Why I prefer to go paperless #1

trees

You don’t have to be a tree-hugger to be interested in going paperless – it will also save you in the hip pocket. So it’s really a win-win situation. A win for you and a win for the environment (which of course benefits you too!)

I previously shared some tips on 4 Easy Ways to Go Paperless. The 4 tips are some really simple ways to make that step towards going paperless without having to spend lots of money or make huge changes to the way you work or run your business. Readers shared some of their tips on going paperless too, which you might want to check out in the Comments section at the bottom of the post.

I wanted to write a couple of posts about how exactly you can benefit from moving towards a paperless office, particularly from a bookkeeping point of view. So instead of the “how” I wanted to explore the “why” of going paperless.

So read on for the first of many great reasons that I prefer to go paperless and how you, too, can benefit.

# 1 Online banking is better than writing out cheques.

Banks often charge a fee to send out cheque books
Banks sometimes charge a fee for each cheque presented
I discovered this the hard way – being charged .95c every time one of my cheques gets deposited!
Mailing cheques is time consuming and you have to pay for stamps.
People can lose cheques, resulting in double the amount of work.
Cheques for small amounts are often not banked, and sit there in your accounting records as being unpresented month after month until you finally get hold of the person and sort it out, or it goes stale.

Just like having 2 cheque signatories, you can set up your online banking so that 2 people have to authorise each payment – resulting in better security of your money. And whilst on the subject of online banking, bank statements can be downloaded from your bank’s website and saved in a suitably named folder which can be backed-up, reducing the need to have paper copies sent out to you.