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Old 12-05-2017, 04:29 PM   #21
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So my question is did you or do you plan to select the option to go paperless? With the possible exception of tax forms , I can't see getting all this correspondence in the mail when I can access it online. Does anyone else feel the same way?
So far, I've resisted going paperless. While I pay all our bills online and would personally be fine going paperless, I'm worried about what would happen if I wasn't around or was incapacitated.

My wife can browse the internet just fine, but doesn't pay any of the bills. I worry that she would struggle with it. At least with paper bills arriving (every day ) I figure she will have a chance.

I keep trying to get her up to speed on our finances and all of the online sites I use. I have everything listed in one document that I keep up to date and printed. She keeps saying she will sit down with me to learn it, but so far nothing.

Maybe some day...
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Old 12-05-2017, 04:33 PM   #22
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So far, I've resisted going paperless. While I pay all our bills online and would personally be fine going paperless, I'm worried about what would happen if I wasn't around or was incapacitated.
I have that to think about too. DW can browse online, likes Facebook, send/receive email just fine but she'd be lost if she had to pay bills online. So as far as bill-paying goes it seems we'll stay in the 20th century for the foreseeable future.
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Old 12-05-2017, 04:56 PM   #23
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I have gone paperless. Once a month I go to all my accounts and download the monthly PDF statements. Pay everything online. So much better than paper.

I scanned in all my years of paper and threw them out as well.
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Old 12-05-2017, 05:25 PM   #24
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Method 1: Get bill/login/go to billpay/enter number/send

Method 2: auto bill pay

Method 3: Get bill/get checkbook/write check out/stuff envelope/lick or stick
stamp/go to mailbox/hope it gets there in time

Many online banking accounts have features that track all your spending by month, category, year etc....
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Old 12-05-2017, 05:28 PM   #25
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I'm all paperless. Print everything to pdf and scan anything that comes in on paper. Scanned all old documents and had a bonfire with the paper.
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Old 12-05-2017, 05:34 PM   #26
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What is paper? What is a PDF? I can see and review all balances and transactions whenever I want with my pocket computer (phone?).
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Old 12-05-2017, 05:36 PM   #27
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With respect to my brokerage accounts (Schwab) , paperless except for end of year tax reports.

Once a year I:

-download pdf's of each monthly statement for each account for the previous year.
-create within the brokerage website and download an excel worksheet of "transactions" for each account for the previous year. This makes it easy for me to search for a particular transaction or to sum expenses. This data is only downloadable for 2 year period hence my yearly download.
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Old 12-05-2017, 05:40 PM   #28
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Oops...thought this was yet another thread about RobbieB's bidets........don't get up, I'll see myself out.
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Old 12-05-2017, 06:41 PM   #29
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We are mostly paperless.

I do get a few bills in paper form, but honestly I could get rid of most of those. Some of those come in both paper/electronic form.

I do pay everything online that I possibly can. The paper that does come in almost always gets scanned, converted to searchable PDF and then uploaded to Evernote (some very confidential financial stuff is kept locally only). Once I have done that I discard (shred) the original document. The exception is mostly things within a return window where it may be easier to have the original receipt.

For bills received only I can usually get a PDF and I do that and keept it as well.

