the desk/home office

stop your desk disappearing under a paperwork mountain.

✢ sort post into action, file or recycle/shred. as you file away bank statements (if you haven’t switched to electronic ones), take out the oldest one first. you should keep six years’ worth for tax purposes, but with the recent PPi refunds, you might want to keep one statement per year going further back. store in hanging files, clearly labelled.

✢ Don’t wait to pay a bill or rsVP to an event, as you’ll risk it getting mislaid. if you can’t do it then and there, pop in a filing box and go through once a week. at least it will look tidy until you do.

✢ Have a birthday card box. buy or even make a stash of cards at the start of the year and keep in one place with a pen and a book of stamps. be ruthless when it comes to keeping cards and postcards you receive – special or favourite ones only!

✢ shred addresses as you go. or at least tear off your info and put in a large jam jar to destroy later.

✢ sort your supplies. don’t be tempted to buy new storage files and stationery until you’ve decluttered your paperwork, as you might be surprised as to what you unearth. Go through your pen pot too, and put things like scissors and glue back where they belong.