Organizing Papers: Creating a Paper Filing System

A familiar scene in many people’s homes is the pile of papers sitting on the desk, kitchen table or counter tops.  How are you  managing the abundance of papers?   Can you locate the important documents you need when it’s time to prepare your taxes?  Organizing papers helps you locate them faster and prevents those hair pulling moments when you just can’t find that bill you need to pay or the receipt you need.   I’ll walk you through how to create a paper filing system for your home.

First, assign an action center in your home for organizing papers.   This action center will need a trash can, recycling bin and/or shredder nearby.   Place the piles of papers cluttering up the various areas of your home.  Begin sorting through them, toss out the papers that aren’t needed. Now we are ready to create the filing system.

Next you will need a filing cabinet for organizing papers.  If there isn’t room for a filing cabinet consider a portable file box, even an old milk crate will do.   This obviously needs to be placed in your action center for easy access.  The other materials you will need are hanging file jackets, manilla folders, labels and of course a pen.   We are now ready to create category folders.

Now it’s time to create categories for organizing papers.  Take a sheet of paper out, and write a category name at the top of the sheet.   Let’s say the category name is “financial,” underneath the heading write file names for the manilla folders.   To be place in that category.  The hanging jacket files will serve as the category folder.  Manilla folders are labeled and organized alphabetically.

Rinse and repeat until you have created all the necessary categories and files.

Finally start organizing papers from the pile you gathered up in the first step.  Place the documents in the appropriate files.

Now you have created a filing system for organizing papers.  Keep your filing system in tip top shape by taking immediate action for incoming papers.  Remember to toss out unnecessary papers.  Assign an action area, gather up the supplies, categories, create folders and file to keep your papers organized.

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