Late fees, expired rebate offers, 11 boxes of crayons: collateral damage of a disorganized office. Follow these tips to tame the paper tiger and get the bills paid with time to spare.

4 Office Tools You Need

• Calendar: A calendar is your first line of defense against late payments. The 1st of the month (the traditional due date for mortgage/rent payments) can sneak up on you. Post a calendar in plain sight in your office and–this is the hard part–look at it daily.
• Budget: Call it a "spending plan" if it makes you feel better, but you need to know how much money is coming in, and how much money is going out. No, you can't just "feel it." Well, you can, but you'll never beat the paycheck-to-paycheck cycle.
• Postal Scale:  Weigh all letters and packages to make sure you're not overpaying postage.
  • Calculate postage at USPS.com.
  • Sell a few items on ebay or Craigslist to fund your postal scale purchase, or just use your food scale.
  • Use carrier pickup to save time and gas–you only need to have 1 Priority Mail item in the lot to qualify for free pickup. Check the difference between Priority Mail and Parcel post–if you'd spend more in gas to get to the post office, it's worth the upgrade.
• Direct Deposit: Setting your paychecks up for direct deposit takes just a few minutes. Once the info is entered by your employer, you'll never worry again about picking up your check, getting to the bank before closing, and waiting for the ATM hold to lift because you didn't make it on time (yes, your checks will bounce, even though you technically have the money in your account, and banks typically process withdrawals before deposits.)
  • Bonus: Your checks may be direct deposited into your account 2-3 days before your less-organized coworkers receive their paper checks, depending on your bank's practices.

4 Completely Unrelated Office Tips

• No More Late Fees!
  • Set up automatic payments on as many bills as possible. (Having direct deposit in place ensures the money will be there when the payments come due.)
  • If you pay bills through snail mail (why?), send them out at least 10 business days before the due date.
  • If you pay bills online, give yourself 3 business days of wiggle room–computers crash, websites go "under maintenance", and holidays throw business day timing out of whack.
• How Many Office Supplies Does One Family Need?
  • The August school supplies sales are just around the corner. It doesn't matter if rulers, crayons, or notebooks are 1 penny each–if you're already stocked up, don't waste your money on the deals.
  • Go through your school supplies stash now and note (on one of the 6,000 index cards you bought last year) what you have, and what you need.
• Managing Rebates
  • Send rebate information out the same day you buy the item, while it's fresh in your mind.
  • Many stores now offer rebate receipts that you can send in without needing to give up your original receipt or make photocopies. Even if you're not a rebater, if the register spits out a rebate form, take the 90 seconds to fill it out and mail it in–are you really going to turn up your nose at free money?
  • Note the contact address, phone number, and the date you mailed the rebate info in your calendar, on the date of the last day of the expected processing time. If the check hasn't arrived, you'll have the contact info right in front of you.
• Receipts to Keep
  • Hold onto all receipts of items you haven't used yet, in case you decide to return them.
    • Many stores can do receipt lookup for items purchased with credit cards, checks, and gift cards–but if you follow an "all cash" budget (good girl!), you'll need a receipt.
  • Keep receipts of items under warranty–you'll need the receipt as proof of purchase.
    • Staple the receipt to the warranty information, and keep that with the product instructions–much easier to locate than rifling through an envelope of receipts.

3 Office Facts You Need to Know

• Your net pay. Can't make a budget without it. Yes, your gross pay sounds a bit more grand, but you should know your net monthly salary off the top of your head, to the penny.
• When big bills are due:  Property taxes are due in December and April. Car registrations are due in February and July. 6 month auto insurance renews in June and December…. Big bills come with hefty late payment fees. Anticipate their arrival and save accordingly.
• Last year's utility bill numbers:  Making a budget based on last month's utility bills doesn't work. Your electricity bill may skyrocket from May to June, and your water usage may plummet from August to September. Plus, gas and electric bills aren't usually on a strict month-long cycle. Your best bet for estimating utility costs is to compare the cost of the same month last year.
  • Beware the "level pay plan": Knowing exactly how much your electric bill will be every month seems great, but without a fluctuating bill to check you, you'll have to be diligent about policing your family's energy usage. Plus, if this year's energy use exceeds last year's, the overage will be tacked on at the end of year, causing a big hike in your electric bill payments next year.

What's on your desk?  Join the discussion in the forum!

This entry was posted on Friday, June 27th, 2008 at 4:00 pm and is filed under Organizing & Cleaning.

