I think we all want to know how to get rid of paper clutter. It’s one of those things akin to an evil monster taking over your home if you don’t take steps to reduce your paper clutter.
Let me explain — have you ever seen the movie Gremlins?
It starts with this cute little harmless furry Gremlin, known as “Gizmo”. As the movie goes on you learn there are three important rules for taking care of Gremlins:
- Don’t get them wet (they will multiply)
- Don’t feed them after midnight (they will turn evil)
- Don’t expose them to bright light (they will be destroyed)
Well, Gizmo got wet and he multiplied. These multiplied Gremlins were fed after midnight and definitely not so cute and harmless as Gizmo. In fact, they were quite evil, literally taking over and terrorizing the entire town.
When it comes to trying to conquer paper clutter, I swear it’s much like taking care, of a Gremlin. If you don’t follow the rules it’s soon multiplying into this evil monster taking over our homes.
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How to Get Rid of Paper Clutter Once And For All!
The time has come to expose our paper struggles to some bright light by following these simple rules to finally conquer paper clutter once and for all!
1. Treat Paper Clutter the Same as Any Other Form of Clutter
Paper clutter is just that, clutter. To get a handle on it, you’ll want to approach it in much the same way as you do with all other clutter in your home.
The only difference, instead of boxes your main tools are going to be a scanner, a paper shredder, a recycle bin, and a file tray
To begin simply gather all of your paper into one place. Now you’re going to make two piles as follows:
A Keep Pile-
For the items you know that you want to keep, start by placing these in your filing tray. Be highly selective here, remember the goal here is to eliminate as many of the paper Gremlins as possible. So the more paper you can get rid of the better!
I highly recommend scanning receipts and all other documents you need to keep, but don’t necessarily need a hard copy of. If you don’t have a scanner, you can get them pretty reasonably priced on Amazon. You can also download scanning apps to your phone, you can find them with a simple search in the app store.
Scanning these types of items really helps conquer paper clutter. The best part about scanning as many paper items as possible is that you can store them all in the cloud. This will give you access to the papers anytime you need them, but get them out of your home!
For important papers that you must keep a hard copy of, you are going to file them in your filing system. We’ll discuss below, how to create a filing system that works for you.
A Trash Pile–
The second pile will consist of all papers of any kind that you don’t absolutely need to keep. If you really want to end the paper struggle, be ruthless here.
Do you really need to keep all of those manuals you have? Honestly, have you ever looked at them? If you do need them, you know what, they’re all online. A simple google search is so much easier than trying to maintain a bunch of unnecessary paper manuals. Toss these straight into the recycle bin.
For sensitive items such as credit card offers or papers with personal information shred them immediately. If you don’t have a paper shredder get one! They are very inexpensive.
Why are you hanging onto all those receipts? Unless there is a possibility you’ll return the item toss them in the recycle bin.
Don’t hang on to anything you don’t truly have to.
Here is a great list of how long you should keep various documents. Print it out and keep it handy as you are decluttering your papers.
2. Give Yourself Time to Sort Through Your Paper Clutter
Going through your paper clutter takes time, especially if you have a lot of papers to go through.
This makes it important to schedule a reasonable amount of time to work on it. I don’t recommend trying to tackle it all in one sitting otherwise it leads to overwhelm. Scheduling 15 to 30 minutes at a time will allow you to make a good dent in a paper pile and also prevent you from becoming disheartened with your progress and giving up altogether.
When your scheduled session is up, straighten up any papers that you did not get to so you’re not leaving a big mess until your next session. Dispose of any papers that belong in the recycling bin and shred any sensitive information.
For the papers that need to be filed go ahead and put them into the filing tray. Finally, put the remaining unsorted papers in a box or designated area for tackling during your next session.
3. Stay Focused on Reducing Paper Clutter
When it comes to decluttering your home, paper clutter is one of the easiest areas in which to become distracted.
As you go through papers you’ll see things you have not seen in years and you’ll be tempted to go through and read them. There may even be old memories triggered or sentimental/emotional items you’ll struggle with. However, you won’t get anything done if you stop and reminisce over all of these items.
If you are having a hard time making decisions with these papers, asking yourself whether it’s worth your time to file this paper and have to deal with it again is helpful. This is especially true when you remind yourself that everything you keep in your home, including single sheets of paper, requires your time and resources. By deciding to keep it, you will have to file it away at some point in time.
If you really are struggling to make a decision here, don’t let these items stop your process, go ahead and set them aside for now. You will go back to them after you’ve completed everything else.
Another area that steals our focus is attempting to file papers during your decluttering sessions. Place any papers that need to be filed in your filing tray until you’ve completely gone through all papers. This will help you focus on one task at a time!
Plus, as an added advantage, you very well may end up decluttering even more papers when you go through your filing pile!
Organize Your Paper Clutter With an Effective Filing System
To successfully conquer the paper clutter you NEED a filing system! It really is a must!
