How To Organise Paperwork At Home + Storage Ideas

It’s no secret that paperwork can quickly become overwhelming, especially if you don’t have a system for organising it. While most workplaces have a system of organising paperwork, at home it can get out of control fast! Thankfully there are some simple ways to organise paperwork at home.

This guide will help you with decluttering paperwork that you don’t need, go paperless where you can and tips on how to organise paperwork so that you can keep your home clutter-free!

Organising Paperwork At Home

How many times have spent far too long searching for a document that you know is somewhere in your house? Or, even worse, you can’t find it at all! This is a frustrating experience that we’ve all had at one point or another.

Or do you have an overwhelming pile of paperwork or an overflowing drawer that you keep meaning to sort through, but you never seem to find the time?

If either of these scenarios sounds like you, then it’s time to get your paperwork organised! Having a system in place for your paperwork will make your life much easier and help you to stay on top of things.

It also means you’re less likely to miss important due dates for bills and other essential appointments.

Whether your goal is to switch to a paperless system or simply get your paperwork under control, you can be ready to say goodbye to paper clutter!

How Long Do I Need To Keep Paperwork?

Before we get into the decluttering and organising side of things, we should cover the basics of what you need to keep and what you don’t.

Gone are the days when we needed to keep every payslip, every bill and every statement.

Depending on your situation, there may be certain documents you need to keep for a specific length of time, such as employee tax records. Although in most cases, this applies more to businesses than to personal documents at home.

For businesses, refer to your local taxation requirements. Typically you will need to maintain records of 5 to 7 years.

The exception of course is that you need to keep the original documents of items such as birth certificates, passports, wills and any other irreplaceable paperwork in a safe and secure place.

The other thing to keep is the receipts for big-ticket purchases in case you need them for warranty claims.

You might also like to keep original medical records, insurance documents and tax documents.

Aside from these, most other documents can be stored digitally or thrown away once you no longer need them.

Other documents like bank statements and utility bills can be kept for 12 months if you choose as these companies will have a history of your account documents on file. In most cases, you can access them online and print them as needed.

How To Declutter Paperwork

The first step to fixing this problem is decluttering your paperwork. You don’t need to keep every single document that comes into your house!

Compile All Your Papers

To declutter paperwork in your home, collect every document and piece of paper clutter you can find.

Look in drawers, on desks and tables, on the kitchen counter and anywhere else you know it has accumulated and bring it all together in piles of papers that are ready to sort.

Get Rid Of Any Unnecessary Paperwork

One of the best ways to reduce the amount of paperwork you have to deal with is to get rid of anything that you don’t need. This might seem obvious, but it’s amazing how much stuff we keep “just in case”.

While it will be a personal choice whether to keep things such as bank summaries, invoices or bills if they are available in your online account for each of your services, you may still choose to keep 12 months of records for such items.

Anything older can go in your declutter pile.

RELATED: 150 things to throw away or donate today

Dispose Of Personal Documents Securely

The best way to dispose of personal documents is to shred them. This will help to protect you from identity theft and prevent any sensitive information from getting into the wrong hands.

You can get a small, inexpensive paper shredder for home, such as this one.

If you do not have a shredder, you can chop your papers into small strips using scissors instead.

Never just throw your unwanted paperwork into the recycling bin without destroying it first!

Once you’ve decluttered your paperwork, you can start to organise it so that it’s easier to find what you need, when you need it.

How To Organise Paperwork At Home

Organising paperwork at home is not one of those one size fits all situations. Like any storage system, what works for one person might not work for you.

Think about how you use your paperwork and what would work best for you in terms of accessibility and ease of use.

Going Paperless

If you manage most of your life digitally, such as using a digital calendar, online banking and photos, going paperless with your household documents might be your perfect solution!

It can be a really big transition if you don’t typically live a digital life, but there are many benefits to going paperless.

You can say goodbye to mountains of paper clutter, you’ll always be able to find what you’re looking for and it’s more eco-friendly.

If you do plan to go paperless, a cloud storage service is far more reliable than just using your computer storage since it can malfunction at any time. The last thing you need is to lose everything!

Cloud storage will allow you to access your documents from anywhere in the world and on any device and it is stored securely.

If you want to stick with a free option, you can get an external hard drive to back up your files instead. This isn’t a guaranteed option either, but having your documents saved on a hard drive and on your computer is better than just on a computer.

Physical Filing System For Storing Paperwork At Home

If you do need to keep some paperwork at home, using a physical filing system might be more your style. Thankfully there are plenty of different options to suit your filing style and the space you have.

