How does everyone deal with paperwork at home?

[Canistaysane]

I have drawers full and I'm not always sure what to keep and what to chuck.
I'm talking about ALL kinds of paper work from dc creations to important documents, leaflets to newspapers, etc, etc,
What sort of things do you keep and what do you bin?
also any Ideas on storage? I did try to set up a sort of filing system for important stuff but a lot of it gets shoved in the drawer.

We have a couple of box files for 'life stuff' documents. Aside from all the obvious important docs (birth certs, passports, driving licenses, health info) we keep the most up to date versions of thing like bank statements, insurance docs, paid bills etc. There is also a 3 drawer in/out tray which is divided into 'to do', 'to file' and 'things you need' - the last has things like timetables, gp surgery contact info, leaflets for days out, cab numbers, takeaway menus .

I have a big ring binder for all my personal letters - each person has their own plastic pocket thing.

As for DC's artwork, well, a huge sheaf of paintings and stuff went in the recycling yesterday Our flat is quite small so we have to be ruthless. There are some of DS's nicest splodges up in the kitchen. He's always happy to make more.

This house seems to have 4 nests for paperwork at the moment: kitchen sideboard, top of piano, dining table and a bowl on the dining sideboard that was supposed to be decorative - grrr.

We have a 2 drawer filing cabinet in the dining room which I have put a bit of fabric over (matches curtains) to disguise ugly greyness. Every once in a while (when I blow my stack) it all gets filed in there.

When the kids bring home their massive folders of 'work' at term end, we look at them over the holidays and before they go back to school, the kids are made to select their 3 fave pieces. The rest has to go. Harsh but necessary.

I have 3 large ringbinders.

The first contains household documents, bills etc. It is divided in to all the relevant subjects plus four sections at the back for documents relevant to each of us personally but not to the other subjects.
As each document comes in it is read, holepunched and filed away. I go through annually and shred anything no longer necessary.

The other two are for the DCs. Each named and again with dividers. Contain school reports for each year, certificates and little gems I can't throw away.

They are kept upstairs in our room. HTH

Filing cabinet. I try to get all papers either in the recycling/shredder or in the cabinet ASAP, but there are a couple deep piles...
MrNC has 10 different pensions which all send him piles of bumf which need keeping, so it's an uphill task. Also nursery send at least 2 invoices a month with various random numbers so I'm keeping the lot - but on the whole everything fits in the filing cabinet.

Thanks everyone, If anyone does anything different would be interesting to hear.

I have separate ring-binders on shelves in the study; utilities; finance/mortgage; insurance; my employment/contract/payslips/P60s etc; DH's employment, etc; motor vehicle documents; household receipts/instruction manuals; very important docs (passports, birth certificates, marriage cert, etc) and so on. Each ring binder has separate plastic wallets in and I keep things for about 3 years so I can compare fuel consumption, etc. Payslips go back at least 5 years. I try to file asap, but things do stack up, so I have a wire basket to put everything in until I deal with it. Works well for me. :)

2-drawer filing cabinet from Staples, with hanging files. Labelled predictably with, for example, gas, electric, Mr WK's car, Mrs WK's car, life insurance, bank account etc etc etc. I have an in-tray - if post arrives and I don't have time to deal with it immediately, it goes in there and gets opened within a couple of days. I keep current insurance policies and certificates, at least a year's worth of utility bills, 7 years of anything tax-related. I file as I go - a good tip is to file the most recent piece of paper at the top, so when you open the file the first thing you have in front of you is the most recent, which is likely to be the one you need to deal with/query.