The Organizational Challenge

By Eileen Reppenhagen, CGA

Feeling organizationally challenged?  What’s in those piles of paper and other items all over your office?  Is there dust on the top of the piles you don’t have time to organize and file away?  Take 10 minutes to consider your system for organizing your books and papers.  What documentation, be it paper, computer or disk, do we keep in our office or home office that is not on the list below?  When was the last time you gave your office organizational system a tune up? 

Can you quickly and easily put your finger on all of the items on this list?  Please let me know if you find something missing from my list.  It's no wonder we have problems coming to grips with what, how and where to organize our documents.   

This list was the result of a mind map using some mind mapping software.  Check out this cool educational software www.inspiration.com, you can download a free copy for a 30 day trial.   

Accounting for our own business

1. Bank Statements
2. Calendars
3. Ownership papers for Assets and Investments, RRSP’s
4. Credit Card Statements
5. Day-timers
6. Loan and mortgage documents, statements
7. Employee documentation
8. Financial Statements
9. GST returns and documentation
10. Insurance contracts, life, house, disability, medical
11. Legal contracts, Wills, Power of Attorney
12. Minute Books
13. Monthly Reports from the business
14. Payroll PD7A’s, T4 Summaries and T4’s
15. PST reports and calculations
16. Purchases for business (write-offs) and personal (warranties)
17. Queries and Notes
18. Sales invoices
19. Tax information about Capital Dividend Accounts, T5’s, T3’s, T2’s
20. Time Sheets
21. TO DO LISTS
22. WCB correspondence and reports
23. Year end reports and tax returns
24. Km logs
25. Professional Development Points 

Our files on our clients

1. Billing
2. Correspondence
3. Individual Jobs/Projects
4. Permanent information
5. Reports and Job Summaries
6. Previous Jobs/Projects

Our client’s documentation (we give this back once we’re finished)

1. Banking
2. Sales
3. Purchases
4. Debts
5. Tax receipts
6. Payroll
7. GST, PST, WCB
8. Investments
9. Budgets
10. Minute books, other

Computer

1. Backups, be it on disk, second hard drive, offsite
2. Original Programs and documentation

Contact Management System

1. Offsite copy
2. Privacy policy and code / commitment to privacy

Forms

1. Government (various)
2. In-house forms we design and use
3. Samples of other people’s forms

Information

1. Foreign exchange rates
2. Interest rates
3. Statistics

Jobs/Projects

1. Contract
2. Research
3. Working papers
4. Client Documents

Personal

1. Banking
2. Books       
3. Credit Cards
4. Critical Items Box
5. Debts
6. Investments
7. Ownership
8. Photos
9. Recipes
10. Reference Books
11. Retirement
12. Tax
13. Collections
14. Writing
15. Medical history of family members
16. Claims yet to be filed for medical insurance
17. Next year’s tax receipts
18. Previous year’s tax returns and documentation
19. Divorce, separation, alimony
20. Birthdays, anniversaries, special dates 

Records Retention

1. Policy for retention
2. Storage organization
3. Privacy Policy

Software   

1. List of what's on the computer
2. Box of disks/tapes/CDs/DVDs for Offsite storage for recovery

Topics

1. Subject matter files of interest
2. Computer folder/file organization systems
3. Books and resource materials on our shelves

Eileen facilitates a workshop,  Record Keeping Simplified, What you Own and what you Owe.  Book Eileen as the speaker for your next event.  Eileen can be reached at 604-943-7414 or

Eileen Reppenhagen, CGA