Hi,
Okay, so you may have sorted through all your paperwork and have it up to date, and even filed away in a filing system that makes sense. But are any of your files overflowing so much, to the point that they’re so heavy you almost fall over when you try to retrieve one from your shelf?! That’s happened to me! I think that means it’s time for me to purge my files of paperwork that is out of date – anything that’s over a year old in fact, doesn’t need to be close at hand.
According to Government guidelines you should keep bank statements and financial records for up to 6 years if you run a business (22 months if you don’t have a business, and five years if you are self-employed).
{source: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/377656/rk-bk1.pdf}
So I’m not throwing away our financial records over a year, but putting them in a box in the garage for any financial statements and bills that are older than 12 months as we will rarely need to refer to them again.
I’ve now got all of our bills filed alphabetically in one file, marked ‘Bills – 2014/15’ and other financial records – insurance, shares, savings accounts etc – in a file labeled ‘Financials – 2014/15.
I removed files older than that first (before buying more boxes and stationery) so that I knew what I needed and didn’t buy extra files or boxes I wouldn’t use. As it turns out, I have two piles of papers – one pile for 2012 paperwork and one pile for 2013 paperwork. So, all that’s needed is two large bulldog clips to keep each together, and both can go in a storage box labelled Bills – 2012 and 2013.
And now I can retrieve my file without falling over 😉
See you on Day #25.
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