Digital filing with the Fujitsu ScanSnap iX500

Those that know me or have read some of my blog articles, I’ve become a big proponent of decluttering.

Arguably, it’s been somewhat addicting. Instead of wanting to obtain, I want to purge.

As I help people become more efficient, one key thing I tell everyone is that you never want to turn your physical clutter into digital clutter.

Let’s say you scan boxes of documents. Sure, you pick up that much space in your office closet but there’s a good chance that you just created a different kind of mess on your computer.

So, before you jump into scanning, consider everything that you have kept and if you will need it for the future. Old gas and utility bills? Tax returns from 10 years ago? Car payment invoices?

None of that is needed.

Check with your accountant but from asking multiple accountants, they all have told me that you only need to keep records that are less than 7 years old.

Once you have gone through all your papers and thrown out everything you don’t need, only then is it time to scan. Just like laying out every piece of clothing you have in one place when you purge, do the same with your papers. You’ll be able to see exactly what you have accumulated over the years.

Regardless of whether or not you have a lot of historical documents, there’s no doubt that you’ll continue to get more. If you are serious about moving your documents to a byte-sized world, my recommendation is that you invest in a great scanner.

Long gone should be the days of the individual document flatbed scanners or all-in-ones. If you try to use one of those, you will fail quickly.

Instead, I can’t highly recommend the Fujitsu ScanSnap iX500 enough.

The quickness of being able to scan all different kinds of documents and more importantly, through a sheet feeder is pretty astounding if you have never seen it in action.

Multiple page documents? No problem. Double-sided documents? Again, no problem. Need to switch between single-sided vs double-sided? Done with ease.

You can scan directly to email or into documents. It even works wirelessly so you don’t have to even plug it in to your USB port. Heck, you can even scan to your mobile device.

It has software for both Windows and Mac platforms.

Not only have I had one myself for over 18 months, I have set them up for friends and clients.

Get this scanner and get rid of all those filing boxes and cabinets.

Note: I am not being paid for this review and I paid for my scanner in full. I am just a very happy user trying to help those that also want to move to a digital filing system.