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avinalarf

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Does anyone have any methods that are easy to maintain?

How long do you keep records for? ie: quotes/invoices, test sheets etc.

Cheers

Nat

 
Does anyone have any methods that are easy to maintain?How long do you keep records for? ie: quotes/invoices, test sheets etc.

Cheers

Nat
Keep your accounts, whilst your are in business and at least until all taxes have been paid.

Test Records as long as required (next inspection)?

Don

 
Keep your accounts for 7 years, Nat, I think that is the law. Invoices are part of them.

Dump quotes once the cheque has cleared. The best thing I bought to organise my paperwork was a second hand 4 drawer filing cabinet . One drawer is all the household stuff , insurances , private car etc. The other three ,business.

I don't know how long we should keep test records TBH .

Someone will .

 
Now I thought Invoices receipts etc.. was 5 years? :| :( ?:|

But saying that..

I am a "Hoarder".. and I just keep everything anyway...

I have Alphabetically ordered files by customer name with quotes, invoices etc...

and another separate file with sequentially ordered Certificates by serial number!

:|

NIC like sequentially sorted files of cert...

makes it easy form them when checking on you!

 
7 years for invoices, purchases, etc. The tax office can go back that far, so you need to be able to.

As for certs & test records - keep `em all. You never know when you may need to cover your bum for a job you did 9 years ago, and someone else caused something to happen, and tries to blame you. Grrrrr.

Advantage of filling certs with software - it archives all certs for you (though I still keep the duplicates)

KME

 
I have a large wooden filing cabinet FULL a large steel cabinet FULL and a dining room table at home FULL.

Thats my filing system and its a nightmare.

If you use the pc back up all files on a regular basis, last year my pc "expired" losing all my customer accounts and invoices.

 
I have a large wooden filing cabinet FULL a large steel cabinet FULL and a dining room table at home FULL.Thats my filing system and its a nightmare.

If you use the pc back up all files on a regular basis, last year my pc "expired" losing all my customer accounts and invoices.
Then, for what they cost, back up on a external drive, so you have 2 independent electronic copies. And if one fails, then replace it. After all a ext HD is only

 
i keep a folder for each of my clients which include test results, certificates, quotes, property details etc

 
i keep a folder for each of my clients which include test results, certificates, quotes, property details etc
That's good, Matt, but paperwork takes up so much space.

Don

 
Then, for what they cost, back up on a external drive, so you have 2 independent electronic copies. And if one fails, then replace it. After all a ext HD is only
 
Well, it's good to see I'm doing something right!

I keep files for each client [with all their bits in] plus I do quotes/invoices and certs on the PC which I back up onto an external HD every week.

Thanks guys.

 
Don't worry Patch - the shredder sits right under my desk. Daughter does that job ;)

 
I've always advocated doing backups - but forgot to do it regularly myself! One ****ged hard drive later I'm regretting it!

I now use Dropbox (google it) as a master and backup onto several different computers - it's freee for 2Gb and seems to do the biz!

 
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