The Litigation Hold (LitHolds) is a notification management system that efficiently handles all aspects and stages of the litigation hold process within your enterprise. The lit hold features offer email notification templates and interview question templates, reports, histories, reminders, acceptance records, interview response records, and centralizes the relevant data in one location.

Elements of LitHolds

Before you create litigation holds, you need to configure the following Litigation Hold general settings. 

To configure the general LitHold settings:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
   • The Manage page of LitHolds is displayed.

2. Click LitHold Configuration.

• The LitHold Management page is displayed.

3. Provide the sender’s email address in Email Sent From Address field.

4. Provide the temporary storage location for reports data in Hold Report Temporary Storage Path field.

5. Click Upload and choose the Notification Site Logo to be uploaded.

6. Click Upload and choose the Notification Email Logo to be uploaded.

7. Provide the base address of the server running Lit Hold in Website Base Address.

Note: The base address includes the protocol and server name, but not the application or
the page that is currently displayed. For example, http://<server_name_or_IP_address>/.

Note: This message is displayed at the bottom of the Person and IT Staff Hold Notification pages, just above the Accept button. This acts as an acknowledgement message, for example, “By clicking accept you agree to the terms set forth.”

Notes: You can set two levels of escalation policies for person hold acceptance. 
Stage One: If a custodian doesn't accept the hold within a number of specified days, the first escalation email is sent to their manager.
Stage Two: After a specified number of days, the next escalation is sent to the email address specified in Default Escalation Stage 2 Email Address field

10. Provide an email address in Test Email Settings and click Send to check if you can receive emails.

11. Click Save.

The IT Staff are those individuals in an organization that work with the organization’s file aging. During a lit hold, they can receive notifications about lit holds.

Adding IT Staffs

To add an IT staff:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click LitHold Configuration.
3. Navigate to Manage IT Staff tab.

5. Enter the First Name, Middle Initial and Last Name of the IT Staff.

6. Enter the Email Address, Title and Username of the IT Staff.

7. Enter the Domain.

8. Click Upload and choose the Profile Picture of the IT Staff.

9. Click Save.

Notes: 
From the IT Staff list, you can click Edit   against the IT Staff member to edit the staff information.
From the IT Staff list, you can click Delete  against the IT Staff member to delete the staff.

Adding IT Staff Groups

To add an IT staff group:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click LitHold Configuration.
3. Navigate to Manage IT Staff tab.

5. Enter the Group Name.

6. Enter the group Description.

7. Click Save.

Notes: 
From the IT Staff Groups list, you can click Edit   against the IT Staff group to edit it.
From the IT Staff Groups list, you can click Delete  against the IT Staff member to delete it.

Mapping users to IT Staff Group

To map users to IT staff group:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click LitHold Configuration.
3. Navigate to Manage IT Staff tab.

4. Click Map User To Group.

• The Map Users to IT Staff Group pop-up is displayed.

5. Select the IT Staff Group from the drop-down.

6. Select the users from Map Users field.

7. Provide a Description.

8. Click Map Users. The newly created IT Staff group will be displayed.

Note: You can choose a default group from the list of groups displayed upon clicking the Default Group option.

Adding Approver Groups

To add approver group:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click LitHold Configuration.
3. Navigate to Manage Approver tab.

Note: You can click Edit   against the approver to edit it.

5. Provide a Group Name and Description.

6. Click Save.

Notes: 
From the Approvers group list, you can click Edit   against the approver group to edit it.
From the Approvers group list, you can click Delete  against the approver group to delete it.

Mapping users to Approver Group

To map users to approver group:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click LitHold Configuration.
3. Navigate to Manage Approver tab.
4. Click Map User To Group.

• The Map Users to Approver Group pop-up is displayed.