When creating your filing system, the main thing you want to focus on is keeping your system simple and making sure that it works for YOU.
Having a filing system will simplify your home so much! You will be able to easily find what you need when you need it. And of course, the best part is you’ll no longer have random piles of paper cluttering up all of the flat surfaces in your home!
When creating a filing system to conqueror your paper clutter, there are five key areas you want to create a system for.
1. Create Files for Each Family Member
Create separate files for each family member that contains Birth Certificates, Social Security Cards, Immunization, and other medical records. Any other important papers that are particular to that family member are also placed in this file. This includes things like school or employments records, insurance documents, etc.
Keep these family files in a file cabinet along with other essential files. Whenever something comes up and you need a certain document for that family member you know exactly where to locate it!
2. Organize Monthly Incoming Papers
When it comes to routine papers, those that come in routinely each month, such as bills and bank statements, or even receipts. I use an accordion file similar to this. What I love about this one is that there are separate pockets for each month. This makes it super easy to file all bills and receipts, bank statements, and other papers in the appropriate month’s pocket as soon as I have dealt with them.
Not only is filing made easy, but it’s also incredibly easy to find what I need when I am looking for it. I just go right to that month’s pocket and there it is.
At the end of the year, when I’m working on taxes, I go through the file and pull out all documents I need to keep for tax purposes. Everything else gets shredded or scanned.
I keep my Tax Returns and all of the supporting documents (bank statements, w2’s, etc,) all together in the same file. I keep these documents for a minimum of 7 years.
3. Coupons and Promotions
When it comes to coupons and promotions, I actually keep them on a metal clip on the side of the fridge. This way I see them and remember to use them. Also, because the clip only holds a small amount, I am forced to go through and toss any expired or outdated items on a regular basis.
4. Limit Sentimental Papers
Honestly, I don’t keep a ton of sentimental paper. I’m pretty ruthless with tossing this stuff. But there are things that are too special to toss. All of those special sentimental papers go into a cute box like this one. I just have a couple of them stacked.
5. School Papers
The hardest part of keeping a handle on the paper Gremlin’s was, without a doubt, dealing with all the kids’ school papers. When they were in elementary school, I came up with a great system that works really well, I still use it today!
I purchased these file folders for each kid. These work so great because there are six separate compartments. I keep all report cards and official school documents in the first part and all award and participation certificates in another section.
One side is for filing a sampling of their artwork. A different section holds a sampling of schoolwork or projects. I throw out everything else. For their elementary school years, there are several folders but I only needed one for middle school and I now have one for high school.
I keep the current file on a shelf so it’s always easy to find what I need.
There are lots of options for organizing your files. In fact, I found this fantastic post from The Organized You that has lots of creative ways to actually organize your paperwork. If you’re looking for inspiration, definitely check it out, you’re to find a system that will work for you!
Maintenance Steps to Reduce Paper Clutter
Let’s be real, this is the hardest part of trying to conquer paper clutter. After all, you’ve got papers arriving at your home every single day.
But coming up with workable routines for maintaining a system to deal with paper is essential to finally getting rid of the paper struggle.
Deal with Mail Right Away
One of my routines for maintaining a handle on the paper clutter is to deal with mail the moment it comes in. In fact, I try to make a point of being the only one who touches the mail when it first comes in. I’ve even banned my kids from getting the mail from the box. This way I can go through it before I ever put it down.
Bills go one place, junk mail is taken straight to the recycle bin, credit card offers are immediately taken to the shredder. If I’m busy I will place things to be shredded on top of the shredder until I can get to them. Anything else I need to go through is placed on my desk. I have a specific day dedicated to desk work as part of my weekly cleaning schedule. You can check out my weekly cleaning schedule here if you’re interested.
Use a Calendar to Note Important Dates
I schedule any invites and school flyers right away. I usually jot it down quickly on my desk calendar. Later, when I’m doing my weekly scheduling I will add it to Trello. See how I organize my entire life with Trello. My favorite part about using Trello is they will send me an alert to remind me what’s coming up.
If I think I might need to refer to the original invite or flyer I will snap a photo or scan it and then I toss the original.
Use Tax Season To Get Rid of Paper Clutter Every Year
Once, a year, during tax season, I go through and eliminate any files and paper I no longer need.
Take Advantage of Paperless Billing
Another important part of maintenance after decluttering your paper is to stop as many paper items as possible from entering your home in the first place.
To do this, start by transferring everything online. Do all of your banking online. Most bills can now offer paperless billing and/or autopay. This has really helped to eliminate a good amount of the paper that comes into our home.
Plus, as an added benefit, switching to online banking and bill pay makes it much easier to pay bills on time and manage our budget.
Banish Paper Clutter
By following these simple rules in no time you will conquer paper clutter once and for all! In fact, you’ll find that reducing paper clutter is easier than getting rid of a gremlin.
Takes steps to control the paper clutter coming into your home. Invest in a few filing systems to organize the papers that remain. Then follow up with your maintenance tasks.
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