Wanting to reduce your paper clutter? Paper receipts can easily add to the piles of paper on your desk or in your purse or wallet. Or just frustrated with looking for a particular receipt and can’t find it anywhere Yes, been there, done that! Well here’s 3 ways you can store and organize your receipts, once and for all. Organize receipts with a receipt box, a filing system or monthly receipt organizer. A simple change that will make a big difference to the paper clutter!
Favorite Receipt Organizers You Can Use
1. Receipt Box
This would have to be the simplest way to organize your receipts and it takes very little time to set up.
Simply grab a pretty storage box, fill it up with your receipts and you are done. An easy idea when you don’t have a lot of receipts you need to keep. Everything is in one place!
Adapt this idea for your own financial situation by using boxes, labelled with the specific type of expense. For example; household, appliances, clothing.
However if you have a ton of receipts, it can be time consuming to find that one receipt you need in that box.
TIP: Keep things more manageable by sorting through the receipts at the end of financial year and discard those that are no longer needed.
2. Receipt Filing System
This option to organize receipts will suit you if you love detailed organizing systems. (That’s not me!) Create a filing system to organize receipts by category.
Though similar to using receipt boxes or jars for storing your receipts by category you could use a lever arch file, tab dividers and plastic sleeves, or a plastic sleeve display book with tabs.
This would work well whether you have a lot of receipts or a small number you need to keep. It looks great and makes it much quicker and easier to find the specific receipt you are after.
However this system is more complex, filing receipts away on a regular basis would take more effort and you could end up with a pile of receipts that always need “filing”.
3. Monthly Receipt Organizer
This is how I organize receipts I need to keep and have been doing so for the last 3 years 8 years. After trying several other receipt organizers prior and finding they didn’t work well for me. I use this small plastic wallet above, I got from Kmart for $4.
Use a small or a large expanding file with several dividers labelled in months or quarters. Then the receipt simply gets put in that quarter’s section at the front as soon as you have received it.
Why I love this way to organize receipts?
I find putting away the receipts is straight forward, and so I do it regularly rather than letting them pile up. Probably every couple of weeks (or less) I tidy out my wallet or purse and put them away.
(Update: most of my shopping is online now so I have very few paper receipts I keep each month.)
There is also an order to how receipts are kept unlike using one large container. That makes it quick to find a receipt for a purchase because I know it will be right at the front of that month’s section.
However I do still have to go back through a lot of the receipts to locate an older one if I am not sure of the exact time of purchase. That can be time consuming!
To make sure receipts aren’t building up, when I get to a new month’s or quarter divider I go through only those receipts. Out dated receipts are put in the bin. It’s usually a 2 minute job to do that!
How to organize your online receipts
If you are like me, and often purchase items online rather than in store, you will need to decide how you will organize online receipts. Some people have come up with systems for filing digital receipts as well as going completely paperless. In contrast, my method is super simple!
I keep the email copy of invoices and receipts in my inbox and use that as my storage. That’s it!
When I need to find a specific receipt, I search the company or product name in my email account and the receipt I need shows up.
If you want to be more organized that that, you can create a folder on your desktop. Simply, download and save a copy of the electronic receipt to the receipts folder.
If you prefer paper receipts, keep the printed receipt that gets sent with most online purchases or print it out yourself. Then file it with your other receipts as suggested above.
More Helpful Organizing Ideas
- How To Organize Bills
- Automatic Bill Paying
- Why You Need A Mojo Account
- Weekly Planning Ideas
- How To Be Organized When You Live With Real People
