I put all paper documents I receive on top of a stack. Therefore it's roughly sorted by date.
If I need to get an invoice from last december, I just lookup around this date in my stack.
Time spent to store information : 0 ; time spent to find something : a few minutes, once every other month.
Every five years, I take the bottom of the stack and file it in the cellar. And I come back from the cellar with 10 year old documents I can either trash (in my office secured bin) or keep in my filing box.
I also keep contracts (insurance, bank, ...) in this filing box.
Last thing : All documents that will be used for my tax returns (at least the equivalent of it in France) go in one folder. I will use it once a year then file this in the "taxes" box.
If I need to get an invoice from last december, I just lookup around this date in my stack.
Time spent to store information : 0 ; time spent to find something : a few minutes, once every other month.
Every five years, I take the bottom of the stack and file it in the cellar. And I come back from the cellar with 10 year old documents I can either trash (in my office secured bin) or keep in my filing box.
I also keep contracts (insurance, bank, ...) in this filing box.
Last thing : All documents that will be used for my tax returns (at least the equivalent of it in France) go in one folder. I will use it once a year then file this in the "taxes" box.