I have developed a pretty good system for containing important family documents that I think is worth sharing, especially in light of several friends who this week are in the path of hurricane Irene along the east coast. I have been through several CAT3's, a few CAT4's and one memorable CAT5. Mistress when she was just old enough to be a Princess, went through her house burning down and all the family pictures and documents going up in flames. These life experience helped develop our Bug Out Folder (BOF). Your folder will allow you in a split second to leave your house but not your life behind you.
To prepare your BOF you need to be organized. All these items can be purchased very cheaply at any office supply store, if you don't already have it.
- Legal sized (11x17) expanding wallet folder. Purchase a very bright, eye catching color.
- Letter sized file folders, with spine tabs. Each a different color. One for each member of the family, plus one extra.
- Fat tipped black permanent marker.
- Business card organizer pages with side hole punches. One package.
- Sheet protectors with side hole punches. One package.
- Digital camera.
- Jump drive, CD or Secure Digital (SD) camera memory card.
Your current organizational skills will determine how long the next phase will take. From your wallet, your purse, your junk drawer or multi-use filing box shoved next to the unused stack of Yellow Pages in your closet, start collecting all the documents that will fill your personalized file folder. Items or copy's of items to include in each personal folder will vary from family member to family member and adult to child but should include items such as birth certificates, social security cards, passports, business cards for all every doctors and clinic, lawyers, banks, insurance agents, a recent photograph, personal policies such as Wills and Life Insurances, any ongoing organizational cards for unions, sporting clubs and groups. Include a voided checking deposit slip for each bank account.
In the Household folder use the sheet protectors to hold a copy of a mortgage bill, a utility bill, contact information for home warranties and insurance policies. Add business cards for the tree guy you used last year and really liked, the pet vet (unless you have a pet folder) the yard guy, the maid agency that got you out of a jam last year, the neighborhood handyman, plumber, all the people that you use one or two times a year but can never remember where you put their contact information.
At a minimum take a digital picture of every item, if possible scan the item directly into a computer file to print out for the folders and retain a digital copy. Remember that digital files can be zoomed in on when viewed using a computer. Thus it is not important to take multiple up close photos of important documents as long as the one picture taken is clear enough to be read by blowing it up on the monitor.
A worst case scenario for a homeowner is a situation where you have to talk to insurance about damage/destruction of the residence or home robbery. Most current digital cameras have a basic video shooting feature. Using this option, slowly walk around your house capturing images of each room, pausing briefly to highlight specific brands of items, the condition of expensive furniture, if possible serial numbers. Do the same outside the house and with each automobile, especially ones with aftermarket products. If there is collection of stamps, coins, comics, dolls or other smaller items in the house lay them out on a bed or floor and slowly scan over each item rather than take individual photographs.
Once a complete video log has been created and placed into a computer system, drop that information onto a jump drive, compact disk or keep it on the camera memory card and pull the card from the camera. Place this digital storage item in one of the business card holders or sheet protectors in the Household folder. This is incredibly helpful when filing a claim for damages.
The cynic will state that all that information out in the open is dangerous if its stolen. They would be right if the following conditions are already met; your house has a history of break in's and a brightly colored expandable file folder presents a better theft item than all the hard items in your house. Otherwise, you and your family will know where this is located in the closet, on a bookshelf, where ever and in the event of an emergency it can be grabbed on the way out the door.
For those that want an extra layer of security and not have hard documents in the house or on a physical hard drive there are a few options. The easiest is to have previously scanned or photographed every item, then create a digital folder for each person and the house and place this on a password protected jump drive that you would not forget in an emergency. The next would be to create a new email address using an online provider like Yahoo or Gmail. Prepare a new email and attach as many pictures, scans and video's that be sent in a single message. Use the subject line to describe the attached items. Then save the message in the draft folder. Repeat this process until all your documents are online and secured in the Draft folder. Now from any computer with internet or your smartphone you can go back to the email account, open the draft folder and view all the attached files. Only those that know the email and password would be able to see these important items.
I hope this effort only becomes a lesson in organization and never needs to be used for an emergency. If the only benefit is that by forward thinking you don't have to waste any time finding the number for someone who did work at your house a year ago, it time well spent.
It is not enough to exist. I am going to live.
A worst case scenario for a homeowner is a situation where you have to talk to insurance about damage/destruction of the residence or home robbery. Most current digital cameras have a basic video shooting feature. Using this option, slowly walk around your house capturing images of each room, pausing briefly to highlight specific brands of items, the condition of expensive furniture, if possible serial numbers. Do the same outside the house and with each automobile, especially ones with aftermarket products. If there is collection of stamps, coins, comics, dolls or other smaller items in the house lay them out on a bed or floor and slowly scan over each item rather than take individual photographs.
Once a complete video log has been created and placed into a computer system, drop that information onto a jump drive, compact disk or keep it on the camera memory card and pull the card from the camera. Place this digital storage item in one of the business card holders or sheet protectors in the Household folder. This is incredibly helpful when filing a claim for damages.
The cynic will state that all that information out in the open is dangerous if its stolen. They would be right if the following conditions are already met; your house has a history of break in's and a brightly colored expandable file folder presents a better theft item than all the hard items in your house. Otherwise, you and your family will know where this is located in the closet, on a bookshelf, where ever and in the event of an emergency it can be grabbed on the way out the door.
For those that want an extra layer of security and not have hard documents in the house or on a physical hard drive there are a few options. The easiest is to have previously scanned or photographed every item, then create a digital folder for each person and the house and place this on a password protected jump drive that you would not forget in an emergency. The next would be to create a new email address using an online provider like Yahoo or Gmail. Prepare a new email and attach as many pictures, scans and video's that be sent in a single message. Use the subject line to describe the attached items. Then save the message in the draft folder. Repeat this process until all your documents are online and secured in the Draft folder. Now from any computer with internet or your smartphone you can go back to the email account, open the draft folder and view all the attached files. Only those that know the email and password would be able to see these important items.
I hope this effort only becomes a lesson in organization and never needs to be used for an emergency. If the only benefit is that by forward thinking you don't have to waste any time finding the number for someone who did work at your house a year ago, it time well spent.
It is not enough to exist. I am going to live.
No comments:
Post a Comment