Lost control of personal admin

[Tootingbec]

Since we moved house (18 months ago!!) I have completely lost control of all our paperwork. I don't think it helps that I had set up a slightly complicated system of multiple box files......anyway, I am thinking of taking a slightly different approach of filing paperwork by month, except for 'static' things like mortgage details, marriage certificates/birth certificates etc.

I have tried to reduce down the amount of bank statements we get in paper form but DH seems to get tons of paperwork through still....

Anyone tried a monthly filing system rather than 'themed'?

We ended up going by time period and not type purely by accident - we moved just before DS was born, so with the move and a new baby everything just went into a folder with the most recent stuff being towards the front

Tbh, I found it very easy. I can usually recall at around what time a particular letter might have come in, so I knew how far back in the folder it should be and didn't spend ages trying to find anything. As in your OP, the static important things were in a separate folder so there was no confusion.

However I hate holding onto paperwork (well, anything) unless absolutely necessary, so I've moved on to another iteration of the system. Recent paperwork (within last month) goes together. I look through it and anything not really important gets destroyed. The rest goes in the folder by type. If it's not really important but could possibly be useful, then it can be scanned, but I've never done this so far as it's always been either very important or simply not.

Fwiw I currently have 2 folders - one for static, one for other important docs that come in - both are A4 and about 1" thick. Nothing else. However, it makes a massive difference that almost everything we do is online - all banking, bills and council tax are all dealt with through online accounts. I even get electronic copies of my payslips and P60s as opposed to paper. It may not be possible to go all that way, depending on what you do, but see if you could possibly switch more paperwork to online. It not only takes up less space but is also much easier to find!

Thanks Delasi - same here re: the one box that all paperwork ended up shoved in when we moved! It was that that gave me the idea as I have found myself saying to DH "it will be in the big red box file, prob towards the back...."

Will give it a whirl then - the pain of getting out 7 different box files and then having to sort the paperwork by topic is just too much now that I have 2 children who won't leave me alone for a second to get anything done!