TAPAs: Perfecting Your Preservation Pitch

A preservation notice, also referred to as a “litigation hold” or a “stop destruction request,” is a written directive advising custodians of certain documents and electronically stored information (ESI) to preserve potentially relevant evidence in anticipation of future litigation. The goal is to advise the recipient of the possibility of future litigation and identify relevant documents and ESI that should be preserved. The consequences of failing to preserve evidence are laid out in Rule 37(e) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure: