Retain the sponsorship description, authorisations, official notices, payment evidence and adviser scope in an organised file with an assigned owner.
Plan for staff turnover
Make it possible for an authorised successor to identify the case, outstanding actions and relevant professional contacts without circulating personal employee records unnecessarily. Ask counsel about actual record requirements and current instructions. This practical retention plan does not establish a universal statutory retention period or permission to share confidential material.
Retention is only useful where the file proves what it claims. An authorisation should show who signed, the scope of the authority and its date; a notice should be kept whole, with its envelope or transmission detail, rather than as a cropped extract; an adviser’s scope should appear in the engagement terms and not in a recollection of a meeting. Hypothetical example: an animation studio keeps a screenshot of an official notice showing the body text alone, and when a successor administrator needs the reference number and the date of issue, neither is on the image.
Store the complete original beside any working copy, name each file so its date and origin are readable, and note who holds the authority to release it. This is practical recordkeeping rather than a statutory retention rule, and it does not authorise circulating confidential employee material.