With each day we are slowly becoming a paperless world, but it’s going to be a very long time before we are completely paperless.  What does that mean to you? It means maintaining good filing systems for your home and business.  For me, nothing stresses me out more than loose papers lying all around.  If you need to find something right away and have to rummage through an enormous amount of papers you will quickly see your face turn a brighter shade of red.  This defeats the purpose of home organization!

I find that most people don’t file for these two reasons:

  • It seems tedious.  Well, you know what…if you let it pile up for months it will be tedious. If you keep up on your filing system and file every day or even once a week it will be easy to maintain.
  • Don’t know where to file things.  Most things that you need to keep have a place. If you truly can’t figure out where a piece of paper needs to be filed, keep a miscellaneous section in your filing system. This really isn’t something that will happen that often anyway.

The first step is to determine the method for your filing systems. Will it be numerical or by categories.  I personally think categories are the easiest way to go for a home filing system. If it’s an office filing system them you will have to put a little more thought into it as each business is different and has different filing needs.

Next is to set up your filing system by separating current files from historic files.  Current files are papers that you access on a regular basis or are from the current year.  Historic files are papers that you will unlikely have to access however you must keep them for retention purposes like tax or loan documents.  If possible try and separate the two filing systems.  You can do this with a lateral file cabinet, but if this is for a home filing system and you do not have a lot of room, keep your historic files in a box or easily identify them in your filing cabinet as historic.

The next step is to determine what papers you REALLY need and what papers can be shredded or recycled. If you have an electronic copy more often than not you do not need a physical copy as well.  You really need to look at each piece of paper and say is this something I really need to keep or can I part with it.  When you choose to keep a piece of paper, sort the paper into different piles/categories and use a post-it note to label each pile until a permanent category name has been chosen.

There are all sorts of reasons to file things, for example if you have hobbies that you research a lot or you keep letters from friends or family and various other miscellaneous items.  Those items only you can decide if they are really necessary to keep.  However, to help you with the basics of what should be kept for either a short period of time or forever I have compiled a list.  These are just the basics for a home filing system, not a business and will vary by person.

Items you need to keep forever:

  • Social Security Card
  • Alien Cards & Passports (usually you can toss these once/if you have renewed them however I like to keep them forever because you just never know)
  • Vaccination Records
  • Certificates – Birth, Marriage, Divorce and Death
  • Important Military Documents

Items you need to keep for at least 7 years:

  • Canceled Checks, Bank Statements & Credit Card Statements– A lot of banks are going paperless so you should look into keeping these electronically. It will help reduce the amount of paper you have in your filing system.
  • Retirement Contributions
  • Tax returns and all supporting documentation for tax returns
    • Once you get your W2’s at the end of each year and all looks well you can toss your paycheck stubs

Items you need to keep while you own them:

  • Car – Titles, Loan documents, Repair records, Warranties
  • Appliances and big purchases – Manuals, Receipts, Warranties
  • Stocks, Bonds, Investments, Savings Certificates, Real Estate Records, Home Improvements – these should be kept from ownership plus 7 years

Items you need to keep until a specified date:

  • Wills – Keep until it has been replaced by a new version
  • Insurance Policies – Keep until you sell the property, the policy expires and claims, if any, have been settled
  • Yearly retirement statements – Keep until funds have been exhausted

Hopefully this information will give you an idea of how to set up your filing system. Like I said, if you keep up on it it’s really not as boring as it sounds.  It’s very important to have filing systems that are easy to get to because you never know when you will need to find something quickly. Plus, when everything is neatly put away and you can start to see your desk again you will smile, I promise!!