Frequently Asked Questions

Don’t hire any shredding company until you have asked them these Frequently Asked Questions…

Please click on each question to read more.

What To Shred?

Account records and ledgers

Activity sheets

Advertising

Applications

Appraisals

Bank statements

Bids and quotes

Budgets

Business plans

Canceled checks

Cell phones

Client lists

Computers and hard drives

Contact lists

Corporate tax records

Correspondence

Customer records

Disciplinary reports and promotions

Educational reports

Expense reports

Financial statements

Forecasts

Formulas, product plans and tests

General service information

Health and safety reports

Internal Reports

Legal Documents

Lottery tickets

Magnetic media

Maps and blueprints

Marketing plans

Medical records

Microfilm and microfiche

New product information

Payroll documents

Performance appraisals

Personnel files

Plastic credit and ID cards

Research and development reports

Sales forecasts

Specification drawings

Strategic reports

Strategies

Supplier purchase orders

Supplier reports

Supplier specifications

Test scores and class rosters

Training information

Treatment Programs

Information Security

There are two types of shredding services. On-site shredding means all confidential materials are shredded on-site, at your location. Off-site shredding means that all material is brought back to the company’s facility for shredding. If your organization requires that you witness the shredding process, then you should choose on-site shredding. If you’re looking for a more cost-effective option, then off-site shredding is your best choice.

Marshall Shredding offers highly secure, on-site shredding services.

The National Association for Information Destruction (NAID) is the watchdog of the shredding industry. They act as an independent auditor, checking a shredding company’s compliance in 22 critical areas, including everything from shred size to employee background checks. NAID awards their highest rating, “AAA Certified,” to only a select few shredding companies that offer the highest level of information security. In fact, of the 74 shredding companies operating in Texas, only 24 have been AAA Certified by NAID. But buyer beware! Many unscrupulous shredding companies will claim to be AAA NAID Certified just to get your business. Check their website for the NAID AAA Certified logo as proof of their standing.

Marshall Shredding is AAA NAID Certified. – Click on the image below to verify our standing

It’s not enough for a shredding company to just shred documents. It’s equally important that they train your staff to protect your confidential information.

Marshall Shredding first audits how your organization handles confidential data and then we provide information security training for your entire staff; all at no extra charge.

Customer Service

On-call shredding means that you just call whenever you need service. There are no regularly scheduled pickups and no monthly fees. That’s why most shredding companies refuse to offer this service. But if you’re not sure you’ll generate enough paper for a monthly pickup, why choose a shredding company that does not offer an on-call service option?

Marshall Shredding offers both on-call and regularly scheduled shredding services.

Many shredding companies use outdated equipment that can’t shred anything but paper. That means someone may have to sift through your containers and remove paper from the binders. There is a much easier and more secure way. Some shredding companies have invested in high tech shredding equipment that can shred almost anything.

Marshall Shredding uses high tech equipment that can shred almost anything including paper, plastic, microfilm, X-rays, CDs, hard drives, whole computers and even many consumer and commercial products.

Shredding companies provide general liability insurance to protect their customers in the unlikely event that confidential documents fall into the wrong hands. However, most limit this protection to $1,000,000. Make sure your shredding company provides at least $2,000,000 in general liability insurance.

Marshall Shredding exceeds industry standards with general liability insurance coverage of $2,000,000.

Price

Some shredding companies will quote you a low, low price and then slam you with hidden fees like fuel surcharges, security fees and pick up fees. Other shredding companies charge by the minute to shred your documents. So you’re actually paying them to go slow. Get an exact quote in writing and always ask if there are any additional charges.

Marshall Shredding provides our services for a low fee, with no hidden charges.

Protecting Your Identity and Information

With identity theft and information fraud at an all-time high, the federal government has enacted over 40 information destruction laws to protect consumers. Here’s a synopsis of the three most significant pieces of consumer information protection legislation:

FACTA

The Fair and Accurate Credit Transaction Act (FACTA) requires that any individual or business that maintains personal consumer information must take reasonable care to protect against unauthorized access to this information, and they must also destroy personal consumer information before it is discarded. Violation of FACTA, which went into effect in 2005, can mean fines and penalties of up to $2,500 for each consumer record compromised.

For more information about FACTA click here.

HIPAA

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) sets national standards for the protection of personal health information. HIPAA, which went into effect in 1996, requires all healthcare providers, including any organization that transmits personal health information, to maintain the confidentiality of this information and to destroy the information before it is discarded.

GLB

The Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act requires that all financial institutions protect the confidential information of their clients. Banks, credit unions, mortgage companies, investment and financial services firms and insurance underwriters are among those affected. Fines for violating GLB can be severe. American United Mortgage Company was fined $50,000 for violating GLB (learn more).

For more information about GLB click here.

Identity Theft Enforcement and Protection Act of 2005

The Identity Theft Enforcement and Protection Act (the “ITEP Act”) , mandates that businesses have a legal duty to protect and safeguard sensitive personal information.