5. Select the Approver Group from the drop-down.

6. Select the users from Map Users field.

7. Enter the Description.

8. Click Map Users.

Lit holds send email notifications to custodians, IT Staff, and the Hold Approver informing them of the status and events of the lit hold. When creating a lit hold, you must specify the text of these email notifications. To expedite this process, you can store and use text in email templates. When you create a lit hold, you can choose the template that you want to use. 

Adding email templates

To create a new email template:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click LitHold Configuration.
3. Navigate to Email Templates tab.

5. Select an existing template or Create New Template from the Template Name drop-down.

6. Enter the email Subject for the email template.

7. Enter the email Body for the email template.

Note:  To set this email template as default for the selected Template type, you can enable Set as Default option.

Note: You can provide the Test Email address and click Send to test if the email notifications are received as intended.

These are any supporting documents that you want to attach to the litigation hold notification emails. To do so, you have to first create a document template and add a document to it.

Creating document templates

To create a document template:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click LitHold Configuration.
3. Navigate to the Document Templates tab.

4. Click Create Document Template.

• The Create Document Template pop-up is displayed.

5. Enter the Template Name.

6. Enter the Template Description.

7. Click Save.

Adding document to templates

To add a document to template:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click LitHold Configuration.
3. Navigate to Document Templates tab.
4. Click Edit icon against the document template
   • The Update Document Template pop-up is displayed.

5. Select any one File Type as explained below:

• Custodian Notice: To attach the documents and questionnaires corresponding to the Custodians.
• IT Staff Notice: To attach the documents and questionnaires corresponding to the IT staffs.

6. Click Select files to upload the file.

7. Click Save.

Note:  From the Document Template list, you can click Delete  against the document template to delete it.

When you create a lit hold, you have the option of specifying interview questions. These interview questions are given to custodians when they accept a lit hold. 

Creating Interview templates

To create an interview template:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click LitHold Configuration.
3. Navigate to Interview Templates tab.

4. Click Create Interview Template.

• The Create Interview Template pop-up is displayed.

6. Enable Allow Modification option to allow custodians to modify the Interview after completing.

Warning:  This option will be applicable only when the Allow Interview Review option is enabled.

7. Provide a Template Name.

8. Provide a Template Description.

9. Enter the Question.

Note:  You can enable the Required checkbox to make it mandatory.

10. Select the question Type as required.

• Text – To provide a text box for the custodian to write a response.
• Checkbox – To request the custodian to select one or more options. 
• Radio button– To request the custodian to select any one of the options.

Note: Upon selecting Checkbox or radio button, you can click Add  to add options or Remove  to remove an existing option. Also, you can select Add ‘Other’ option to add other as an option.

Note:  At any point, you can select a question and click Delete  to delete it or click Reset to clear the complete questionnaire.

Notes:  
Enable the Default Template option to set this as the default interview template.
From the interview template list, you can click Edit   against the Interview template to edit it.
From the interview template list, you can click Delete  against the interview template to delete it.

To create a LitHold:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.

• The Manage page of LitHolds is displayed.

2. Click Create New Hold.

• The Create Hold page is displayed.

General - Basic Details

1. Enter the LitHold Name.
2. Select the Case Name from the drop-down.
3. Select the Start Date (UTC) of the LitHold.
4. Provide a brief about the hold in LitHold Description.
5. Enter the requester name in the Requested By field.
6. Select the Termination Date (UTC) to close the hold.

General – Approval Settings

1. Select one approver from the options listed below:

• Any Approver – Selecting this will allow any approver to approve the litigation hold. If you select this option, no Approval Notifications are sent.
• Any Selected - Selecting this will allow any user belonging to the Approver Group to approve the hold.
• All Selected – Selecting this will require all the users belonging to the Approver Group to approve the hold.

2. Select the Approver Group from the drop-down.

Warnings:  
The Approver Group option will be enabled only when the approver value is selected as ‘Any Selected’ or ‘All Selected’. 
You can enable the Default Settings option to use the values that are defined in LitHold Configuration.

