---
id: KB-LE-030
url: https://app.codecontract.io/help/legal/proving-it-with-whatever-you-kept
idioma: en
categoria: sector-legal
subcategoria: arbitraje
audiencia: usuario
nivel: avanzado
actualizado: 2026-08-13
tambienEn: [es]
relacionados: [KB-LE-002, KB-LE-013]
citadoPor: [KB-LE-031]
---

# Proving it with whatever you kept

_The argument is no longer who is right: it is who can show it. And there is a deadline, and no second round._

**Responde a:** what documentation to submit in arbitration · proving what was agreed by email · deadline to submit documents · cannot find the emails from that project

By this point there is no room left to explain: there is a deadline, submissions must be made, and **what is submitted is what there will be**. The whole relationship —two years of emails, calls, meetings, decisions taken on the hoof— is reduced to whatever can be put on the table by a date. And what can be put there does not depend on how you worked, but on how you filed while working.

## What the submittable material consists of

| What there was | Where it usually sits | If it is not there |
| --- | --- | --- |
| The contract | It gets found | Rarely missing |
| What was agreed later | In scattered emails | **In practical terms it never existed** |
| What was discussed | In memory | It cannot be submitted |
| **What was warned and ignored** | **In an email, if one was sent** | **It weighs most and is missing most** |

> [!IMPORTANT]
> **Almost every change to a commercial relationship is agreed by email, and almost no email is filed as what it is: a contract amendment.** The original contract lives in a folder and is always found; the six emails that changed the scope, the dates or the price live in specific people's inboxes, some of whom have left the company. In a procedure, those six emails weigh more than the contract.

## What can be done beforehand, and only beforehand

1. **File later agreements where the contract lives** — An email that changes something is part of the contract, not correspondence.
2. **Put warnings in writing** — «We did tell them» only counts if it was said on a channel that leaves a trace.
3. **Do not let it depend on personal inboxes** — People leave and their mail is closed. It is the commonest loss.
4. **And retain beyond the end of the project** — Procedures begin once the project has already been archived.

> [!WARNING]
> The commonest discovery when preparing a procedure is **that the person who handled it left and their mailbox was closed**. Nobody decided it: the normal leavers policy was applied. With it went the conversations explaining why what was done was done, and what remains is a contract that does not reflect what was actually agreed. That loss cannot be repaired, and it happens through an administrative decision taken months earlier without this in mind.

> [!NOTE]
> What documentation is admissible as evidence, within what deadlines it must be submitted and what weight each kind of communication carries **is determined by the rules governing the procedure and settled by your lawyer**. Here we cover what comes before: how to arrive with what is needed already filed, because at that point nothing more can be generated.

**Does an email count as proof of an agreement?**

Its weight is for the procedure to decide; what is certain is that it counts for nothing if it does not exist.

**How long do I keep a finished project's records?**

Longer than the project lasts. Your lawyer sets the exact period.

**What if the person who handled it has left?**

Which is why the archive cannot live in their inbox. It is the commonest loss.

## Ejemplos

**Later agreements live in scattered emails.**

- Files each agreement alongside the contract it amends

→ What was agreed later is submitted with what was agreed before.

**The person who ran the project left and their mailbox was closed.**

- Stores documentation outside personal inboxes

→ A departure does not take the relationship's history.

**Submissions are due and half the relationship is missing.**

- Gathers the complete file for each client or project

→ Preparation is a review rather than a search.

**«We did warn them» is nowhere on record.**

- Keeps sent communications with their dates

→ The warning is shown rather than recounted.

**The project was archived and its documentation purged.**

- Applies retention set with legal periods in mind

→ What is needed years later still exists.

**Each department keeps its part of the relationship separately.**

- Centralises the file in one place

→ The complete account exists in one location.