How long do Wisconsin law firms need to keep trust account records?
Wisconsin Supreme Court Rule 20:1.15(f)(5) requires law firms to retain trust account records for a minimum of six years. This applies to all IOLTA and client trust accounts maintained by Wisconsin attorneys.
The six-year requirement covers a specific set of records. You need to keep bank statements, cancelled checks or images of them, deposit slips, client ledgers showing individual trust balances, a general ledger for the overall trust account, and documentation of every transfer and disbursement. Anything that shows money moving in or out of your trust account and how those funds were allocated to individual client matters falls under this rule.
The clock starts from the date the record was created, not the date the client matter closed. If you receive a settlement deposit in January 2024 and disburse funds in March 2024, records for both transactions need to be kept through at least 2030.
Trust accounts are one of the most heavily regulated aspects of legal practice in Wisconsin. The Office of Lawyer Regulation can audit your trust account records at any time, and incomplete records create problems even if no funds were actually mishandled. Not being able to produce what they ask for raises a presumption that something went wrong. That is a position you never want to be in.
Monthly three-way reconciliations are also required under the same rule, and those reconciliation reports should be preserved alongside your other trust records. The three-way reconciliation ties together your bank statement balance, your general trust ledger balance, and the total of all individual client ledger balances. When those three numbers don’t match, something needs to be resolved before you move forward.
Beyond the six-year minimum, many firms choose to keep trust records longer. Malpractice claims and client disputes can surface well after a matter closes, and complete trust accounting records are your best defense. Some firms hold trust records for as long as they hold client files, which often means ten years or more.
Organization matters as much as retention. Six years of bank statements in boxes doesn’t help when the OLR asks for a specific client’s trust ledger from three years ago. Digital storage makes this manageable. Scan paper records, organize them by year and client, and maintain backups. Your bookkeeping software should hold the ledger detail, but you also need to preserve source documents like bank statements and deposit slips that verify those entries.
If your trust accounting is behind or disorganized, getting it cleaned up protects you. Falling months behind on reconciliations and then trying to reconstruct everything later is stressful and error-prone. Our Wisconsin small business bookkeeping services include support for law firms that need reliable, ongoing trust account recordkeeping so the documentation is always audit-ready.
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