I used to have lots and lots of file folders. Now I have 3 drawers and I could probably consolidate it to 2 if I wanted to.
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Old 12-05-2017, 07:17 PM   #30
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Paperless here for all investing and monthly bills.
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Old 12-05-2017, 07:35 PM   #31
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Nearly paperless. I do print out the latest quarterly statement from Vanguard since 95% of our money is there. I started doing that after Clark Howard suggested keeping at least one recent statement of bank accounts just to prove that you have money in an account - I guess in case of a giant computer hack or something. Other than that, pretty much all paperless.
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Old 12-06-2017, 01:26 AM   #32
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We're paperless except for property taxes, car maintenance files, and EOB's from health insurance company. Although we are paperless with our credit card companies, I print and keep the statements. I don't generally keep receipts and sometimes I've needed to research a transaction and it's so much easier with the hard copy statements already printed.
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Old 12-06-2017, 03:28 AM   #33
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Having multiple homes makes it almost mandatory to go paperless. Almost nothing of importance received by mail. About the only thing is insurance premium requests, insurance companies are way behind banks on this. Maybe a couple of tax slips but almost all are available on line. It’s really amazing how the internet has changed our lives in a pretty short time.
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Old 12-06-2017, 03:38 AM   #34
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Originally Posted by PatrickA5 View Post
Nearly paperless. I do print out the latest quarterly statement from Vanguard since 95% of our money is there. I started doing that after Clark Howard suggested keeping at least one recent statement of bank accounts just to prove that you have money in an account - I guess in case of a giant computer hack or something. Other than that, pretty much all paperless.
I have electronic copies (PDFs) of all our account statements with multiple backups. Never felt the need to print them though.
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Old 12-06-2017, 03:41 AM   #35
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My biggest issue with making the switch is twofold:
1. For tax purposes you effectively need access to all bills and receipts documents for 8 years for audit purposes. Thats a long time. Recently nneeded very old bank statements that were long ago discarded. Bank could not provide some and the rest required fees.
2. All these ebills basically send you an email then you have to log in and print it out or save it. Seems like this step takes more time than opening smailmail and electronically or auto paying it?

I do of course use electronic and auto bill pay. Just not sure paperless really would save me time or really allow access to docs if I don’t manually save them.
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Old 12-06-2017, 03:44 AM   #36
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I can find electronic copies much faster than paper copies. I learned this at work and have now applied it at home too. YMMV
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Old 12-06-2017, 06:18 AM   #37
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I am paperless for some stuff but I still get credit card statements in the mail as well as any routine accounts that change significantly on a monthly basis. I handle finances and bill paying but DW skims through all of the bills highlighting anything she questions. It is a good partnership.
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Old 12-06-2017, 06:25 AM   #38
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Paperless, but very little auto-pay. Stopped a service years ago but auto pay kept rolling along. Clawing back my money was a hassle. Most on-line payments are from my checking account, so it's pretty much one stop shopping.
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Old 12-06-2017, 06:53 AM   #39
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I would love to go paperless, but resist in some cases. I know you have online access to all the detail of billing statements, but I am more comfortable holding a piece of paper and analyzing it. For one, I don't trust cable companies and have found in the past that they might throw in some movie or extra charge. When I challenged the cable bill and got some satisfaction, I make notes on that paper bill and stick it in my file. Old fashioned? Yes, but then I'm an "old fashioned" kind of guy.

Recently moved into a new community of about 3000 residents. We have our own post office, gangs of mail boxes by street name and house number. Inside there is a table to sort through your mail and there are large bins to discard junk mail. I go in about every other day and these recycle bins are always loaded. Just junk mail. I guess the cost of mailing all this helps support the USPS but sometimes I wonder. What a waste.
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Old 12-06-2017, 07:06 AM   #40
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I'm a little surprised that some folks think they have to keep this or that on paper. Even if you only get a paper copy (repair bill for the car maybe?), you should be able to scan it in pretty easily if you have a multi-function printer (which are very cheap) or one of any number of cell phone apps that will "scan" a document using the phone's camera, auto-rotating and de-skewing it automatically.

Once you have the documents scanned in, it's far easier to organize them in a computer. You can make folders within folders and name both the files and folders in a way that's meaningful to you. There's no reason anything should ever be hard to find.

With remote access to my NAS (network attached storage) drive, I can get at my "home" files from anywhere. Just yesterday I was on a boat I sometimes work on, and needed the manual for a piece of equipment. I had it within seconds. But even if the Internet were unavailable, I have all the files I need on my home network, backed up to a remote location, and most of the important ones are on my laptop, too.

I've been picking away at my life-long collection of paper files, scanning in what I need and in some cases getting rid of things I don't. I have yet to find any reason to retain paper.
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