Standard Size File Boxes - What The Hell Does That Mean?

Hi Everybody,

Before you call a single Paper Shredding Company to ask about prices, you need to know one Very Important thing:

How many Standard Size File Boxes do you have?

Every document destruction company on the planet needs to know how much paper you have in order to provide to you a quote.

In order to answer that question, you need to know: What is a Standard Size File Box?

Click on the Link Below to check out my newest VIDEO answering that very question.

Standard Size File Boxes - What The Hell Does That Mean?

Keep Total Secure,

Mike

Retired Business Man Gets $7,200 Lesson

Hey folks,

If you're not 100% convinced there are people looking through your trash... you NEED to read this...

Allen, a successful but now retired businessman came down to our facility just this morning to get four boxes of documents shredded. Allen shreds everything now, but that was not always the case…

When Allen sold his house a few years ago he had a few items to get shredded… and because we all know what a royal "pain-in-the-ass" those little shredders are… he decided to just throw his papers (including old canceled checks) right into the trash.

… within two and a half months, Allen was contacted by his CPA notifying him that the business checking account was hit for $42,000 and he was in danger of bouncing checks!

Not only was money missing, but having to explain everything to his kids who now run the business is the last thing someone who’s worked for so hard for 50 years wants to do. Especially when all he really wants to do is hit the golf course.

It took a year and a half and Allen was able to get everything back but $7,200. Only the threat of jail time was needed to force the thieves to return the money. Even then, over $7K is a real expensive lesson to learn.

Now back to this morning…

Allen was able to walk out of our facility after witnessing, live and in person, his four boxes of papers get shredded. The whole ordeal took about 20 minutes with less than 10 minutes of actual shredding time (Remember, it took a little longer since we were having this conversation).

On top of that, he had a receipt and signed Certificate of Destruction that he could show to his kids (the ones now actually running the business).…

And the final price tag - $23.80.

The moral of this story is that personal office shredders, even the ones you pay a couple hundred bucks for, really suck.

They force you to take shortcuts… Potentially so much so that you willing to take the chance of throwing sensitive papers in the trash...

...After all, nobody would take the time to look through your trash… and even if they did… they’re not smart enough to know what to do with anything they find – right?

If you ever have any questions, don’t hesitate to give me a call – (619) 295-5474.

Until next time, keep Totally Secure,

Mike

Ralph's Employee Spearheads ID Theft Bust

Just a couple of Sundays ago (June 17, 2009), after an individual tried to pass a fake credit card, a Ralph's grocery store employee alerted the Oceanside Police Department and provided a description of the vehicle. The vehicle was consequently pulled over with the suspects placed "behind bars" by the following Wednesday. See the full story here: http://www.10news.com/news/19779383/detail.html

Businesses and employees must remain alert and be trained to detect potential perpetrators of ID Theft. As part of the Federal Trade Commission’s Red Flag Rules that are slated to come into effect August 1, 2009, many businesses are going to be required to implement programs "designed to detect the warning signs - or 'red flags' - of identity theft in their day-to-day operations, take steps to prevent crime, and mitigate the damage it inflicts."

In the following weeks, I will be posting a series of blogs outlining some procedures businesses can include in their Red Flag Program to prevent ID Theft at the point-of-sale when accepting credit cards.

Everyone must do their part to prevent ID Theft and the Ralph's Grocery store in Oceanside and their on-the-ball employee deserve much credit for preventing ID Theft and ultimately helping to catch the criminals.

Trash Voyeurism

If you ever had any doubts about whether you should shred everything, then I have something to show you.

I found it absolutely astonishing that something like this even exists for public consumption. And even if you find it interesting to read through other people's stuff, even if it seems innocent or cute, you should have the right to decide whether you want to make your papers public.

With ID Theft running rampant, you can find at least a couple of news stories every day covering ID Theft, you must take proactive steps to destroy any and all documents you receive and produce. Whether you shred, burn, pulverize, or chew them up and swallow them, they must not leave your possession in readable form.

Without further ado, here's what all this about. This story ran on 20/20 last Friday night and it is must viewing for anyone even a little concerned about ID Theft: http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=7830369

Glossary of Terms

I've finally been able to get down on paper a glossary of terms related to identity theft, privacy, and document destruction. For the most part, the terms below relate to various federal laws passed within the last 20 years.

It's kind of long and not extremely interesting unless you're looking for exactly this sort of thing. I tried to include links to the various government websites relating to the laws. With that said, it could be useful as a good starting point for more research into the subject.

This is also posted on the Total Secure Shredding website.

