Tax season is finally over for most of us and now all those documents we gathered are sitting around. You may need to hold onto those documents for a while, but what about the bank statements, credit card statements, receipts, and other financial documents we have laying around our houses? Not only does all of that clutter our homes, but those documents have information that you probably wouldn’t want someone to get ahold of.
If you have the time and discipline to keep up with it, a great option is to store all of these electronically. As they come in, scan and save them to your computer. That way you can get rid of the paper copy. That raises the question, what to do with the paper copy? Your best option is to shred any document containing sensitive personal information. If you’re not sure about a particular document, it’s best to be safe and shred it anyway. By properly disposing of our documents we lower the risk of a criminal getting their hands on sensitive information that could allow them to steal our identities or access any of our accounts.
Want to take it one step further? Sign up to have your bills and statements electronically sent to you. Using eStatements for your credit card or bank accounts not only keeps your statements in a safe place, but you usually get them quicker. If you need to print out a hard copy, just download it and hit print. (just don’t forget to shred it later) HFS members, check out how easy it is to sign up: https://bloomcudev.com/online-banking/.
