As a reminder, in 2020, the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia adopted the Law on Archival Material and Archival Activities (“Law”), the implementation of which began on February 02, 2021.

On May 07, 2021, the Ministry of Culture and Information issued its Opinion extending the deadline for drafting and submitting mandatory normative acts until December 31, 2021, while the deadline for submitting transcripts of the archive book was extended to April 30, 2022. Companies are obliged to register with the competent archives as holders and creators of archive materials by December 31, 2021, as well as to submit the necessary normative acts (rulebooks), the decision on appointing an expert with contact information, list of categories.

In accordance with the Law, companies have the obligation:

  • to provide adequate space and equipment for the storage and protection of archives and documentary material;
  • to adopt a general act on the manner of recording, classification, archiving and storage of archival material and documentary material,
  • to adopt the  List of categories of archive material and documentary material with retention periods,
  • to adopt a general act on the manner of recording, protection, and use of electronic documents
  • to keep an archive book on the prescribed form;
  • to record, mark, classify, date and archive archival material and documentary material;
  • to submit to the competent archive a transcript of the archive book no later than April 30 of the current year, for documentary material created in the previous year;
  • to inform the competent public archive about all changes that are important for the archive material no later than 30 days from the day of their occurrence.

Non-compliance with the obligations prescribed by Law triggers fines in the amount of 50,000 to 2,000,000 RSD, i.e. from 5,000 to 150,000 RSD for the responsible person in the legal entity.

Though the Law prescribes obligation(s) for entrepreneurs, i.e. natural persons who perform a registered activity, it is interesting that no penal provisions exist for this category of entities.