Last Updated: May 21, 2026

In the State of Washington, agencies like the University of Washington must meet specific requirements to digitally scan records and dispose of original paper documents. Records must be scanned and verified in a systematic, consistent manner.  

 

Each UW department is responsible for ensuring all records are scanned in compliance with these scanning guidelines. If your department uses a third-party vendor to scan records, the vendor must meet these same technical requirements. To ensure compliance with Washington State requirements, Records Management Services (RMS) has established the following standards for the UW Academy. 

How Do Records Need to be Scanned?

Technical Scanning Requirements 

  • Records must be scanned at a minimum of 300 dpi (dots per inch). 

  • Scanned records should be saved as PDF files whenever possible. When scanning records using a mobile device, JPEG is an acceptable format. 

Quality Control 

  • Each scanned record must be visually inspected to ensure the image is complete, clear, and legible. 

  • Scanned records should be compared to the original paper document to verify image quality and accuracy. 

  • The length of the resulting PDF must be compared to the number of scanned pages to ensure all documents were properly captured. Similarly, when using a mobile device to scan records, the resulting images must be reviewed against their originals to confirm completeness. 

Image Enhancement 

At times, scanned records may be difficult to read or unusable. If a scanned document is replacing the original paper record, these common problems must be corrected. If the condition of the original record prevents a good quality scan, the original paper copy must be retained. 

OCR Text in Adobe Acrobat: 

For details on how to recognize text in Adobe Acrobat to make scanned images searchable and more accessible, refer to our resource. 

Speckles, spots, or lines on the scanned image: 

Clean the scanner glass. 

Scanned image is crooked or cut-off: 

Place the document directly on the scanner glass instead of using the document feeder. 

General readability issues: 

Increase the scanning resolution above 300 dpi (dots per inch). 

Scan in color instead of black & white. 

Adjust the scanner’s brightness and contrast settings. 

Watermark or background interferes with readability: 

In addition to the recommendations above, check if the scanner has a "background suppression" setting and turn it on if applicable. 

Oversized documents (e.g., a European hotel folio): 

Either make multiple scans, adjust the image size settings, or reposition the original document to capture all relevant text. 

Scanner Security Requirements 

A growing number of office devices, such as printers, copiers, and fax machines are network-connectable and may retain copies of scanned or copied documents. In most cases, these devices can be configured to automatically delete stored information. We strongly recommend enabling automatic deletion or, if that is not practicable, establishing a process to manually clear the device’s memory. 

 

If a source document cannot be scanned completely or accurately, or if the scanned image does not meet these requirements, the original document must be retained for the entire retention period. Departments are not approved to dispose of original paper records that do not meet these scanning requirements.  

Archival Records  

Records deemed archival in the records retention schedule require departments to contact the UW Archives before destroying the original paper document.  

How Do I Manage, Store and Retain the Scanned Images? 

University records must remain readable and accessible for the full legally required retention period. By following the Technical Requirements, Quality Control, and Image Enhancement requirements above, departments are ensuring readability. To maintain the accessibility and protect records from alteration, deletion or loss, departments must be intentional about where and how they store their digital records. 

 

When an employee leaves the department, it is the responsibility of the departmental Administrator or Manager to close all related accounts and remove all access for the employee. User System access must be tied to a unique identifier (login). Shared accounts are not permitted unless authorized by the system owner or operator and where appropriate accountability can be maintained. 

 

RMS partners with the UW enterprise Document Management System (DMS), powered by DocFinity, that meets a wide variety of compliance, security and record retention requirements and is a terrific long-term storage solution for scanned images.  

 

RMS also offers a variety of resources to support departments, such as Choosing the Right Storage Location, Best Practices for Structuring Electronic Files, Folder Structures, File Naming Conventions and the questions to consider when using Third-Party Software. 

 

Visit our resource on What, When, and Why to Scan Paper Records to help get started. Contact RMS at recmgt@uw.edu for more detailed information on your specific records and digital storage solution.  

FAQ

Q: My department previously created a unique scanning policy with RMS. What should I do?  

A: Department-specific scanning policies were created with many of the same technical requirements specified above. As a result, if you continue following your existing scanning policy, you will remain in compliance. However, as of May 21, 2026, departments are no longer required to create or maintain a unique department scanning policy with RMS. As long as your department follows the requirements above, no additional -documentation is needed. RMS will retain previously created scanning policies and make them available for 6 years from May 21, 2026, after which RMS will be delete them.  

 

Q: Our program would like to have a customized standard operating procedure created for our scanning practices, can RMS help us with this?  

A: As of May 21, 2026, RMS is no longer creating or hosting department-specific scanning policies. If you would like to create a standard operating procedure (SOP) for your unit that dictates where and how you are storing your scanned images in accordance with the technical requirements above, you are encouraged to document your practices for clarity and posterity. RMS can provide feedback on these SOPs, but departments are responsible for managing, updating and disposing of them per their retention period.  

  

Q: Does RMS offer scanning services to units? Do you provide recommendations for vendors to use?  

A: Our program does not offer scanning services to the UW. However, Creative Communications Scan Center offers secure, on-campus scanning that meet these requirements. C2 can assist with document preparation, scanning, file naming, data processing, and shredding. Contact the C2 Scan Center for assistance with your large-volume scanning projects.