Types of Shredding Services: Mobile, Drop-Off & Off-Site Explained

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Shredding services are methods that businesses use to destroy documents containing sensitive information. This destruction occurs by cutting or crushing the records into tiny pieces using commercial-grade shredders. Besides freeing up space, shredding also ensures compliance with various retention and disposal laws, thus managing the risks of unauthorized data access.

Depending on your needs, shredding can be categorized by:

  • Where it happens: On-site (mobile) vs. offsite
  • How often it happens: One-time purge vs. scheduled
  • Who it’s for: Businesses vs. individuals

This guide breaks down the main shredding service types and helps you decide which option best fits your business.

Mobile Shredding Services (On-Site Shredding)

Mobile shredding involves a truck equipped with a shredding machine visiting your office, where documents are destroyed on-site. Because the destruction happens where your business is located, on-site shredding offers full visibility and maximum security for your records.

How Mobile Shredding Works

Here’s a step-by-step process of what you can expect from mobile shredding services:

  • Collection: Uniformed and background-checked staff collect bins with disposed documents and roll them to a shredding truck.
  • Shredding: An automated system lifts the bins and dumps the documents into the truck-side shredder.
  • Certification: After destruction, the service provider issues a certificate of destruction as proof of compliance.

Benefits of Mobile Shredding

On-site shredding minimizes security risks because you can oversee the entire process, from bin collection to the final shredding. Other benefits include:

  • Immediate destruction eliminates the chances of a security breach.
  • Clients feel secure working with you, and auditors are reassured due to the security involved in mobile shredding.
  • Full oversight ensures compliance with industry-specific regulations governing the disposal of records.

When Does Mobile Shredding Make Sense?

Mobile shredding is ideal for businesses that handle highly sensitive data and require visual confirmation of destruction, such as financial institutions and medical practices. Financial records, for example, contain identifiable personal data such as biometrics and social security numbers. A bank or an investment company may want less chain of custody and actual oversight for particular types of records. On-site shredding offers the much-needed peace of mind for such cases.

Offsite Shredding Services

In offsite shredding, a service provider picks up your records and securely transports them to a destruction facility. This method is more cost-effective and scalable for bulk volumes, especially with documents that don’t necessitate direct oversight during disposal.

Industries such as legal, medical, and finance handle high volumes of data. Offsite shredding provides the necessary infrastructure and security for large-scale shredding operations.

How Offsite Shredding Works

Secure offsite shredding typically involves the following steps when working with Corodata’s shredding services:

  • Collection: We collect your packaged materials and load them into our secure trucks for transportation to a designated facility. If you haven’t packaged your documents, our team can recommend and deliver secure bins and containers to your location beforehand so you can fill them up at your convenience.
  • Transportation: Screened drivers transport your documents in GPS-tracked trucks to one ofour shredding facilities near you.
  • Destruction: Materials, whether paper or digital media, are destroyed using commercial-grade shredders to ensure the data is irretrievable.
  • Recycling: As a certified member of the California Green Business, werecycle 100% of the paper shreds and as much material as allowed for non-paper waste.
  • Certification: We send a certificate of destruction after the process to confirm that your records were securely destroyed in compliance with our standards.

Benefits of Offsite Shredding

If you’re dealing with a large volume of paper or recurring shredding needs, offsite document shredding can be cost-effective in the following ways:

  • Employees save time that would otherwise be spent overseeing destruction on-site.
  • Offsite shredding for recurring needs streamlines business operations and enables easy scaling without a backlog.
  • The more boxes or bins you shred, the lower the cost per unit, making off-site shredding ideal for bulk document destruction.

How Secure Is Offsite Shredding?

Many business owners worry about the perceived security risks of offsite shredding. You don’t have full visibility of the actual shredding, and there’s a longer chain of custody before destruction.

With decades of experience in records management, we anticipate such risks and have several security measures in place for off-site shredding:

  • Uniformed and background-screened shredding technicians and drivers
  • Delivery and shredding trucks with GPS tracking
  • A strict chain of custody with real-time tracking features
  • NAID AAA certified shredding for the highest industry standards
  • Commercial-grade security features at destruction facilities

Drop-Off Shredding Services

Drop-off shredding involves transporting the material to your provider’s facility for secure document destruction. If you’re a solo or small business owner with a few records to dispose of, mobile and off-site shredding may be too much to set up at the moment. Drop-off shredding may be an ideal option for your needs.

How Drop-Off Shredding Works

This shredding method is straightforward because it involves low-volume disposals.

  • Transportation to facility: You cater for the transport from your office or residential place to a facility near you.
  • Destruction: Your documents are irretrievably destroyed, and paper waste is recycled.
  • Certification: You’ll receive a certificate as proof of secure and compliant document destruction.

Benefits of Drop-Off Shredding

Individuals and small businesses can get the most from drop-off shredding because of:

  • Affordability for the small quantities of documents generated by such parties
  • Easy access whenever one requires shredding services, without having to schedule a slot
  • Flexibility to destroy as few documents as required

Is Drop-Off Shredding Right for You?

