What I Do About Document Storage!

Last week my friend, Marcy asked about document storage and what to do about it! So I thought I would take the time to give you a "tour" of my document storage. First off I am going to tell you my weakness when it comes to saving documents and papers.....I keep every receipt!! I am learning that I don't need to do that but it is a hard habit to break! Most stores are not going to take something back from 3 years ago even with a receipt!(unless it is something that has a warranty and that is the only way to get a replacement).

Anyway, here is the tour of how documents/bills/receipts get managed at my house....

This is the clothespin with a magnet superglued to it that is on the side of my fridge...this is where the receipts go that need to be recorded into the Quicken checkbook. As for the bills, they go into the mail slot that is on my office desk.After the receipts are recorded or the bills are paid they find themselves in the top of my stackable trays. Any other papers/documents that need to be filed get set into the stackable tray as well. I try every month to tackle this tray and file the papers that have accumulated in it but that doesn't always happen!

When I do get the papers filed, they go into the safe that we have with hanging folders---each of the hanging folders is a general category and in each category there is manila folder with the specific place labeled on the folder.

Hubby and I clean out the safe after we file our taxes each year. We take a couple of days and purge the safe of the past year's papers and save the ones that we needed to keep for taxes. We shred them as we go thru them so we don't end up with a huge stack to shred.



This year, hubby and I decided that we were going to add something "new" to our filing system in that we purchased this stackable file storage box. We are going to weed out those papers that do not necessarily need to be in the locked fire proof safe. Papers like our utilities bills, and non-essential receipts, etc. This way it will open up space in the safe for documents that need that extra protection should we have a house fire.

Now I told you that I had a weakness of saving every receipt! Well I guess I have a couple more weaknesses when it comes to holding on to papers/documents and such. Hubby and I have this little filing box for all the different manuals(and extra ceiling fan parts) for items that will be staying with the house when/if we ever move. There is manuals in there for the ceiling fans, built in automatic dishwasher, fridge, etc. This way when/if we move we can just take everything in this filing box and leave it for the next homeowners.


Speaking of manuals from baby strollers to digitial camera to TV to stereo equipment to the kids bicycles to hubby's tools you will find in the bottom drawer of this Iris carts. We have hanging folders in there divided up into hubby's, mine, ours, and kids. Anything and everything that we have purchased or received as gifts you will find the manual for in this drawer. I try to go thru it about once a year and purge those toys that were broken that got thrown away or those things that I forgot to attach the manual to that we sold at our yearly garage sale or those things that we just donated because the kids were too old for them.

So there you have it...what I do about document/paper/manual storage! I am sure that there is a better way to do my madness! But so far I haven't figured that out and this is what works for me! What do you do? Have any tips for me to streamline things to make them more efficient?

For what works for others....Head over to Works for Me Wednesday at Rocks in My Dryer.