Comments on: Use a good shredder to eliminate unnecessary paper

By: Interesting Things on the Web | Just The Right Things

Interesting Things on the Web | Just The Right Things — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 03:11:04 +0000

[...] for a decent paper shredder? One of our favorite websites, Unclutterer, recommends the best. The article includes guidelines and time lines for what papers you need to [...]

By: Overachiever’s Spring Cleaning Office/Man Cave Edition | Little Black Guidebook

Tue, 20 Apr 2010 23:36:14 +0000

[...] he doesn’t have an office to do his Army job at so it all comes home with him. Read this four post series from UnClutterer to follow the same process as we did to get rid of the paper. It has a nice list of which papers [...]

By: Organize IT Recap: Learn To Read Faster, A Large Collection Of How-To Videos And The Importance Of A Good Shredder | Organize IT

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 22:09:44 +0000

[...] time must you keep that bill or wage slip? Thankfully, Unclutterer has come to our aid and offers a guide to what exactly you can shred and when you can do it. The post also mentions how important is to [...]

By: A year ago on Unclutterer | Unclutterer

A year ago on Unclutterer | Unclutterer — Sun, 10 May 2009 14:15:16 +0000

[...] Use a good shredder to eliminate unnecessary paper [...]

By: Unclutterer » Archive » Paper clutter begone, part 1

Unclutterer » Archive » Paper clutter begone, part 1 — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 15:55:33 +0000

[...] Part 4 — Shredding unnecessary paper [...]

By: Donna

Donna — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 16:47:40 +0000

An expired passport makes a wonderful addition to a scrapbook – especially if it can be removed from the scrapbook so you can thumb through all the stamped pages and relive your journeys.

Of course, that leads to a whole new category of clutter.

By: Yahhoooo

Yahhoooo — Sat, 02 Jun 2007 14:24:33 +0000

For “convenience” (lazyness) I bought a good (overpriced) home shredder. Most home shredder, including the one I bought, are crap and will die on you. Now, once a month, I shred at work. We have a killer shredder there. You can put a quarter inch stack through it with staples. Look around… our shredder at work is on wheels and the admin secretary usually has it. She doesn’t mind that I use it once a month. We chat while I shred. It’s a nice social visit. That shredder is seriously industrial and better than anything I can afford for my home. Don’t buy what you can borrow or use elsewhere! Look around. You may have access to a shredder you don’t know about. Or hey, once a month, bring your buddy you don’t have time to hang with, a six pack, and you two can chat while you use his overpriced, soon to crap out shredder. You don’t need to buy everything…

By: Lane Scott

Lane Scott — Mon, 28 May 2007 05:17:42 +0000

I finally gave up on having a home shredder. The really good ones cost an arm and a leg. And if you have a large amount of shredding to do, they take forever and overheat easily.

Instead, I found a local shredding company. It costs $6 to shred banker’s box full of papers, CD’s and what-not. I save all my papers that need to be shredded, and drop them off at the shredding company on the way to work. There are also shredding companies that will come and pick up papers at your house. It beats sitting dealing with the hassles of a home shredder.

By: Lisa

Lisa — Fri, 18 May 2007 04:42:21 +0000

I bought the QwikFinish ShredderShark SH8CDCC and the instructions do say to remove all staples. It seems solid and capable, but I think I’m going to take to a shredding store that big stack of old bank statements and other papers I’ve been saving, then use my new shredder for the day to day stuff. Thanks for a good post. It got me moving on shredding and disposing of old papers.

By: Freda

Freda — Thu, 17 May 2007 16:48:07 +0000

When I replaced my cheap shredder with a better one, I moved the old one to the garage. It and the recycling bin sit right next to my car door. Now when I get out of the car with a handful of junk mail, anything with name and address goes to the shredder and generic pages go to recycling, not into the house.

By: Darlene

Darlene — Sun, 13 May 2007 13:30:39 +0000

Tom, your comment doesn’t make sense. If you’re out of country, how are you accessing your documents at home? The passport agency does not request you to relinquish all of your old passports when applying for a new one, they only request your current passport. However, if you feel that you must keep hold of your dozens of old passports, you should store them in a safe deposit box instead of in your home. If someone were to rob you, your expired passports and expired credit cards would be a gold mine for that robber. The reason to shred unnecessary papers is to do everything that you can to protect yourself against identity theft.

If people have a special circumstance, like is mentioned in the post above, then they need to use their brains and do what they need to do instead of blindly following the list.

By: Tom

Tom — Sun, 13 May 2007 07:30:31 +0000

That list is not safe. For example, you may well need your expired passports to document when you were out of the country.

While you can safely shred some things, the best thing I found for dealing with “might be useful some day” is to put it into a big box labeled by year. On the rare occasion that I need something, I can dig through that and find it.

By: R Anderson

R Anderson — Thu, 10 May 2007 23:29:03 +0000

Keep your credit card and check receipts for returns & warranty purposes.

Expired credit cards are dangerous to keep because while they may not be useable, the information on them can be used to request new cards or open new accounts.

By: Daniel Cooper

Daniel Cooper — Wed, 09 May 2007 15:15:21 +0000

As a recovering pack rat, I do have to say that I am glad that I kept receipts for a very long period. I was in a custody dispute in which the parties fighting me for custody attempted to claim that I never came to visit my children during certain periods. I was able to produce receipts showing where I had been on certain dates – gas station receipts because I made sure to fill up close to their home, grocery receipts when they claimed I didn’t offer any support for my kids, copies of cashed checks that had cleared my bank for the same reason, etc.

I’m certain that most people don’t have to worry about that. But I believe in keeping a clear paper trail wherever possible in the event someone ever accused me of something that could be easily disproved.

I don’t have to worry about it as much any more since I was successful in my custody claims for the aforementioned reasons – so I urge anyone to ask themselves if something would come in handy before shredding.

By: Erin

Erin — Wed, 09 May 2007 14:00:41 +0000

Asdf — (Is that your real name? Your old account number, which is found prominently on the front of your old credit card, could be used by someone on a falsified credit application.