Who actually has to keep one #
A bound book — formally an acquisition and disposition record — is a licensee obligation. If you hold no federal firearms license, no federal rule requires you to keep one (27 CFR 478.125(e), (f)).
The one license a private individual commonly holds is the Type 03, the collector of curios and relics — and it comes with the record attached:
A licensed collector (Type 03) must enter each receipt and disposition of a curio or relic in a bound record — the license covers only transactions in curios and relics (27 CFR 478.125(f); 18 U.S.C. § 923(b)).
What the Type 03 buys is convenience: curio and relic firearms can be shipped to you across state lines without routing through a dealer and without a transfer fee. It does not permit dealing. The record is the price of that convenience, and it is not optional.
Everyone else is in a different position — no duty, and also no backstop. That is the argument for keeping the same record voluntarily, and it is made in full under inventory and valuation.
What counts as a curio or relic #
The regulation gives three routes.
A firearm is a curio or relic if it was manufactured at least 50 years before the current date (replicas excluded); if a curator of a municipal, state or federal museum certifies it as of museum interest; or if it derives a substantial part of its value from being novel, rare, bizarre, or associated with a historical figure, period or event (27 CFR 478.11).
The 50-year test is a rolling one, which is why collections drift into eligibility over time.
The two deadlines #
These are the part people get wrong, because they are asymmetric.
Type-03 licensees only: record acquisitions by the next business day and dispositions within 7 days in the A&D book (27 CFR § 478.125(f)).
One business day is short enough that the entry has to happen when the package is opened, not when the weekend is over. A record you intend to fill in later is a record that is already late.
The fields #
On the acquisition side: the date received, the name and address of the person the firearm came from — or their license number if they are a licensee — and the firearm itself, described by manufacturer, importer, model, serial number, type and caliber or gauge. The importer is a separate field from the manufacturer, and it is the one most commonly left blank by people used to keeping a casual list.
On the disposition side: the date, and the recipient — name and address, or the FFL number. Where the recipient is not a licensee, the record also needs their date of birth and the type of identification you were shown.
The record and its supporting documents are kept until the business or licensed activity is discontinued — there is no fixed period in years (27 CFR § 478.129(e)).
That can be decades, so the medium matters: a notebook that has to survive years of house moves is a real risk.
Electronic records — allowed, with conditions #
An electronic record is permitted where the format meets ATF requirements and can be printed on demand within 24 hours. Note the second half of that sentence: a record you cannot produce on paper quickly is not a compliant record, whatever it looks like on a screen. The rules in this area are also moving — a notice of proposed rulemaking on electronic record-keeping was published on May 8, 2026 and had not settled as of this writing. Check the current text before you rely on any of it.
The honest framing for any software, this app included: it is a tool for keeping a bound book, not a bound book. Nothing you install moves the responsibility off the licensee.
Why private owners keep the same record #
There is no national registration system in the United States, and ATF says so plainly: it does not take reports of stolen firearms from private citizens, and it cannot help a private citizen locate a serial number, because no such registry exists. If you did not write the number down, there is generally no route back to it outside an active criminal investigation.
The practical minimum turns out to be the same handful of fields the police need for an entry in the FBI NCIC Gun File: make, caliber, type, serial number, plus the date and a case number from the agency where the theft occurred. Without a genuine serial number there is no entry at all. A private A&D-style log — acquired when, from whom, for how much, disposed when and to whom — happens to capture exactly that, plus the cost basis you will want later.
How Waffenschrank helps #
Waffenschrank records acquisitions and dispositions with date, counterparty and price against each firearm, and produces a worksheet laid out in the column order the regulation prescribes for a collector's record. The export names, in its own header, the fields the app does not hold — importer where it differs from the manufacturer, the other party's address or FFL number, date of birth and identification for non-licensees — so you can see what still has to be completed in your own book rather than assuming it is done.
The disclaimer sits on the export itself: a worksheet for Type 03 licensees, not a compliant bound book within the meaning of the regulation, and not legal advice. More about the app.