The aim of this document is to provide guidance for the management of archaeological information and archive throughout the course of a project and thus protect them should they be threatened with loss.

A likely instance of this in the present climate is that of a contractor going into liquidation and becoming unable to complete archaeological projects to the archive transfer stage. English Heritage commissioned a survey of current practice that has informed the formulation of this guide. It is intended that this document will be circulated to all archaeological practitioners, especially those involved in development control, archaeological contractors and curators of archive repositories. It is hoped that this guide will enable them to work together in the best interests of the archaeological information that is currently being recovered.

We hope that this initial publication will engender further best practice suggestions and 'lessons learned' experiences which will inform the production of updated guidance in due course.

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