My husband works for a transportation company.  I've been worrying that rising fuel costs will impact the company's bottom line, thereby affecting ours.  Nope–stores have simply hiked up their prices in response to $4-plus per gallon diesel, effectively passing the transportation buck to consumers. So my husband's June raise is a go, but everybody is getting hit with the one-two punch of higher gas prices and higher store prices.

It's more important than ever to maximize your dollar and minimize waste.  Stay organized and save money in the kitchen with these tips.

You Need a Plan

Menu planning is a fool proof way to guard against food waste, extra trips to the store, and the lure of takeout.

Plan a week's worth of menus around supermarket sales and seasonal availability.

• Get inspiration:  Flip through cookbooks or browse online for summertime recipes that use ingredients you're likely to find on sale throughout the summer, like grilling meats and fresh fruit.
• Read The Circular Game:  Decoding Your Supermarket Weekly, at Cheap Healthy Good.
• Browse supermarket circulars online at SundaySaver.com.  Scroll down to "Supermarkets & Grocery", then click on the link to your favorite store to view current ads.

Coupons

• Weed out expired coupons at least once per month; this process also helps to refresh your memory on which coupons you have, so you'll be more likely to remember to use them.
• As you write your grocery list, put a "C" next to any item you have a coupon for, or put coupons you're likely to use in the front of your coupon organizer to save a bit of time when the kids are melting down in the checkout line.
• That 50 cent ice cream coupon won't do you any good if it's sitting on your desk.  Keep your coupon organizer in your purse or car so you're always ready to save.
• Stash larger coupons (like those huge postcards from Bed Bath and Beyond or fast food coupon booklets) in a small manila envelope in your glove box.

Savings Doesn't End at the Store

• Find a great deal on ground beef?  Don't let it go gray in the fridge, waiting until you "feel like" burgers–portion meats in freezer bags and put them in the freezer the day you buy.
  • Write the date, contents, and approximate weight on each bag with a permanent marker.
  • I also write the number of days left until the sell-by date so I know how much time I have to safely thaw food in the fridge.  For instance, if I find pork chops on sale because the sell-by date is tomorrow, I write "1 day" on the freezer bag.
• Arrange meals to maximize freshness:  Plan to use up items with a short shelf life (strawberries, fresh fish, lettuce) early in the week; hold hardier selections (apples, steak, eggs) for the last days before your next shopping trip.

The Organized Pantry

It doesn't matter if you have a dedicated walk-in pantry, or stash canned goods under the bed; knowing what you have on hand is the key to avoiding waste, both from rebuying items you have stocked, and from missed expiration dates.

• Mount a magnet inside a kitchen cabinet to hold a magnetic notepad and pen so you can keep a running grocery list.
• Rotate your pantry stock like restaurants and stores do:  First In, First Out.  When you buy a can of beans, put it behind the beans that are already in the pantry, so you always use the oldest products first.
• Read Pantry Pandemonium, from Creative Homemaking.
• Get free printables at Cindy's Porch: templates for meal planning, grocery lists, and freezer, fridge, and pantry inventory.

Leftovers

• If you're a leftovers lover, check out Love Food Hate Waste.  Select the item want to use up from the picture list to get dozens of recipe suggestions featuring your chosen ingredient. 
  • The site also offers tons of Cook Once, Eat Twice recipes–a totally different beast from "planned leftovers" (see below)–that may save you time, energy, and money.
• Keep leftovers on a dedicated shelf in your fridge, preferably at eye level.  Why go through all the effort of wrapping and saving food if you're just going to dump it next week?
• Beware the "planned leftovers" lunch: dinner fare is often pricier than traditional lunch items, so you may end up paying more to "save."  Apparently I'm the only one who feels this way–my Google search for "leftovers waste money" turned up nada.  Here's a very simple example of my theory:
  • Dinner leftovers:  4 oz chicken breast, $0.55 ($2.20/lb)–this is for plain chicken, not counting whatever sauce/cheese/pasta it was served with.
  • Quick Lunch:  PB&J, $0.33
    • 2 slices bread: $0.20 ($2/24 oz loaf–20 1-slice servings)
    • 2 Tbsp peanut butter:  $0.09 ($2.29/28 oz–25 servings)
    • 1 Tbsp jam:  $0.04 ($2/32 oz–45 servings)

That 20 cent savings may not seem like much, but replacing planned leftovers with a sandwich just twice a week could save you $20 in a year.  By this time next year, that may just pay for one gallon of gas!

Got a great idea for saving money in the kitchen?  Join the discussion in the forum!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008 at 2:00 pm and is filed under Organizing & Cleaning.