Employee Center Data Retention and Backup Policy

No Raw Database Data Claim

For clarity, this document does not claim that Quintin N. Mahan owns raw facts, raw database rows, independent outside source records, CRS-owned operational records, customer-owned records, third-party-owned records, or customer relationships merely because such information is entered into, stored in, processed by, displayed through, backed up with, or exported from EC.

This document protects EC Protected Materials: the application, software, source code, schemas, database design, data model, relationships, indexes, workflows, dashboards, reports, queries, automations, integrations, APIs, access controls, credentials, hardware, infrastructure, legal records, certificate records, hashes, metadata systems, audit systems, methods, processes, techniques, trade secrets, documentation, and EC-created structural organization.

Version: 1.0
Effective Date: June 1, 2026
Platform: Employee Center / EC
Owner: Quintin N. Mahan
Legal Hub: /legal
Policy URL: /legal/data-retention-backup-policy

1. Purpose

This Data Retention and Backup Policy explains how Employee Center (“EC”) may retain, archive, preserve, back up, restore, export, migrate, and protect EC records.

EC is a private operational platform owned by Quintin N. Mahan. EC records may be retained for operational, customer-service, legal, security, evidence, continuity, ownership, audit, and backup purposes.

This policy is intended to protect EC, the EC Protected Materials, EC backups, EC legal records, EC certificates, EC audit logs, EC generated exhibits, EC operational history, and evidence preservation and authorized transition support.

2. Scope

This policy applies to:

• EC database records;
• customer records;
• company records;
• contact records;
• store/location records;
• service records;
• task records;
• timecard records;
• call-log records;
• attachments;
• uploaded files;
• service reports;
• signatures;
• API records;
• webhook records;
• automation records;
• audit logs;
• metadata;
• legal records;
• Terms versions;
• policy versions;
• acceptance records;
• decline records;
• certificate records;
• certificate PDFs;
• generated exhibits;
• backups;
• exports;
• archives;
• historical records;
• system configuration records;
• EC source/control records where applicable.

3. Relationship to Other Policies

This policy works together with:

• Employee Center Terms and Conditions;
• Privacy Notice;
• Acceptable Use Policy;
• Cookie and Local Storage Notice;
• Data Security Policy;
• API and Integrations Policy.

If this policy conflicts with the Employee Center Terms and Conditions, the Terms and Conditions control unless Quintin N. Mahan signs a separate written agreement stating otherwise.

Nothing in this policy transfers ownership of EC, EC records, EC backups, EC source code, EC certificates, EC legal records, EC infrastructure, or the EC Protected Materials.

4. Retention Principles

EC may retain records when retention supports:

• EC operation;
• customer service;
• service history;
• employee time/work history;
• accounting or business reference;
• evidence preservation and authorized transition support;
• troubleshooting;
• reporting;
• auditing;
• legal evidence;
• security review;
• certificate validation;
• Terms enforcement;
• policy enforcement;
• owner/admin defense;
• backup and disaster recovery;
• migration or export;
• post-trigger continuity use.

EC may retain both active and historical records.

5. Active Records

Active records are records currently used by EC for ordinary operations.

Active records may include:

• active customers;
• active companies;
• active contacts;
• active tasks;
• active timecards;
• active service reports;
• active equipment records;
• active integrations;
• active user accounts;
• active legal documents;
• active Terms version;
• active certificates;
• active dashboards;
• active reports;
• active audit records.

Active records may remain available in EC as long as needed for authorized EC-related purposes.

6. Archived Records

Archived records are records no longer active but retained for history, audit, continuity, evidence, or reference.

Archived records may include:

• former customers;
• old contacts;
• inactive stores;
• completed tasks;
• old timecards;
• closed service records;
• historical call logs;
• old attachments;
• old reports;
• old exports;
• old user accounts;
• superseded Terms versions;
• superseded policy versions;
• prior certificates;
• prior exhibits;
• old integration logs.

Archived does not mean deleted.

Archived records may remain part of EC and the EC Protected Materials.

7. Deletion and Removal

EC is not required to delete records merely because they are old, inactive, archived, disputed, inconvenient, or no longer used day-to-day.

Deletion may be restricted where records are needed for:

• legal preservation;
• evidence;
• audit history;
• evidence preservation and authorized transition support;
• backup integrity;
• certificate validation;
• Terms history;
• policy history;
• ownership defense;
• security review;
• dispute resolution;
• trigger-event continuity.

If records are deleted through authorized workflows, EC may still retain metadata, audit logs, deletion records, backups, snapshots, or historical references.

8. Legal and Evidence Records

EC legal and evidence records should be retained and protected from deletion.

These records include:

• Terms versions;
• policy versions;
• user acceptance records;
• company acceptance records;
• decline records;
• individual acceptance certificates;
• company acceptance certificates;
• Exhibit A;
• Exhibit B;
• Exhibit C;
• generated certificate PDFs;
• certificate hashes;
• Terms hashes;
• policy hashes;
• legal email logs;
• legal send logs;
• generated exhibit snapshots;
• audit logs relating to legal records.

These records may be retained indefinitely unless Quintin N. Mahan decides otherwise or deletion is legally required.

9. Backup Records

EC may create and retain backups of:

• databases;
• attachments;
• uploaded files;
• legal records;
• certificate PDFs;
• generated exhibits;
• configuration files;
• application files;
• logs;
• exports;
• metadata;
• repository or deployment-related materials;
• other EC-related materials.

Backups may be stored on EC-controlled storage, local systems, network storage, external drives, servers, cloud systems, or other systems controlled or approved by Quintin N. Mahan.

Backups may contain records that were later edited, archived, deleted, or superseded in active EC.

10. Backup Rotation

EC may rotate backups according to operational needs.

