As an Organizer, the most common question I hear is “how long should I keep documents?” Here’s a guideline on residential record keeping.

Save for 1 month:

• Credit-card receipts
• Sales receipts for minor purchases
• Withdrawal and deposit slips.  (Shred after checking against your monthly bank statement.)

Save for 1 year:

• Paycheck stubs (Shred after your W-2 arrives.)
• Monthly bank, credit-card, brokerage, mutual-fund, and retirement-account statements
• Utility bills

Save for 7 years:  Read more...

• W-2s, 1099s, and the other “guts” of your tax returns

Before – Laura Ray Organizing

After – Laura Ray Organizing

Client:  Saleswoman for a service company in Georgia.

Here’s the situation: Like many people, the client had converted a room of her home into an office. In this case, it was the dining room, which had no storage. Then, the client’s aging mother needed to move in for a few months and the only place to put a bed on the first floor was the home office. 

Solving the problem:

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• We purged a lot. There were outdated sales and seminar materials. There were products from a former business, and household items that just landed in the space. She needed to make decisions about what items to purge.

Here’s the situation:  Residential files were created over several years, resulting in random colors and tabs, jumbled order and overstuffed folders. The client procrastinated with filing because it was cumbersome to find and file documents.

Client:  Business executive

How solved:  Read more...

1. Weeded out old files.
2. Separated too full files into multiple folders.
3. Bought hanging folders in client’s favorite color and eliminated the use of all internal file folders.
4. Created new tabs and lined up on the left side to make it easier on the eye.

You’re about to start a big project, but first you want to give e-mail a quick check. One hour later, you close e-mail and wonder where the time went. Your whole schedule’s thrown off. You vow to not let that happen again.

Usually the problem is your e-mail in-box. You want to get it under control, with a few minutes answering e-mail here, and a few minutes sending and forwarding there. If the types of e-mails in your in-box don’t change and the way you handle them doesn’t either, then it’s likely more time will disappear from your schedule.  Read more...

Laura Ray with consumer advocate Dale Cardwell

In January 2015, I had the privilege of being interviewed by consumer advocate Dale Cardwell for his TrustDale Radio Show. We talked about organizing and productivity in the office to highlight “National Clean Off Your Desk Day!”

If you’ve never heard it, the TrustDale Radio show features advice and tips on how to find reputable contractors and avoid scams.

If you’d like to listen to it, here’s  the  link on my YouTube channel.

It’s wonderful to be asked to be on Good Day Atlanta (Fox 5) for a second time this year! I was interviewed on their live show for mail and paper organizing on February 19, 2015.

Here are my tips below from the show, or watch Fox 5’s show HERE on my YouTube channel

Mail and Paper Organizing Tips by Laura Ray Organizing

Set up a mail center in your kitchen or nearby space  Read more...

• Use trays or a desktop file
• Use a recycle bin and/or shredder