Retention Monitoring

CoralLedger Comply enforces per-business data retention policies through scheduled enforcement runs. The default retention period is 7 years (5-year statutory minimum under Value Added Tax Act, 2014, Part X §79–80; CoralLedger extends this to 7 years as platform policy). Operators can review retention schedules, preview upcoming enforcement actions, and investigate detected violations before data is affected.

Accessing Retention Monitoring

Navigate to Platform Ops > Data Operations > Retention. This feature requires PlatformAdmin access.

Default Retention Policy

All businesses are subject to the platform-wide default:

Setting	Value	Basis
Minimum retention period	7 years (CoralLedger policy; 5-year statutory minimum extended)	Value Added Tax Act, 2014, Part X §79–80
Applies to	Transactions, VAT returns, audit records, uploaded files	—
Enforcement	Scheduled; runs on a scheduled basis	—

Records that are within their retention window cannot be permanently deleted, regardless of operator action or approved deletion requests.

Why "five years" appears multiple times in the VAT Act 2014

The 5-year retention period (which CoralLedger Comply extends to 7 years) is set by §79(2) of the VAT Act 2014, within Part X — Record Keeping and Accounts. Readers familiar with the Act may encounter two other "five years" that are not the retention obligation — distinguishing them prevents the citation confusion that has crept into Bahamian VAT documentation in the past:

1. Part VIII — Assessments. The Comptroller has five years after a VAT return is filed to make a tax assessment. This is the Comptroller's assessment window, not the taxpayer's record-retention obligation. The two clocks run independently — retaining records under §79(2) is a separate obligation from the Comptroller's right to assess under Part VIII.
2. §50 — Input tax deduction. §50 requires that documentation supporting an input-tax-deduction claim exist at the time the return is filed, but §50 itself sets no retention period. The retention obligation is in §79(2); §50 governs allowability, not retention. (A propagated mis-citation of §50 as the retention authority was corrected across CoralLedger documentation on 2026-05-31; see CASS-VAT-ACT-RETENTION-VERIFICATION-2026-05-31.md for the verification bundle.)

CoralLedger Comply's retention enforcement is grounded in §79(2). Operators citing the legal basis to clients or auditors should cite VAT Act, 2014, Part X, §§79–80.

Verbatim §79(2):

Accounting records maintained pursuant to this section must be kept for a period of five years after —

(a) the end of the tax period to which such records relate, in the case of a registrant; or

(b) the occurrence of the taxable transaction to which such records relate.

Per-Business Retention Policies

Operators can configure a custom retention policy for each business:

1. Navigate to Platform Ops > Data Operations > Retention > Policies
2. Select the business
3. Adjust the retention period (minimum 7 years; longer periods are permitted)
4. Click Save Policy

info

Custom policies can only extend the retention period beyond the 7-year minimum. Reducing a business's retention period below 7 years is not permitted.

Policy Summary

The Policy Summary table lists all businesses with their configured retention settings:

Column	Description
Business	Business name
Policy	Custom or Default
Retention Period	Configured retention window
Records in Window	Count of records currently within retention
Upcoming Purges	Records scheduled for purge in the next 90 days
Violations	Count of active policy violations

Enforcement Preview

Before retention enforcement runs, operators can preview which records are scheduled to be purged:

1. Navigate to Platform Ops > Data Operations > Retention > Preview
2. Select the business (or view all)
3. Set the preview window (e.g., next 30, 60, or 90 days)
4. Click Run Preview

The preview shows:

• Record Type — Transaction, return, file, etc.
• Record ID — Unique identifier
• Created Date — When the record was created
• Retention Expiry — When the record is eligible for purge
• Legal Hold — Whether a legal hold is blocking purge

tip

Use enforcement preview before each scheduled purge run to ensure no unexpectedly critical records are about to be removed.

Violation Detection

The system continuously monitors for retention policy violations — records that should have been retained but were prematurely deleted, or records past their retention window that have not yet been purged.

Viewing Violations

The retention monitor surface exposes a HasViolations indicator on each business's policy summary card. The full per-violation drill-down with the columns below is planned functionality — the violation count is computed today via RetentionMonitorSummary.HasViolations, but a dedicated violations page is not yet implemented in the Comply UI:

Column	Description
Violation ID	Unique identifier
Business	Affected business
Record Type	Type of affected record
Record ID	Affected record identifier
Violation Type	Premature deletion or retention overrun
Detected On	When the violation was flagged
Severity	Low, Medium, or High

When a non-zero violation count appears on a business, contact the security team for the underlying detail until the dedicated UI ships.

Resolving Violations

1. Review the violation details to understand the cause
2. For premature deletion violations, check the Audit Trail for the deletion event
3. Mark the violation as reviewed once investigated
4. If data recovery is required, contact support

Enforcement Run

When the enforcement schedule triggers (or an operator manually initiates a run):

1. Records past their retention window are identified
2. Records under a legal hold are skipped
3. Records within an active deletion grace period are skipped
4. Eligible records are permanently purged
5. A summary report is written to the Audit Trail

To manually trigger an enforcement run:

1. Navigate to Platform Ops > Data Operations > Retention > Enforce
2. Select the scope (single business or all)
3. Review the enforcement preview
4. Click Run Enforcement

warning

Enforcement purges are permanent and cannot be undone. Always run and review an enforcement preview first.

Best Practices

1. Review the enforcement preview monthly — Avoid unexpected purges of important records
2. Set longer retention for high-risk businesses — Businesses under audit or with litigation should have extended periods
3. Resolve violations promptly — Unresolved violations may indicate a compliance gap
4. Coordinate with legal holds — Ensure that any records subject to litigation are held before enforcement runs
5. Export before purge — Use Business Data Export to archive records before they are purged if needed

By Statute References

• Record Keeping and Retention

Next Steps

• Deletion requests
• Legal holds
• Business data export
• Audit trail
• VAT Act compliance reference