Compact Filing System

You can use a simple lever arch file or box file with hanging files and labels. These are two of the easiest ways to keep your paperwork organised at home.

There are so many stylish options for hanging files these days, from decorative file boxes that match your home decor to wire file racks that can sit on your desk or shelf for easy access to your documents.

Filing Cabinet

If you have a lot of paperwork or you want to be able to lock it away for security, using a filing cabinet is a great option. You can buy one second-hand quite cheaply if you don’t want to spend too much money.

The key is to keep your paperwork filing system simple, regardless of whether it is digital or physical. If it’s too hard, you won’t maintain your system!

Secure Document Storage

For all your important documents, such as birth certificates, passports, family death certificates, insurance documents, etc it is best to keep them in a secure, fireproof box.

You can get small-sized fireproof document boxes or a larger fireproof safe if there are other valuables you wish to store in there as well.

This will protect them from any damage and you can be sure that they are safe. Most of these document storage boxes will also protect your papers from water damage in case of floods also.

Folders Or Binders

Alternatively, you can go for a pretty solution and buy a set of matching folders to keep your paperwork looking chic! Use a hole punch to put your paperwork within the correct folder, as soon as it comes in the door!

If you do not get a huge amount of paperwork into your home, you may consider adding your physical paperwork to a section inside your home management binder as a great way to keep all your financial documents and personal documents with your household information.

Extra Tips For Organising Paperwork At Home

These extra tips will help you maintain your paper organisation system for important papers and insure that household paperwork doesn’t fall through the cracks!

Action Immediately

One of the riskiest parts of paper clutter at home is accidentally misplacing an important document or missing the due date on a bill.

To make sure this doesn’t happen to you, take action as soon as possible.

As soon as a document comes in, pay the bill if required and file it away in its correct place. If it is a bill that you cannot pay immediately, set yourself an alert or planner reminder (that you will see) to pay it on a specific date instead.

Then file your paperwork straight into your home filing system or digital storage.

Don’t let it build up or you will get overwhelmed!

Weekly Routine

If you do plan to scan the documents that come into the home, but know you won’t always have time to deal with incoming papers straight away, set up a tray system that you action each week or fortnight as part of your regular household routine.

You can either have a paperless tray or a physical tray.

The paperless tray is an email inbox or similar that you file all your documents into as soon as they come in. Then, each week (or whenever you have time), you action the items in your tray by scanning them and filing them away.

Storing Receipts

Receipts for big-ticket items can be kept from the date of purchase in case you need to return them or make a warranty claim.

Instead of storing them in a drawer where they may get misplaced, staple them to the inside cover of the product manual and file them into your filing system. This makes it easy to find both the receipt and the manual if there is an issue.

However, receipts are known for fading quickly, so if you do make any large purchases and need to retain a copy, always scan or photograph your original receipt and store this in a cloud-based folder so you don’t face the issue of it fading beyond recognition.

This also means you can get rid of the original receipt instead.

Annual Paperwork Declutter

At least every 12 months, go through your paperwork and declutter what you no longer need.

Shred or recycle any old documents that are no longer needed and update your preferences with any bills that you can instead have sent digitally. This will help to keep your paperwork organised and tidy all year long!

Use A Label Maker

For physical paper storage, consider using a label maker to easily identify what tab or section is for what type of documents. This will save you time and energy when looking for specific documents, as you will be able to see at a glance where everything is.

I love my Dymo label maker for this purpose and many others.

If you don’t have a label maker, simply write out labels by hand and tape them onto the front of each file or box.

Kids’ Paperwork

If you have kids at home, you know how much extra important paperwork and other random papers come into the home. One of the best ways to manage kids’ school papers, school certificates, ribbons and favourite drawings is to set up a file for each child.

I use a large plastic folder that stores up to 100 pieces of paper. This has been great for putting all their awards, recognition, special drawings, photos and cards that they might like to keep.

It has become a special keepsake that they sometimes flip through and it will be something they can take with them when they are adults and ready to move out too.

Kids’ Artwork

If you struggle with what to do with all your child’s artwork, take a photo of each piece and create a photo book each year with all their drawings and paintings. This is a fun gift idea at Christmas time or as a special keepsake for you to see how their artistic skills grew along with them.

This way, you don’t have to keep every physical piece of art but you can still look back on it and enjoy it whenever you want.

Paperwork doesn’t have to be a pain! By using these simple tips, you can easily keep paperwork organised in your home and avoid it taking over your life. This means less clutter and less stress since you know where everything is, when your bills are due and how to manage the new paperwork coming in the door! You’ve got this.

Do you have any other tips for how to organise paperwork at home? Share them with us in the comments below!