How To Organize Bills

how to spend less time and effort organizing your paperwork - bill organization

HELP!! I’m OK with paying bills on time but what do I do with all the paperwork? Here are 3 bill organization ideas that will make life easier for you. Tips to organize your bills and papers.

1. Go Paperless

What?? Simply elect not to receive paper bills in the mail. Less decisions! Less paperwork to organize!

Simply to opt to receive your bills by email or by email notification, telling you the bill is available to view on the provider’s website. I

In fact, most service providers prefer their customers to choose that option. Even a few will now charge a small fee to send out a paper bill or invoice.

Save yourself time and space by having less paper work to organize, as well as saving on money and trees!

How To Remember To Pay Your Bills On Time

But a paper bill is a good physical reminder to pay the bill on time. What if I forget?

The “set it up and leave it” option will ensure your bills get paid on time. This means organizing with your service provider for your bills to be paid either monthly or quarterly by direct debit.

Businesses love it when their customers choose direct debit too. Direct debit is when the company withdraws an amount, either what you have requested or the amount of the bill, when it is due.

All you need to do is make sure there is enough money in your account to cover the direct debit. Again there may be a fee from your bank or the business, if that direct debit transaction cannot be honored.

For me personally, I have now changed most of my bills to receive the invoice online and to pay by direct debit. I then make sure I have the amount available in my account by using a budget and setting up Barefoot Investor bank accounts.

For any bills, that you don’t want paid for by direct debit, a simple way is to schedule them for payment in your online bank account as soon as you receive the bill by email. Or whenever you do your planning each week.

Then it’s all done and dusted!

2. Shred Your Paper Bills

You like the above option of going completely online, but for whatever reason paper bills will still be a reality in your household for a while longer. Instead decide whether the specific paper bill needs to be kept and filed at all.

Usually there is no need to hold onto residential or household bills beyond the due date. Most bills can be shredded immediately after paying. Yes simply tear them up and put in the recycling bin.

I love how tidying up expert, Marie Kondo shares in her book, the life changing magic of tidying up, how some clients she sees have more elaborate filing systems for all their household paperwork than a small business.

My basic principle for sorting papers is to throw them all away… there is nothing more annoying than papers… I recommend you dispose of anything that does not fall into one of these three categories: currently in use, needed for a limited period of time, or must be kept indefinitely.
– the life – changing magic of tidying up

Store The Few Paper Bills

There are one or two bills you need to keep for now. So where should you put them?

I use two ways of organizing important documents for my household. I have a lever arch file file that all expenses and documents related to the house, get filed in. For example; rates, electricity, invoices for major repairs etc., as well as the mortgage documents and title deeds.

I also use A4 plastic sleeve display folders labelled by category. The categories I use at the moment are Medical, Vehicles, Documents (eg birth certificates, passports), Insurance Claims and Other.

Paper bills or any other paperwork related to that category gets filed in a sleeve in that specific folder. About once a year I will go through them and remove anything I no longer need to keep.

It’s simple and it works well for our family!! Especially when it comes to accessing specific documents at a moment’s notice.

Also check out how to organize receipts.