Document retention periods for businesses: the complete guide

You run a business and every day you receive invoices, contracts, bank statements, payslips. At some point the question lands: "How long must I keep all this?" Many owners answer on instinct: "A few years" or "Until it is settled." The reality is more precise and varies by document type. Keeping too little exposes you to penalties; keeping too much clutters storage. At Hayot Expertise, we help clients set clear policies that avoid both traps.

Quick answer. Accounting records (books, registers, invoices, purchase orders) are kept for 10 years from the close of the fiscal year (Commercial Code, Article L123-22). Tax documents are kept for 6 years (Tax Procedure Code, Article L102 B), extended to 10 years for undeclared activity. Payslips and most employment documents are kept for 5 years, like commercial contracts (30 years for real property). Premature destruction deprives you of evidence and can lead to rejection of your accounts on audit.

Document retention is not personal housekeeping: it is a legal obligation. Three reasons justify it:

1. Proof in case of dispute. Your documents are the evidence in an administrative or legal file. Without a record of an order, delivery or invoice, you cannot justify a good or service provided.
2. Tax audit. The authorities can ask you to support each accounting entry. No documents means rejection of accounts, reassessment and penalties.
3. Employment compliance. Labour inspectors enforce working-hour, wage and leave rules: they need registers, contracts and payslips.

The GDPR right to erasure coexists with these duties but does not override them: you must keep what the law requires, even where documents contain personal data, while processing them securely.

The law distinguishes several categories. Here is the reference table:

Our reading. This table covers common duties, but each sector adds its own periods: a healthcare professional keeps patient files twenty years after the last treatment, and some bank records are kept longer. Before applying the table uniformly, check your sector-specific duties.

A sound archival policy follows these steps:

1. Identify what must be kept: inventory documents you receive or create (invoices, contracts, payroll, reports, exchanges). Ask each team: "What do we produce here?"
2. Apply the legal period: classify each type per the table above. A colour code (5, 6, 10, 30 years) adds clarity.
3. Date the origin: note the start of the period (contract signature, fiscal year-end, employee departure). A frequent source of confusion.
4. Choose the medium: paper or digital? The law accepts both, provided digital storage is legally sound (integrity guaranteed, timestamp).
5. Organise storage: create folders by year and category. Name files with the date, for example "Invoices 2026 Q1" or "Key client contracts 2024-2026".
6. Plan destruction: once the period ends, destroy physical documents (certified shredding for sensitive data) and delete files. Document the destruction for your internal records.

Archival checklist#

• Inventory of document types created and received completed.
• Legal period applied to each document type.
• Start date of each period identified (signature, year-end, departure).
• Medium choice (paper or digital) documented and justified.
• File naming and filing rule established.
• Destruction calendar and alert system in place.
• Persons responsible for retention identified (assistant, accountant).
• Backups of critical documents in place.
• Past destructions documented as proof of diligence.

Micro-enterprise#

Retention duties remain identical: you keep accounting records ten years, even with simplified accounting. You can, however, digitise more easily.

Liberal profession#

The same accounting and tax periods apply, plus duties specific to your profession (client files, durations set by each professional body).

Association or foundation#

Keep annual accounts ten years, meeting minutes five years, payroll vouchers three years. Non-profit status does not exempt you from accounting duties.

Digital archiving#

The law accepts digital storage, provided the file is legally sound:

• Integrity guaranteed (electronic signature, timestamp, cryptographic hash).
• Durable accessibility (lasting format, no lock-in to a single software).
• Storage and access traceability.

Legally sound e-archiving sets out these conditions, consistent with the lifecycle of electronic invoices.

• "Retained" versus "accessible". A document held by a third party (cloud, accountant) must remain accessible to you and the authorities throughout the period. Check archival contracts: who deletes after the period? Who pays?
• Extended audit rights for fraud. For undeclared activity, the authorities can go back ten years even where the normal period is six. Keep longer as a precaution if a thorough review is possible.
• Payslips: employee right and employer duty. Employer side, five years. Employee side, no duty to return: advise them to keep payslips indefinitely in a digital safe.
• Electronic contracts of EUR 120 or more. Often overlooked: online-signed quotes and emailed purchase orders are kept ten years, with their acceptance trace.
• GDPR erasure and legal retention. Legal duties prevail over the right to erasure: do not delete before the legal term. Keeping a GDPR records register helps reconcile both.

We supported a services SME that had gone "paperless" but mishandled the transition: invoices from 2015 to 2018 were deleted from the server to "free up space". On audit, the authorities asked for proof of subcontracting declared in 2016. No invoice available. Entries had to be reconstructed from bank statements, a long and costly task. A clear retention plan, set up from the start, would have avoided months of back-and-forth.

Hayot Expertise advice. Draw up a written archival policy with named owners and a destruction calendar. Do not leave the decision to the manager of the day. Half a day invested in a retention plan spares you months of stress and avoidable penalties. If you digitise, check that the medium guarantees the required evidential value. Our accounting and administrative management team can audit your setup.

• Accounting records: 10 years from close of fiscal year (Commercial Code Art. L123-22).
• Tax documents: 6 years (Tax Procedure Code Art. L102 B); 10 years for fraud or undeclared activity.
• Payslips, employment documents and commercial contracts: 5 years.
• Real property contracts: 30 years; electronic contracts of EUR 120 or more: 10 years.
• Personnel register: 5 years after the employee's departure.
• Social charges: 3 years; work-day records: 1 year.
• Document your destructions and guarantee the evidential value of digital archiving.

Official sources#

• Service-Public — Document retention periods for a business
• Légifrance — Commercial Code, Article L123-22
• Légifrance — Tax Procedure Code, Article L102 B
• Légifrance — Labour Code, Article L3243-4 (payslips)
• Légifrance — Labour Code, Articles L1221-15 and R1221-26
• Légifrance — Consumer Code, Article L213-1