Many King County employees use Microsoft Teams chat to communicate with colleagues on a daily basis. As a reminder, employees’ chat messages may disappear from view within three days, but are retained in servers up to 17 days. During that time, they are discoverable and subject to public disclosure.

Best practice is to only use Teams chat for transitory communications that do not need to be retained as documentation of your work. If your agency’s retention schedule requires a message to be kept for longer, consider using email that can be filed to Content Manager.

Examples of transitory communications appropriate for Teams Chat include:

• Asking if a coworker is available for a phone call
• Sending an FYI that you’ll be late for a meeting
• Sharing non-work related information

Please direct technical questions about Teams to KCIT.

For more information, visit the county’s Records Management Program website or contact them at records.management@kingcounty.gov. The Records Management Program, in the Department of Executive Services, provides guidance, resources, and training to all King County employees to assist them with managing King County’s public records according to state and local legal requirements and best practices.