S.C. Code Ann. § 34-3-540 – Copies and reproductions of bank records; admissibility in evidence

(A) Any corporation, institution, or association whose deposits are insured by the federal government or an agency or a nonprofit corporation that has been designated by the State to originate or hold educational loans made to or on behalf of students may cause promissory notes, checks, drafts, and records kept by the corporation, institution, association, or agency to be copied or reproduced by:
1. (1) photostatic, photographic, or microfilming process; or
2. (2) electronic graphic imaging through scanning, digitizing, or other means.
(B) These processes or means must correctly copy, reproduce, or form a medium for copying or reproducing the original record so that an accurate facsimile of the original can be printed or otherwise reproduced on paper, film, or similar medium. The reproduction is considered an original record for all purposes and must be treated as an original record in all courts or administrative agencies for the purpose of its admissibility into evidence, regardless of whether the institution retains or disposes of the original, provided that the original document otherwise qualified as a business record pursuant to the South Carolina Uniform Business Records as Evidence Act or the appropriate state or federal rules of evidence.

HISTORY: 1962 Code Section 8-268; 1956 (49) 1673; 1957 (50) 179; 1960 (51) 1673; 1985 Act No. 128, Section 4; 1995 Act No. 132, Section 1, eff June 28, 1995; 1998 Act No. 331, Section 1, eff June 9, 1998.

Effect of Amendment

The 1995 amendment revised the entities to which this section applies, and revised the manner in which records may be copied, reproduced and admitted into evidence.

The 1998 amendment designated the first paragraph and items (1) and (2) following it as subsection (A), and made a nonsubstantive change in that text; designated the remaining text as subsection (B); and in subsection (B), in the second sentence substituted "reproduction" for "printed reproduction", deleted the designator for item (1), and deleted item (2) requiring certification of the copy by the custodian.