Similar to the Gramm-Leach Bliley Act, the ITEP Act requires businesses that collect or maintain sensitive personal information in the regular course of business to implement and maintain reasonable procedures and corrective measures to protect and safeguard sensitive personal information from unlawful use or disclosure. Further more , the ITEP Act includes a “Dumpster Diving”provision where companies are required to destroy customer records no longer in use by shredding, erasing modifying the records to make the information unreadable or undecipherable.

The ITEP Act not only allows the Attorney General to seek permanent injunction, but also exposes defendants to a civil penalty of at least 2,000 and up to $50,00 against each defendant.

For more information click here.

Total Security Breaches Nationwide Tops 218 Million

Think a security breach can’t happen to your organization? Think again! Since they began tracking security breaches in Jan. 2005, PrivacyRights.Org reports that over 218 million confidential files, in every imaginable industry, have been compromised!

For a comprehensive list of these information security breaches, click here.

5 Reasons You Should Dump Your Office Shredder And Hire Us

1. Office Shredders Produce Strips of Paper That Can Be Reassembled

Most office shredding machines shred paper using a cross-cut or ribbon cut method. So when these strips of paper are discarded or recycled, “dumpster divers” just sort through the trash and reassemble these paper strips. This gives them easy access to confidential information you thought was destroyed. In fact this form of information fraud is so common, now there’s software available to help these thieves scan and reassemble this information.

Marshall Shredding uses advanced shredding technology to produce a confetti-like output that is small and unreadable. And since there are hundreds of pounds of documents from numerous clients, all mixed together, our shredded material is impossible to reassemble.

2. Office Shredders Can Cost Twice As Much As A Shredding Service

Small businesses that operate an office shredder spend, on average, 15 minutes of staff time each and every day, shredding confidential documents. When you consider employee wages and benefits, then factor in depreciation and maintenance costs on the shredder, it costs (on average) about $95 per month to operate an office shredder. That’s nearly twice as much as our regularly scheduled, on-site shredding pickup service.

3. Office Shredders Can Leave You Vulnerable In Audits And Lawsuits

Irregular shredding practices. That’s the charge an auditor or lawyer can make when they discover your organization uses an office shredder. Why? Because in-house shredding programs don’t adhere to a regular shredding schedule and they don’t provide adequate documentation of what’s been shredded, when it’s been shredded or by whom. So when a question arises as to when and why a particular piece of information was shredded, organizations without documentation are susceptible to severe fines.

Marshall Shredding offers a variety of regularly scheduled shredding services and a Certificate of Destruction to provide documented evidence of every single shred.

4. Office Shredders Are A Safety Hazard

In the last five years there have been more than 50 reports of injuries from office shredders, including lacerations and lost fingers. And while these cases are isolated, office shredders have sharp blades that can injure you if you’re not careful. Additionally, office shredders produce paper, plastic and metal dust fragments that, left unchecked, can get into the air ducts and create a fire hazard.

Marshall Shredding’s shredding service means you’ll never have to deal with sharp blades or dust fragments again.

5. Office Shredders Make A Big Mess

Even though “shredder mess” is not a risk factor, it’s still something that you’ll have to deal with if you use an office shredder. Fragments of paper will fall onto the floor while dust builds up on the shredder, the shredder table and the floor.

Marshall Shredding eliminates shredder mess caused by office shredders.

Understanding the Costs

If you’re a business professional who thinks that “feeding the office shredder” is a cost effective way to protect your clients, customers or patients from identity theft and the unauthorized disclosure of private information…then I’d like to challenge you to calculate your own costs, to see just how much money “do it yourself shredding” is costing you.

An Office Shredder Costs A Lot More Than You’d Think

To illustrate, let’s take a look at a typical business office. When they decided to start shredding they purchased a shredder at an office supply store for $185. The chart below shows how much it cost this business to operate their office shredder.
Calculate your cost here.

A Typical Business Office Will Spend $97.58 a Month

In our example, there are five employees that use the office shredder during the course of a day, each averaging about three minutes of daily shred time or 15 minutes total per day for the entire office. (Remember shred time is not just the amount of time the shredding machine manufacture claims it takes to shred paper. One must also include the time to sort the documents, walk from the work area to the shredder, pick up and straighten the paper, feed the paper into the shredder and clean up any paper residue and when necessary, dispose of the shredded paper.)

Since the average hourly wage of their employees, plus benefits is $16.19. The total monthly labor cost to operate an office shredder is $87.71. Factor in depreciation and maintenance costs (shredding blades must be sharpened) the total cost of operating their office shredder is $97.58 per month.

How Much Is The Office Shredder Costing You?

Now your costs will be different based upon how much you shred, your average hourly wage, initial cost of the shredder, etc. But the fact is that using an office shredder costs twice as much as a monthly pickup by a shredding service…and saving money isn’t even the best reason to use a shredding service. (To learn how your shredding service is putting you at risk, click here.)