3. Select the required email Notifications for the approver.

• Select Send Acceptance Emails to People and IT Staff on hold approval to send email notifications to the hold approvers and IT Staffs.
• Select Send Approval Notifications to send the hold approval notifications.
• Set the number of days to remind the approver, against the Send Approval Reminder every field.

General - IT Staff Settings

1. Select the Default Settings to use the configured default IT staff settings.
2. Select the required IT Staff Group from the drop-down.

Note: IT Staffs are the individuals that you want to inform that data, for example emails and files stored on the network, must be preserved during the hold. These individuals are notified when a LitHold is created and must acknowledge that they have a role in the lit hold. They are also notified with reminders and when the lit hold is terminated.

 3. Select the number of days against Send Aging Acknowledgement every to resend the hold to members who have not acknowledged every number of specified days.

• Select the number of days against Send Aging Reminder every to send the reminder email notification.
• Enable the Disable Termination Emails option to disable the termination email notifications that is sent to the members of the IT Staff group.

4. Click Save and Next.

Custodians

1. You can enable Display Custodian data sources on acceptance page option to display the data source of the custodian in the acceptance page. 
2. Select the required Custodians by enabling the checkbox against it.
3. Select the custodians and enable Exclude From Interview column to exclude them from the interview.
4. Select the custodians and enable Exclude From Escalation column to exclude them from the escalation.

Notes:
You can click the Add Custodian button to create and add a new custodian.
You can click Edit   against the custodian to edit the custodian details.

Custodian Notifications & Escalations

1. Set the number of interval days to send the notification for Hold Acknowledgement.
2. Set the number of interval days to send the notification for Hold Reminder.
3. Set the number of interval days to send the escalation email notifications in Stage One and Stage Two.

Notes: You can also override the email address for escalation email notification in stage one and stage two fields. i.e., 
Override Escalation Stage One Email Address: When specified, this email address will be used instead of the manager’s email address as specified in Active Directory.
Override Escalation Stage Two Email Address: After a specified number of days, the next escalation is sent to the specified email address

Email Notifications

Lit holds send email notifications to people, IT Staff, and the Hold Approver informing them of the status and events of the lit hold. When you create a lit hold, you can choose the template that you want to use create your own custom email templates. You can edit or delete.

Notes: 
The email content of the selected template is displayed on the right pane for you to view.
Click the View  to view the corresponding content in email view.
You can modify the Subject and Body of the email notification from the right pane and click Save.
You can provide the Test Email address and click Send to test if the email notifications are received as intended.

2. Add the email address of the CC recipients in Add CC. You can also add multiple email addresses separated with commas (,).

3. Click Save and Next.

Documents and Questionnaires

Documents are any supporting documents that you want to attach to the litigation hold notification emails.

Note: The document attached to the template will be automatically loaded in the File Type. However, you can click Delete  to delete the file and manually add it.

Notes: 
You can enable Default Questionnaires to use the default questionnaire.
You can click View  to view the selected questionnaire.
You can click Edit  to edit the selected questionnaire.

Tip:  You can also select the document templates and add the file type documents as well.

Summary

Note: You can click Save as Template to save the hold as a template.

A litigation hold will be initiated only after approving it. Based on the approvers configured during creation, any or all the users will have to approve the hold. 

Tip:  To filter the grid efficiently, you can simply enter a keyword into the search box  located at the top of any grid and click the search button or press enter.

To approve a LitHold:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click Approve  against the hold to be approved.
   • The Please confirm pop-up is displayed.

Deactivating a hold does not terminate or delete the hold; instead, the hold is “paused” or made not active, regardless of any pending actions. It is to be noted that while a hold is deactivated, scheduled email notifications, such as reminders, are no longer sent. You can re-activate the hold anytime later. 

Warning:  When you deactivate a hold, custodians and IT staff do not receive termination notices.

To deactivate a LitHold:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Select the required holds by enabling the check box against it.
3. Click Deactivate icon. 
   • The Please confirm pop-up is displayed.

