Defining Time & Space News

Bills and receipts are with us and here to stay.  They come at us in both electronic and paper form and can pile up quickly.  The trick is to have a system and make a habit of using it. 

First thing is if we use an on-line bill pay system and purchase things on line, try to keep as much as you can in an electronic form.

Create electronic files that mirror the paper files so that they can be easily found and make sure they are backed-up.  

Have a system for purging.  The amount of time is not as important as having a plan and using it.  Decide on keeping the last month, last 6 months, last year or whatever you are required for tax or legal reasons.

Besides those receipts that are necessary for tax records, we sometimes keep receipts for warranty or other record of purchase.  For these create a “Receipts to Keep” file.

Happy filing,

Rosanne

770.995.8556

www.dtsorganizing.com

Tags: E-mail, Filing, Home, Office by organizing atlanta
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Personal Medical Records can be difficult to keep up with, especially if we are keeping up with multiple people in a family.  It can also be challenging when it is time to sign up for the “expected” amount we need to commit to for in our company flexible spending accounts.

One way to help with this is to use a summary sheet for each member who has medical care.  There is a form that can be printed on my website at http://www.dtsorganizing.com/resources.php called Medical Inventory.  Print and fill out a form (name and date) at the beginning of the year, for each person, and place it in a medical folder labeled with the year.  Then as medical care is received throughout the year, attach the receipt, tests, or other documentation to the appropriate summary sheet.  The summary sheet allows us to easily track the date of the medical visit, treatment, or prescription, the amount spent, the reason for the visit/event and what person/company is being paid.  At the end of the year, we have a list by person that can be tallied to predict medical expenses for the next Flexible Spending Account year and/or for our own medical expense budgeting.

Rosanne

770.995.8556

www.dtsorganizing.com

Tags: Filing, Medical by organizing atlanta
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We often attain newspaper or magazine articles of interest or collect materials for business topics to use for a future article to write, topic to research further, room to decorate, or other project to do. 

Collecting these materials is only one step of the process because we also need to be able to find them when it is time to actually use them for what they were kept for.   One way to allow us to easily find information on these topics is to file them by their subject name in alphabetical order.  As we collect them or as we find them if we already have a collection somewhere, we need to identify the best topic name for the file and start labeling. 

As always, try to start with as broad a category as possible and then subdivide as needed.  When I am collecting materials on organizing, I keep them by topics such as office, recycling/green, filing, feng shui, record retention, etc.  As I read information or find articles, I add them to the topic file I have or create a new one if one doesn’t exist or if I need to subdivide a file because there is too much within a category area.

This filing process can be duplicated and paralleled in an electronic filing system. Often times we have articles and materials that we receive or retrieve electronically.  These can be filed the same way but in electronic folders so that they do not have to be printed just to file them.  If necessary notes for either electronic files or paper files can be added to the other to reference what is in the other areas.

Happy Filing

Rosanne

770.995.8556

www.dtsorganizing.com

Tags: Filing by organizing atlanta
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Another set of documents that find their way into our homes and offices are manuals and sometimes associated warranty information.  These can be from a simple sheet of paper to a large manual with spare parts.  Here are a few tips that can help with these type documents.

1. Documentation for each product should be fastened together or contained in some type of envelope.  Based upon how bulky these documents are, they can be kept in either a hanging folder in a file drawer or in envelopes in drawers.  
2. Decide the best way to subdivide the types of information; for example, we can label hanging file folders or drawers and subdivide them between products used outside versus inside,  products that are large from small, or have categories like electronics or computer related.  How we divide it has much to do with how much material we have in each category.  The goal is to have it subdivided enough to find it easily.
3. It is important that we purge the information from our files when we sell, donate, or discard the product.
4. Fill out warranty cards if we plan to submit them and keep a copy of the receipt in the file with the product information.  Remember some warranty requests/cards are only requests for marketing information.  Also remember that many receipts today fade easily and will not be legible when we need them for a warranty claim or for insurance purposes.  Copying the receipt or creating an electronic copy can be helpful.
5. Many times spare parts and software CD/DVDs are part of the “stuff” we choose to store with the manuals.  Be sure they are clearly labeled as to what they support so that if they become separated we know where they belong.

Happy Filing

Rosanne

770.995.8556

www.dtsorganizing.com

Tags: Filing by organizing atlanta
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