Features & tools
The condominium document archive in a management system
The condominium manager keeps a mass of documents: mandatory registers, meeting minutes, supplier contracts, insurance policies, plant certifications, financial reports and invoices. An orderly digital archive is not just convenience, it is the condition for responding quickly to owners' requests and for handing a complete set of documents to a successor when the manager changes. A management system organises these documents by linking them to the condominium, the financial year and the units they relate to, with profiled access to protect personal data. This guide explains which documents to keep, how to structure the archive, what role the mandatory registers play and how to handle access and privacy under the GDPR.
Which documents the manager keeps
Condominium documentation falls into recurring categories. There are the mandatory registers required by Article 1130 of the Italian Civil Code: the condominium register, the register of meeting minutes, the register of appointment and revocation of the manager and the accounting register. Alongside these are the documents of ordinary management: reports, budgets, allocation plans, invoices and receipts, supplier contracts, insurance policies.
A block of its own is the technical and safety documentation: declarations of conformity of installations, boiler and lift logbooks, periodic inspection reports, certifications relating to common parts. This documentation must be kept and made retrievable, because it is the evidence of the building's safety condition and is needed in the event of checks, claims or works.
How to structure the digital archive
The most effective criterion is to link each document to the objects it relates to: the condominium, the financial year, the unit if any, the supplier or the installation. A management system that files an invoice by linking it to the supplier and the recorded expense makes that document retrievable from several points, without having to look for it in a folder by date.
Compared with a folder of files on a disk or a generic cloud service, the archive integrated into the management system has the advantage of context: the minutes are linked to the meeting, the contract to the supplier, the certification to the installation. Retrievability does not depend on the memory of whoever named the file but on the links the software maintains.
- Mandatory registers under Art. 1130: register, minutes, appointment, accounts
- Accounting documents: reports, budgets, allocations, invoices
- Supplier contracts and insurance policies
- Technical documentation: conformity, logbooks, periodic inspections
Owners' access to the documentation
Owners have the right to inspect and take copies, at their own expense, of the management documents. A digital archive with a reserved area lets the manager meet these requests in an orderly way: the owner accesses the documents concerning them without the manager having to photocopy and hand over each time.
Access, however, is not unlimited: it must be profiled. An owner can see the common documents and their own position, but not the detailed data of other owners that go beyond the management. A management system with differentiated permissions distinguishes what is common from what is personal, so that opening the archive to owners does not become an undue exposure of others' data.
Privacy and retention under the GDPR
The archive contains personal data, so it falls within the scope of EU Regulation 2016/679. The manager, as data controller for the management activity, must keep the documents with adequate measures, limit access to those who actually need it and not keep the data longer than necessary for the management purposes and the legal terms. An archive with profiled and traced access is easier to defend than a shared folder without controls.
Retention also concerns the handover. On termination of the appointment the manager must hand the successor all the condominium's documentation. An orderly and complete digital archive makes this handover verifiable and reduces the risk of lost documents, a frequent problem when documentation is scattered between paper folders and local files.
Why the integrated archive pays off
An archive integrated into the management system avoids the fragmentation typical of documents scattered between email, local folders and paper files. Every document has a context, an owner and an access level, and remains retrievable even years later, when it is needed for litigation, a check or a handover.
In AmministraPro documents are linked to the condominium, the financial year, the units and the suppliers, with profiled access that distinguishes what is common from what is personal, and made available to owners in the reserved area where appropriate. The document archiving features are described on the /funzioni page, while the plans with their storage and limits can be compared on the /prezzi page.
Frequently asked questions
Which registers must the manager keep by law?
Article 1130 of the Italian Civil Code requires four mandatory registers: the condominium register, the register of meeting minutes, the register of appointment and revocation of the manager and the accounting register. Beyond these, the manager keeps the management documentation, such as reports, contracts, invoices and technical certifications of installations, which must be made available to owners and passed to a successor when the manager changes.
Can owners access the document archive?
Yes. Owners have the right to inspect and take copies, at their own expense, of the management documents. A digital archive with a reserved area lets these requests be met in an orderly way. Access must be profiled, though: the owner sees the common documents and their own position, not the detailed data of other owners unrelated to the management, to avoid an undue exposure of others' personal data.
How long must condominium documents be kept?
Retention must take account both of the legal terms (tax, limitation) and of the management purposes. The GDPR requires not keeping personal data longer than necessary for the purposes for which it is processed. In practice the manager keeps the documentation for the period in which it may be needed for accounting, liability or litigation, while avoiding indefinite retention of data no longer useful.
What happens to the archive when the manager changes?
On termination of the appointment the outgoing manager must hand the successor all the condominium's documentation. An orderly and complete digital archive makes this handover verifiable and reduces the risk of lost documents, a frequent problem when documentation is scattered between paper files and local files. The completeness of the handover protects both the condominium and the outgoing manager.
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