You can activate a deactivated hold to resume the hold to normalcy.

Warnings:  
When you activate a hold, custodians and IT staff do not receive termination notices.
Upon activating a deactivated hold, the hold will be moved to ‘Awaiting Approval’ status again.

To activate a lithold:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Select the required holds by enabling the check box against it.
3. Click Activate. 
   • The Please confirm pop-up is displayed.

Resubmitting a hold creates a new copy of the hold and sets it back to its original state so that all actions must be performed again. You can use this to replace a hold that is already in place or clone an existing hold and leave the original hold intact. 

To resubmit a LitHold:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Select the required holds by enabling the check box against it.
3. Click Resubmit.  
   • The Resubmit Hold pop-up is displayed.

4. Enter the New Hold Name.

5. Enable Terminate existing lit hold if you want to deactivate the original hold after creating a new one.

6. Enable Provide a new email termination notice if you want to send a notification email on this.

7. Provide the Message Body for the email to explain that the previous hold has been replaced.

8. Click Resubmit.

Warnings:  
You will be able to enable Provide a new email termination notice only if Terminate existing lit hold is enabled.
The Message Body section will be enabled only if Provide a new email termination notice is enabled.

This page allows you to view the overall status of a highlighted hold, which includes the status of the hold, number of IT Staff or custodians along with the actions they completed for the hold and a chronological log of every events of the hold.

To view a lithold:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.

• The Manage holds page is displayed.

To view the responses of the custodians:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click Custodian Responses.
   • The associated Custodians List is displayed.

3. Click View  against the required custodian.

• The LitHold Responses page listing the holds associated with the custodian is displayed.

You can generate various predefined reports with summary or detailed information about litigation holds in the application. You can generate the following 4 types of reports for LitHolds:

• Hold Summary report
• Custodian Details report
• Hold Details report
• Hold Custodians report

Tip:  The downloaded reports will also be available in the Case Folder Path.

This report provides you an overview of all litigation holds in the application. Additionally, this report lists their approval and acceptance status, associated case, and when it was created. Along with it, number of custodians and IT Staff associated with a litigation hold, and the current stage of approval are furnished in the report.

 To generate hold summary report:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click Generate Reports.
3. Click Hold Summary Report.

4. Select any of the following as required: 

• All Holds – To generate the report of all the holds in the application.
• Active Holds - To generate the report of all Active holds in the application.
• Inactive Holds - To generate the report of all Inactive holds in the application.

5. Click Generate to downloaded in the report in .xlsx format.

This report provides you a detail report of the custodians in the hold such as their email address, notice dates, reminder counts, reminder dates, acceptance status, etc. 

To generate custodian details report:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click Generate Reports.
3. Click Custodian Details.
   • The Custodian Selection pop-up is displayed.

This report provides a detailed overview of a litigation hold’s approvers, custodians, IT Staff, any associated document files, and interview questions. Also included are the start and end dates of the hold, the priority of the hold, and a description.

To generate hold details report:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click View  against the hold to be viewed.
   • The Dashboard of the corresponding hold is displayed.

This report provides a detailed overview of the custodians associated with the corresponding litigation hold, notice details, reminder details, termination details and the count of interview questions answered. 

To generate hold custodians report:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click View  against the hold to be viewed.
   • The Dashboard of the corresponding hold is displayed.

To edit a lithold:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click Edit icon against the hold to be edited. 

(This can be done to both active/non active litholds.) 

• The Edit Hold page is displayed.

3. Make the necessary changes.

4. Click Save LitHold.

You can delete a hold in any status and upon deleting it, no further email notifications are sent from it.

To delete a LitHold:

1. From the home page, click LitHolds.
2. Click Delete  against the hold to be deleted.
   • The Please confirm pop-up is displayed.

Note: You can also select multiple holds from the Manage Holds page and click Delete   to delete the selected holds at once.