BOBs and important paperwork

[diamond lil]

How are you all dealing with important stuff like birth/marriage certs and insurance etc? I've just realised after 10 months in this house that our important stuff is scattered all over the place and if there was a major fire or gas leak etc, we'd be running about like headless chickens What do you keep the papers in? I had a folder in the last house but it's used for something else now.

[Yorkshire Andy]

https://www.screwfix.com/p/master-lock- ... 56mm/746fh

Beware some cheaper versions are not waterproof.. so whilst the contents survival to a house fire is good .. once trumpton turn up and put the wet stuff on the hot bits it's no longer protecting your papers

[Cocotte]

https://www.screwfix.com/p/master-lock- ... 56mm/746fh

Beware some cheaper versions are not waterproof.. so whilst the contents survival to a house fire is good .. once trumpton turn up and put the wet stuff on the hot bits it's no longer protecting your papers

That's definitely more secure than our paper drawer, next to the large odds & sods drawer.

[hobo]

Yep, everything in fireproof/waterproof safe and on the cloud and multiple USBs kept on our persons

[GillyBee]

I found the whole of this site an interesting read - from a prepper who had to handle Hurrricane Katrina and found all the places his preps worked and where they did not. Documents was a big fail but he has kindly put together a guide based on what he learned to beneft the rest of us. Older and American but still useful. I wonder if he will update it to include Ida too

https://www.theplacewithnoname.com/blog ... /0006.html

For myself, original key documents live in a folder that can be easily grabbed. Backups are encrypted and in the cloud and I occasionally remember to put a copy onto an encrypted USB key. Family photos also get the same treatment for backup and I am very slowly working throught the older ones that were taken before the days of digital to back them up.

The fireproof safes are great but pretty small capacity so you are not likely to be able to keep all you need. Proof of identity is the most important as with that you can mostly replace the rest.

[Arzosah]

How are you all dealing with important stuff like birth/marriage certs and insurance etc? I've just realised after 10 months in this house that our important stuff is scattered all over the place and if there was a major fire or gas leak etc, we'd be running about like headless chickens What do you keep the papers in? I had a folder in the last house but it's used for something else now.

Most things are scanned onto my laptop, I have a modern external hard drive that I back up to, and new flash drives that are an additional backup for most information. The paper copies ... not so good, actually. Birth certs etc are with my genealogy info electrical approval certs etc are with my accounts or in my "to do" filing drawer My paperwork could stand a little work

Lil, you know what to do! Go for it

[Arzosah]

I found the whole of this site an interesting read - from a prepper who had to handle Hurrricane Katrina and found all the places his preps worked and where they did not. Documents was a big fail but he has kindly put together a guide based on what he learned to beneft the rest of us. Older and American but still useful. I wonder if he will update it to include Ida too

https://www.theplacewithnoname.com/blog ... /0006.html

For myself, original key documents live in a folder that can be easily grabbed. Backups are encrypted and in the cloud and I occasionally remember to put a copy onto an encrypted USB key. Family photos also get the same treatment for backup and I am very slowly working throught the older ones that were taken before the days of digital to back them up.

The fireproof safes are great but pretty small capacity so you are not likely to be able to keep all you need. Proof of identity is the most important as with that you can mostly replace the rest.

Thanks for this! I love that guy's writing about Hurricane Katrina - he was so open and honest about having let go his preps so that he was a fair bit headless chicken. Very realistic - I thought he'd taken the website down, so this is great.

Photos - when I decided to input *all* my photos, and my mother's photos, onto my computer, it took me months - and I made mistakes about sizing the photos too. Fifteen years ago, people kept writing about saving space - some of those photos I scanned then are only 50kb, they're absolutely tiny. My pride and joy (11Mb!) is a photo of my Irish great grandmother and my Liverpudlian great grandfather on their wedding day in September 1903. It's really worthwhile doing it.

[jansman]

The important stuff we used to keep in a ‘Citadel’ brand fireproof metal suitcase . However,now we have one of these:

It’s light,and sits under our bed,next to our hotel bag. We can easily sling it out of the escape window in an emergency. If S is going to HTF,it WILL be at night!

[diamond lil]

Ok many thanks everybody. We have a safe but it's small and only used for money.