Backup rotation may include:

• current backups;
• daily backups;
• weekly backups;
• monthly backups;
• annual backups;
• manual snapshots;
• pre-migration snapshots;
• pre-update snapshots;
• legal preservation snapshots;
• incident snapshots;
• trigger-event snapshots.

Older backups may be retained, rotated, replaced, archived, or deleted depending on EC needs and owner/admin decision.

11. Legal Holds and Preservation

EC may place records, backups, logs, certificates, files, exports, repositories, or metadata under legal hold or preservation hold.

A preservation hold may be used for:

• disputes;
• threatened claims;
• employment changes;
• CRS ownership changes;
• sale/change-of-control events;
• attempted seizure;
• attempted lockout;
• suspected misuse;
• security incidents;
• evidence preservation and authorized transition support risk;
• data integrity concerns;
• Terms enforcement;
• policy enforcement;
• owner/admin defense.

Records under preservation hold must not be deleted, altered, concealed, corrupted, overwritten, or interfered with.

12. Trigger Events

Certain events may require enhanced retention, backup, or preservation.

Trigger events may include:

• employment termination;
• constructive termination;
• suspension;
• lockout;
• access revocation;
• refusal of Terms;
• company refusal of Terms;
• attempted system seizure;
• attempted credential takeover;
• attempted repository copy;
• attempted database export;
• attempted backup deletion;
• CRS dissolution;
• CRS insolvency;
• CRS sale or change of control;
• evidence preservation and authorized transition support risk;
• nonpayment;
• security incident;
• legal dispute;
• threatened litigation;
• regulatory inquiry.

After a trigger event, EC may preserve or increase retention of relevant records.

13. Audit Logs and Metadata

EC may retain audit logs and metadata relating to:

• logins;
• failed logins;
• user sessions;
• IP addresses;
• user agents;
• route access;
• record changes;
• exports;
• imports;
• file access;
• API calls;
• webhook activity;
• automation activity;
• Terms views;
• Legal page views;
• certificate views;
• acceptance events;
• decline events;
• admin actions;
• database actions;
• backup actions;
• security events;
• errors.

Audit logs and metadata may be retained for security, evidence, troubleshooting, reporting, evidence preservation and authorized transition support, and legal defense.

14. Certificate and Terms Retention

Acceptance certificates, Terms records, policy records, and generated legal artifacts may be retained for as long as needed to prove:

• notice;
• access;
• acceptance;
• refusal;
• decline;
• authority;
• company acceptance;
• Terms version;
• policy version;
• hash integrity;
• certificate generation;
• email notice;
• legal preservation;
• EC ownership;
• EC Protected Materials rights.

These records may be retained indefinitely.

15. User Departure or Employment Change

When a user leaves, changes roles, loses access, declines Terms, or has access revoked, EC may retain that user’s related records.

Retained records may include:

• user account metadata;
• role history;
• task history;
• timecard history;
• service records;
• notes;
• attachments;
• audit logs;
• acceptance certificates;
• decline records;
• certificate views;
• login history;
• session logs;
• security events.

User departure does not require deletion of EC records.

16. Customer or Company Changes

When a customer, company, store, or contact becomes inactive, archived, transferred, disputed, closed, sold, or replaced, EC may retain related records for history, audit, continuity, reporting, legal, and evidence purposes.

Archived customer/company records may remain part of EC and the EC Protected Materials.

17. Backup Restoration

EC may restore from backups when needed for:

• disaster recovery;
• data corruption;
• accidental deletion;
• system failure;
• migration;
• security incident;
• testing;
• legal preservation;
• evidence preservation and authorized transition support;
• owner/admin defense.

Restoration may reintroduce records that were edited, archived, or deleted after the backup was created.

18. Exports and Migration

EC may export or migrate records for lawful EC-related purposes.

Exports may be used for:

• backup;
• reporting;
• troubleshooting;
• legal preservation;
• evidence preservation and authorized transition support;
• migration;
• system repair;
• owner/admin defense;
• evidence packages;
• generated exhibit packages.

Exports remain subject to the Terms and applicable EC policies.

19. No User-Controlled Destruction of EC Evidence

Users may not delete, alter, corrupt, conceal, overwrite, or interfere with EC evidence records.

Protected evidence records include:

• Terms versions;
• policy versions;
• acceptance records;
• decline records;
• certificate PDFs;
• generated exhibits;
• audit logs;
• backup logs;
• security logs;
• API logs;
• automation logs;
• email logs;
• metadata;
• preserved files;
• legal holds.

20. Security of Backups

Backups should be protected from unauthorized access, seizure, deletion, copying, corruption, or lockout.

Users may not:

• take backup drives;
• copy backup files;
• delete backup files;
• disable backup jobs;
• change backup credentials;
• block owner/admin backup access;
• restore backups without authorization;
• use backups to clone EC;
• transfer backups to a buyer, successor, or third party without authorization.

21. Retention After Sale or Change of Control

A sale, transfer, merger, acquisition, ownership change, control change, asset sale, or successor transaction involving CRS does not require EC records, backups, certificates, source code, or the EC Protected Materials to be transferred to a buyer or successor.

EC may retain records and backups after such events for ownership, evidence, continuity, legal, and operational purposes.

Any buyer or successor requires a new license from Quintin N. Mahan to access EC.

22. Changes to This Policy

Quintin N. Mahan may update this Data Retention and Backup Policy by publishing a new active version in EC.

The current active version will be displayed through the Legal hub.

Older versions may remain stored in Postgres for audit, evidence, and historical review.

23. Contact / Owner

Employee Center is owned by Quintin N. Mahan.

Legal and policy documents are available from:

/legal

The current Terms and Conditions are available from:

/legal/terms-and-conditions

End of Data Retention and Backup Policy.