Drop-off shredding is right for:

  • Individuals wanting to destroy documents with sensitive data, such as tax records and financial statements
  • Businesses, especially with residential offices, that produce few documents
  • Organizations looking for a one-time records purge, either for a cleanout or closure

One-Time vs. Scheduled Shredding

Shredding can also be classified by the frequency at which it happens. One-time purge shredding destroys a large amount of business or personal documents in a single event, while a scheduled shredding occurs when there’s an ongoing need for records disposal.

When to Use One-Time Purge Shredding

One-time shredding is ideal for high-impact shredding situations that don’t need long-term commitment to schedules or contracts, such as:

  • Office or residential relocation: Moving often involves a significant amount of decluttering. A one-time purge destroys unwanted documents and records, leaving you with only what you need for your new place.
  • Annual cleanouts: Annual cleanouts can leave you with heaps of sensitive or personal documents. The best way to dispose of these records securely and affordably is a one-time purge.
  • Post-tax season cleanups: Tax filing season involves a lot of receipts, old reports, invoices, and financial statements. The aftermath can be overwhelming, especially when the documents take up space. Digitize the records you need to retain and then use one-time shredding to free up valuable space.

Why Scheduled Shredding Pays Off

For most businesses, there’s new customer data coming in every week. Allowing sensitive documents to linger longer than necessary takes up valuable space and poses a data security risk. Scheduled shredding services allow businesses to automate their recurring document destruction needs on an ongoing basis.

Scheduled shredding alleviates the stress of document disposal for businesses through:

  • Automation: When done right, shredding schedules integrate seamlessly into workflows and become one of the processes, without causing friction between other parts of the business.
  • Compliance: Scheduled shredding ensures compliance by keeping up with various records retention and disposal laws.
  • Reduced staff burden: With automatic scheduling and the shredding team handling all the work, this method alleviates the burden of proper document disposal from your employees and places it on professionals.

How to Choose Between the Two

The right shredding method for you depends on your document destruction needs.

  • Compliance needs: If you operate in heavily regulated industries, scheduled shredding is ideal because it regularly consults various disposal laws to avoid non-compliance and stay up-to-date with changes.
  • Document volume needs: While both methods are ideal for large volumes of documents, a one-time purge fits best when you need them destroyed at once. Scheduled shredding, on the other hand, is ideal for large volumes that require an ongoing destruction system to prevent accumulation.
  • Frequency: If you don’t have regular document destruction needs, one-time shredding offers convenience and flexibility, allowing you to shred on your own schedule. For frequent document destruction, scheduled shredding offers the right services, from regular pickups to enhanced security.
Download the Records Retention Schedule Guidelines

Why Businesses Need Professional Shredding Services

Shredding is more than a disposal task; it’s also essential for ensuring compliance and information security. Handling such a sensitive business process without professional oversight can lead to non-compliance and unauthorized data access, making shredding less efficient than it should be.

Why DIY Shredders Fall Short

  • Cost-driven decision: Some businesses opt for office shredders, thinking they are cheaper; however, this is misleading.
  • Limited destruction power:
  • Operational risks
    • Shredders require manual operation by staff
    • Handling personal data requires strict oversight to minimize security breaches
    • Often, employees aren’t trained in proper document destruction, exposing compliance risks

Outsourcing professional shredding services means utilizing commercial-grade destruction machines for all disposal needs, enhanced document security, and the overall peace of mind that an expert is handling a critical business process.

How Does Professional Shredding Keep You Compliant?

Industries such as healthcare and finance process large volumes of sensitive customer data. Regulatory bodies establish document disposal laws that businesses must adhere to. For instance, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) requires proper data disposal practices, with a $250,000 fine for each violation involving a patient’s data. The Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACTA) document destruction guidelines require businesses to dispose of sensitive consumer reports appropriately for data breach prevention.

Corodata is fully audited and certified as compliant with these and other document destruction laws. This means our shredding processes follow the law to the letter, directly protecting you from non-compliance penalties and fines.

pro tip

Corodata is fully audited and certified as compliant with these and other document destruction laws. This means our shredding processes follow the law to the letter, directly protecting you from non-compliance penalties and fines.

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Why Does a Certificate of Destruction Matter?

The Certificate of Destruction (CoD)issued after every disposal confirms that you have followed the necessary steps to fulfill your data security obligations. It provides a paper trail in case of an audit and offers even more protection when you partner with a NAID AAA-certified company.

How to Choose the Right Shredding Service for Your Business

Ask yourself these key questions:

  • How much material do I need to destroy?
    • High volume → Offsite shredding
    • Low volume → Drop-off shredding
    • Sensitive data → Mobile shredding
  • How often do I need shredding?
    • One-time cleanup → One-time purge
    • Ongoing disposal → Scheduled shredding
  • What’s my compliance need?
    • Regulated industries benefit from on-site or scheduled options.

Why Choose Corodata for Secure Shredding?

With decades of experience and multiple NAID AAA-certified facilities across California, Corodata offers secure and eco-friendly shredding solutions. Whether you need a one-time purge or recurring destruction, we ensure your documents are handled safely and responsibly.

Ready to dispose of unwanted business documents and records securely?

Get a free shredding quote from Corodata to learn how much it will cost and where to get started.