California vs. Greenwood

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the "expectation of privacy in trash left for collection in an area accessible to the public... is unreasonable." Consequently, when you throw something in the trash, anyone that happens to come across your documents is able to take whatever they like.

Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA)

Privacy Rule: Entities covered by HIPAA much have policies and procedures in place to safeguard patient medical information and to minimize its disclosure.

Who this Covers:

• Health Plans: This includes such entities as Insurance companies, HMO’s, and Corporate Health Plans.
• Most Health Care Providers: Doctors, Dentists, Chiropractors, Nursing Homes and the like.
• Health Care Clearinghouses: Entities that transcribe patient medical data.

What is protected:

• Information that is put into your medical records.
• Conversations your doctor has regarding your medical care and treatment.
• Electronic medical records.
• Billing information.

For more information see the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services website: www.hhs.gov/ocr/privacy/index

Economic Espionage Act of 1996

This act makes commercial trade secret theft a federal crime. One aspect defining a trade secret is that there must be reasonable measures in place to preserve its secrecy. Consequently, items found in the trash or recycling bin may not be considered secret and may hinder effective prosecution.

Graham-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999

Also know as the Financial Modernization Act of 1999, this act acts "to protect consumers' personal financial information held by financial institutions."

• Financial Privacy Rule: This rule requires financial institutions to provide their customers "privacy notices" on how thier personal financial information will be collected and shared. Also, customers are provided the opportunity to limit how some of their information will be shared.
• Safeguards Rule: Financial Institutions are required "have a security plan to protect the confidentiality and integrity of personal consumer information."
• Pretexting: Prohibits using "false pretenses" to acquire personal consumer information.

Some examples of financial institutions that are covered includes tax preparers, lenders, mortgage brokers, credit counselors, and those institutions that transfer or safeguard money.

For more information see the FTC website

Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACT Act or FACTA) of 2003

This act amends Fair Credit Reporting Act that was passed in 1970. This amendment promotes accuracy in consumer reports and is meant to ensure the privacy of the information in them.

FACTA Disposal Rule

"The FACTA Disposal Rule requires disposal practices that are reasonable and appropriate to prevent the unauthorized access to, or use of, information in a consumer report." (http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2005/06/disposal.shtm)

Reasonable measures for disposing of consumer report information could include the use of a third party shredding company to destroy any consumer report information.

FACTA Red Flag Rules

These regulations require development and implementation of written identity theft programs. These new rules apply to financial institutions and creditors with covered accounts.

• Financial Institutions: "Defined as a state or national bank, a state or federal savings and loan association, a mutual savings bank, a state or federal credit union, or any other entity that holds a 'transaction account' belonging to a consumer."
• Transaction Account: "A deposit or other account from which the owner makes payments or transfers. Transaction accounts include checking accounts, negotiable order of withdrawal accounts, savings deposits subject to automatic transfers, and share draft accounts."
• Creditor: "Any entity that regularly extends, renews, or continues credit; any entity that regularly arranges for the extension, renewal, or continuation of credit, or any assignee of an original creditor who is involved in the decision to extend, renew, or continue credit. Accepting credit cards as a form of payment does not in and of itself make an entity a creditor. Creditors include finance companies, automobile dealers, mortgage brokers, utility companies, and telecommunications companies. Where non-profit and government entities defer payment for goods or services, they, too, are to be considered creditors."
• Covered Account: "An account used mostly for personal, family, or household purposes, and that involves multiple payments or transactions. Covered accounts include credit card accounts, mortgage loans, automobile loans, margin accounts, cell phone accounts, utility accounts, checking accounts, and savings accounts. A covered account is also an account for which there is a foreseeable risk of identity theft – for example, small business or sole proprietorship accounts.”

Originally, these rules were intended to be put into enforcement on November 1, 2008. Consequently, the FTC has postponed mandatory compliance to May 1, 2009. (http://www.ftc.qov/bcp/edu/pubs/business/alerts/alt050.shtm)

Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002

This act was initiated in response to a number of corporate accounting scandals which included such companies as Enron, WorldCom, and Tyco International. It established new standards for internal financial controls to eliminate accounting fraud. These internal controls could be construed to include standardized and routine document disposal so as to avoid the appearance of impropriety of non-routine document destruction.

