Tech Forum

After a temple recommend book is fully used up, how long should it be kept? And what is the best way to dispose of it?

As long as all of the recommends have been activated/recorded by the stake, I'm not sure as there's any reason to keep it. Certainly no reason after they've expired.

I'm curious what others have to say.

russellhltn wrote:As long as all of the recommends have been activated/recorded by the stake, I'm not sure as there's any reason to keep it. Certainly no reason after they've expired.

I'm curious what others have to say.

I understood that it should be retained until the last recommend entered has expired i.e. 2 years.

Biggles wrote:

russellhltn wrote:As long as all of the recommends have been activated/recorded by the stake, I'm not sure as there's any reason to keep it. Certainly no reason after they've expired.

I'm curious what others have to say.

I understood that it should be retained until the last recommend entered has expired i.e. 2 years.

I don't have one to refer to but this used to be printed in the books themselves. But that may have been before temple recommends had to be activated. If they don't have a statement like that in there somewhere then it may no longer be necessary to retain them.

Biggles wrote:I understood that it should be retained until the last recommend entered has expired i.e. 2 years.

This is what we do. It serves as a useful tool when a recommend is lost, or as a backup when online resources are not available.

I don't have access to the actual book to see what the instructions say, though. And if they are different, the instructions in the book should be followed.

When I was clerk, I recall somewhere there were instructions to keep the book until the last recommend had expired. That was a couple of years ago, though, and things may have changed.

As a suggestion for my method: I would take the completed book, fold the hard cover page (the one that backs up the carbons) over the top and write "destroy after MM/DD/YYYY" on the face (the expiration date of the last recommend issued from the book). Then I would file it (reverse date order) in the locked file cabinet. That way, the oldest book was in front and it was easy to check if one was due for the shredder (I made it part of my monthly process to review the month's records to make sure they were in order for the next Audit).

davesudweeks wrote:When I was clerk, I recall somewhere there were instructions to keep the book until the last recommend had expired. That was a couple of years ago, though, and things may have changed.

I've just checked in the book and that is still the recommended course of action.