HR

Step-by-step guide

This guide explains how the Data Retention Dashboard provides an overview of the age of Leaver data in your HR system and enables that data to be purged (archived and anonymised) or deleted.

Overview
To configure the Data Retention Dashboard
Deleting or Archiving Leavers at Risk
- Archive
- Delete
Deleting Leaver Contacts

Overview

The dashboard is typically accessed by clicking Reporting > Specialist Reports > Data Retention Dashboard.

⚠ When you first open the Dashboard you may find there are no records displayed. This is due to the Subset remembering your last search option which may not include Leavers. Click on the Subset icon in the top right and ensure the subset includes Leavers to display records.

The top two quadrants in the Dashboard enable you to manage leaver data that is approaching or exceeding your data retention period and determine whether that data should be purged (archived and anonymised) or deleted.

The bottom two quadrants display graphs of the leaver data.

To configure the Data Retention Dashboard

Leavers at Risk

The top left quadrant displays a list of people who have surpassed the Grace Period Length (the retention period for keeping leaver data) and also that are within the Expiry Warning Length period (approaching the Grace Period).

Columns

The columns can be sorted by clicking on the header or filtered using the funnel icon.

The Action column will display information based on your Grace Period and Expiry Warning Length
configuration:

Overdue Removal: Employee’s Date Left is beyond (older than) the Grace Period
Requires Removal: Employee’s Date Left will go beyond the Grace Period this month
A period in months (eg 2 months) warning that the employee’s Date Left will go beyond the Grace
Period in this timeframe

Hitting the Purge button gives you the option to Delete or Archive the employee(s), see next section for full details.

Configuration

Click on the cog icon to configure the time periods:

Set the Grace Period Length for your data retention period to include Leavers whose data you wish to process, based on their Date Left (eg use 72 months to look back 6 years and identify Leavers who left before this)
Set the Expiry Warning Length for how long before the Grace Period you want the system to warn you of people approaching it (eg use 3 months and the system will show a countdown in months when leave dates are within 3 months of the Grace Period)
Click Update to apply your settings and the data will refresh

Leavers at Risk with Contacts

The top right quadrant displays a list of people who have surpassed the Grace Period Length or are within the Expiry Warning Length period. This gives a count of how many contacts each person listed has. Deleting will delete the contacts of the employee(s).

Subset

The Subset tool in the top right corner of the screen can be used to filter the view of data so that only
records meeting specific criteria are visible in the dashboard (such as a particular Location). Ensure Leavers are included in your Subset data as a minimum or no data will show.

Distribution of Leavers Approaching Grace Period

The bottom left quadrant provides a tree map view which represents people in each Country broken down by Location, then by OrgUnit1 (eg Department).

Leavers Approaching Grace Period

The bottom right quadrant provides a bar chart of employees who are Overdue Removal, Require Removal or have an Expiry Warning Length value as they are approaching the Grace Period.

Hovering over any of the blocks in the two graphs will display the number of records.

Deleting or Archiving Leavers at risk

Alongside each record that appears in the Leavers at Risk quadrant there is a Purge button, or at the top of the Leavers at Risk quadrant there is a red Purge Records button to purge (archive and anonymise) all records in view
Clicking on either option will present the option to Delete or Archive the related record(s)

Archived areas

The following data areas will be retained as part of the Archive process, however, the fields listed will be removed as potentially identifiable information.

Data Table	Deleted Fields
Absence (Time Off)	Further Information (FI) Fields Return to Work Notes
Holiday Adjustment History	Reason
Job and Pay	FI Fields Notes
Allowances	Notes
Payments	Notes
Personal Details	Address Date From Address Line 1 Address Line 2 Address Line 3 Address Line 4 Bank Code Bank Name Bank No Building Society Roll No Car Reg Number Contact Email Address Disability Notes Disability Option Employee Number FI Fields Holiday Adjustment Reason Home Email Address	Home Fax No Home Telephone No Home Telephone No 2 Honours Intranet Password Intranet Password GUID Intranet Password GUIDSalt Leaving Notes NI Number Notes Payroll ID Photo Post Code RDP Desc Work Email Address Work Mobile NoWork Telephone No
Qualifications (Skills and Qualifications)	More Subjects Notes FI Fields
Training (Training Details)	FI Fields Invoice Address Line 1 Invoice Address Line 2 Invoice Address Line 3 Invoice Address Line 4 Invoice Name Invoice Postcode Misc Description Notes Purchase No Withdrawn Reason
Training Needs (Development Needs)	FI Fields Notes
Tutors	Tutor Email Address (note this is only if the Tutor is marked as an employee)
Case Management	Case information retained linked to 'Archived' employee (Note: case correspondence may need to be manually redacted)
Talent Management	Employee review forms are removed but Manager and Peer forms are retained

Note: Areas not listed here will be completely removed.

If you choose to Archive then following completion of the action you will be presented with confirmation of the Purge and details of other data management that you may wish to action

Note: If you choose to subsequently delete an Archived record this must be completed
via:

Go to the following area:
• Latest menu: Data Management > Delete Employee
• Pre 2025 menu: System > Security > Delete Employee

Archived names will not appear in the Data Retention Dashboard.

Delete

If you choose to Delete a record then it will be removed from the system.

When clicking Delete you will be presented with a similar confirmation as the Archive/Purge action and details of other data management that you may wish to action

Deleting Leaver Contacts

Where you have stored additional contact details (such as next of kin) in the Emergency & Other Contact Details page, you can choose to specifically delete these from a leaver record without affecting the rest of their data, as you may have a shorter data retention period for this type of information that relates to other people.

The number of contacts are displayed against each leaver that can be deleted. This number relates to contacts that are not a Home address type.

Alongside each record that appears in the Leavers at Risk with Contacts quadrant there is a Delete button
Clicking on the button will present the option to confirm Delete and an explanation as to what that will do
Delete as required
At the top of the Leavers at Risk with Contacts quadrant there is a Delete Records option which will carry out the same action as the above but for all records in that quadrant on display

Footer

Field	Anonymised value
Forenames	Archived
Initials	A
Known As	Archived
Name	Archived
Surname	Next available sequential number
User Logon (in Account Settings)	random 8 alpha characters e.g. '38AA2879'
Performance Reviews (Archive) Reviewer Comments	Archived Comment this is for archiving comments made by the selected record on other reviews
Tutor Name and Notes fields (if flagged as employee)	Anonymised
User Applicant Subset Description	Archived Subset (Note: this relates to a former, pre-v9 version of Ciphr HR and is only relevant if the Employee had a PerUserId and had any Applicant Subsets)
User Subset Description	Archived Subset (Note: this relates to a former, pre-v9 version of Ciphr HR and is only relevant if the Employee has a PerUserId and has any Subsets)

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