Prudent-Man Rule: Finance Definition

A legal securities standard that asks the question, "What would a prudent man do" in order to determine whether an action was reasonable or whether it violated fiduciary duties. The legal standard originated in 1830 when Judge Samuel Putnum wrote, "Those with responsibility to invest money for others should act with prudence, discretion, intelligence and regard for the safety of capital as well as income." (http://www.yourdictionary.com/finance/prudent-man-rule)

California Civil Code Section 1798.80-1798.84

"A business shall take all reasonable steps to destroy, or arrange for the destruction of a customer's records within is custody containing personal information which is no longer to be retained by the business by (1) shredding, (2) erasing, or (3) otherwise modifying the personal information in those records to make it unreadable or undecipherable through any measure." Injured customers may file "a civil action to recover damages." "In addition... a customer may recover a civil penalty not to exceed three thousand dollars ($3,000) per violation."

My Take on Personal (Small Office) Paper Shredders

I received a call the other day from an individual who was looking for a replacement motor for his personal home shredder. (I won’t mention the brand but they are a biggie when it comes the producing these sorts of shredders.) At Total Secure Shredding, we don’t perform this sort of service. We provide shredding services using mobile shredding trucks or using our in-house shredder. However, it did get me thinking that there could be a lot of money in repairing these little shredders. After all, they tend to cost a lot and don’t last too long!

But I digress. For the gentleman who called, I looked up the manufacturer’s website and passed along the local INDIANA phone number that was provided. I mentioned to the caller that I wouldn’t expect too much since it looked like corporate headquarters. I have yet to hear back from this person so I guess he found what he was looking for.

But this gentleman’s call really got me to thinking about what a pain it is to shred your own documents in your home or office with one of these little personal shredders.

Before I got into the shredding business, I, like everyone else, had a little personal shredder sitting right next to my computer desk. And for the most part, it only was used every other month or so. Between uses, I would just stack all my “For Shredding” documents right on top of the shredder. In about two month’s time, I would collect a fairly substantial stack of paper. Then on one Saturday morning, I would pull off the stack of papers and spend two to three hours shredding. This included pulling out staples, shredding two pages at a time (if I was lucky), emptying the shredded paper three or four times, and then vacuuming up all the paper pieces that ended up on the carpet.

But that was before. Today I bring in all my junk mail and credit card offers to our office to shred in our industrial paper shredder – it only takes a minute. And although my intent for this blog was to be more informational then to advertise my service, the fact is, we provide the same convenience for the general public.

When you compare the price of a personal shredder to the service we provide, there is really no comparison. I performed a quick internet search looking for a consumer review of these personal shredders. The top 4 listed ranged in price from $60 to $180. And although these shredders are rated from 8 to 17 sheets per pass, the reviews said the best you could hope for is about half that. They go on to say that that translates into 220 to 1,700 sheets per day depending on the type of shredder you purchase. Of course, the more expensive you go, the more throughput the shredder is rated. I would guess the daily throughput is much less. But let’s stick with 1,700 sheets a day for argument’s sake. And let’s assume one day is referring to the amount of paper you could shred in 8 hours of work as opposed to 24 hours. 1,700 sheets is just under 4 reams of paper (there are about 500 sheets of paper in a standard ream). So if a standard case of paper holds 10 reams, it would take over 2 ½ days to shred just one case of paper. So you’re looking at over 20 hours to shred one case of paper.

How much is your time worth?

Please forgive me but here’s where I pitch our service. If you are located in San Diego, especially somewhere in the greater metro area, do yourself a favor and bring your documents down to our facility for shredding. We are located behind the San Diego Sports Arena where Interstate 5 and 8 intersect. No appointments are necessary and walk-ins are always welcome. We shred your documents while you wait and you can actually watch your documents get shredded through our viewing window. You’re actually no more than a few feet from the shredder. All the shredded paper is then loaded into one of our mobile shredding trucks, where it actually gets shredded again, and then is taken to a recycling center. There is no catch! That’s how simple it is!

But this must cost a fortune – Right? Actually, the price is only $5.95 per standard size file box.

What’s a standard size file box? Well it’s about the size of a case of copy paper. That’s right, 10 reams of paper. Remember, we were talking that it would take over 20 hours to shred this on the best rated personal shredder!

So for the $180 it would cost you to purchase the top rated personal shredder we could shred 30 standard file boxes.

It gets better. If by chance you have 30 boxes, we will actually bring our high speed shredding trucks out to you for the same low price of $5.95 per box. That’s right, don’t bring it to us – we come out to you. Of course we can’t service the whole world for this price. For mobile shredding, this price is only good for the greater San Diego Metro Area.

If you would like more information on the services we provide please check out our website at www.TotalSecureShredding.com/services.

Or please give us a call:

Locally: (619) 295-5474
Toll Free: (800) 536-4832

The point of all this is to say that there is a much easier, faster, cheaper, and environmentally friendlier way to destroy your documents.

Hopefully this helps and again I apologize for the shameless plug of our services.

Regards,

Mike