We are almost to the end of April. Have you filed your taxes for the previous year? The first weeks of the month tend to inspire anxiety, though online filing brings some assurance that deadlines are met. Once all your tax paperwork is filed you can relax… until next April.
It’s no coincidence that April is National Records and Information Management Month? If you struggled to gather the necessary information for a proper return this year, no doubt you have pledged to do better going forward.
To insure smoother transactions with the Internal Revenue Service, it’s recommended to keep records of filed tax returns for at least three years. If ever you’ve filed a claim for a financial loss, records for those years should be kept for at least seven years. It’s a good idea to hang onto files this long anyway, in the event of an audit.
Self-storage is ideal for archived tax information and other non-pertinent documents. When storing paper files, use bins designed to hold multiple folders. To avoid confusion when you need to access your paperwork, label each bin on the outside by year. Store the most recent years closer to the front of your unit if you feel you may access them first.
As older files reach an expiration date for their usefulness, you should remove them to restore space to your unit. Do not, however, simply throw any documents with classified information into the trash. Contact a shredding company or look for a free shred event in your neighborhood for proper disposal. Depending on the event, you may also be able to destroy other expired sensitive data like old hard drives, disks, and other software.
A self-storage unit in Chesapeake can help you better organize all your personal belongings. When you rent a climate-controlled unit in a secure facility, you free up space at home and bring peace of mind, knowing everything you need is in one place.
Have questions about renting one of our units? Contact us today and see if you qualify for our first month’s rent for $1 special.