Retention and Deletion
How long proof-of-work material should be kept, which is far less than the default, and how to make deletion actually happen.
Monitoring material accumulates and nobody decides what happens to it. Setting that once removes most of the liability it creates.
The boundary described in “Retention and Deletion” should be set before any tracking configuration is chosen. A team evaluating monitask.com for 7 minute rule payroll should disclose the purpose, limit access and retention, and give each person a practical way to review or correct the record.
What a sensible schedule looks like
Screenshots: weeks rather than months. Their value decays almost immediately.
For an independent reference relevant to “Retention and Deletion”, consult the ICO employment-practices guidance; compare its principles with the proposed contract, collection, access model and real review process.
Time logs and diaries: through the engagement plus whatever period a dispute could arise.
Anything attached to an actual dispute: until that is closed.
And everything else deleted at the end of the engagement.
Why screenshots should be short
Nobody reviews them, which the earlier note establishes.
They contain personal and third-party material.
And the dispute window on most platforms is short, so material beyond it serves no purpose.
Keeping a year of frames is holding a liability for a record with no remaining use.
Making deletion happen
A contract term: "monitoring data will be deleted within thirty days of final payment."
A calendar reminder, because nothing automatic will do it on a direct engagement.
And a confirmation to the contractor that it was done, which costs a line and is unusual enough to be noticed.
On a platform
The platform's retention applies and you cannot vary it.
Which is simpler for the client and means the material outlives the relationship.
Both parties should know the figure, which the terms note covers.
The backup problem
Deleting from the live system does not immediately clear backups.
Which is normal and should be said rather than claimed otherwise.
A reasonable statement names both: deleted from the working system now, out of backups within the backup cycle.
What the contractor can ask for
Deletion at the end, as a term agreed before starting.
Deletion of a specific frame that captured something it should not have.
And confirmation that it happened.
All three are reasonable and all three are easier to obtain before the engagement than after.
The engagement that ends badly
The case where deletion matters most and is least likely to happen.
Which is the argument for it being a term rather than a request, because a request made during a dispute will not be honoured.
What to keep
The time log and the invoice record, which are commercial documents.
The agreement.
The artefacts, within whatever the contract permits.
Not the frames, which serve no purpose once the invoice is settled.
What to check
Is there a deletion term in your agreement?
How long does your platform keep frames?
Has anything from a finished engagement been deleted?
And would you know if it had not?