency of the data contained in them. Causes for the loss of relevant data in emails may include defective PST files, intentional or unintentional deletion or changing systems and the associated restructuring and overwriting of data. It’s also about guaranteeing only authorized people can access certain information. 

The following points are important when processing emails:  

• Retrievability 
• Protection against data loss 
• Immutability and verifiability 
• Access management 

The benefit of email archiving with supporting software is that all these points can be performed automatically. easy for Exchange is certified in accordance with IDW ps880, the testing standard for auditors, and is also coupled to easy archive, which is GDPR-ready. That means it is no longer possible to erase important emails. With the help of workflows, users can add permissions for types of email, and, thanks to the intelligent full-text search function, all emails can be retrieved at any time. Responsibility for the information and data is fully and completely with the company and not Microsoft.  

4. Increase in productivity

Once the email archiving software is set up, the archiving process starts automatically. Employees no longer need to organize or maintain inboxes. Thanks to the full-text search function, employees can retrieve business-related emails quickly and easily. You can keep on top of your emails and have more time for ongoing projects or new ideas.

5. Reducing internal IT costs, easing the burden on IT systems

Companies sometimes shy away from introducing email archiving software as they bemoan unavailable IT resources due to the effort of managing various IT systems. Several heterogeneous IT systems tie up valuable resources during the daily operations. And now you want to add email archiving too? 

When selecting email archiving software, you should make sure that it can be implemented quickly. The solution easy for Exchange can be implemented within a short period of time and is based on Microsoft standard technology, which reduces the operational workload for running the solution to a minimum. The integration into the email client means that no additional training for the users is necessary. 

Another benefit of email archiving is that storing emails and attachments in different places has become obsolete. This reduces your company’s storage requirements and thus the costs of backing up data externally. This also reduces the complexity of the backup as the volume of data is also reduced. A smaller dataset can also be reproduced more quickly in the event of a loss of data.  

6. Easing the burden on the email servers

Predefined workflows automatically archive your emails. That means your emails no longer need to be stored on the server. This significantly reduces the data load on the server and makes mailbox limitations designed to reduce the data on the server obsolete.  

EASY for Exchange is the only email archiving solution on the market that not only archives your email, but also provides you with the option for referencing it. This unique referencing of your emails results in a huge reduction in the volume of your Exchange database. That means you no longer need to think about the timing of lengthy backups.