Stop Printing Paper - Use Free PDF Creators Instead

Everyone has "going green" on their minds today, and one of the easiest ways to do this is to stop printing most of the things that you print.  Printing to a PDF (Portable Document Format) print utility instead will not only save the paper, you will save precious time, and improve your productivity.  Remember - more productivity equals one of two things: (1) More work accomplished in the same amount of time, or (2) The same amount of work accomplished in less time.  You choose - both outcomes are good things! When you print a document, you must get up to retrieve it, along with the inevitable chores of putting paper in the printer, etc., and then do something with the paper afterwards like filing it somewhere.  Then all of that filing needs to be dealt with at some point, and put into storage.  You're probably thinking - what about the state and federal records retention requirements?  Don't I have to keep these records for 7 years?  Yes, you probably need to keep certain accounting records for that long.  but they do not have to be hard copies - it is perfectly acceptable to the IRS and others to have electronic copies of these valuable documents available rather than hard copies.  It is actually easier for auditors to use electronic copies, rather than sifting through a mountain of paper.  Which means less time spent on the audit, and the sooner the audit can be completed, the better the chance of a "no change" result. If you don't already have a PDF creator software such as Adobe Acrobat, which can cost $450 for the full version, consider one of the many FREE PDF creators.  One of my personal favorites, which I use and recommend to all my clients, is CutePDF Writer.  So far, 740,000 people have downloaded it from www.downloads.com alone.  You can also download it from www.cutepdf.com.  There is a freeware version, as well as a few other, more functional versions at very reasonable prices. The only other choice to make is where to save all these electronic documents.  They should definitely be saved where they will be backed up, such as your network server if you have one.  Come up with a scheme to store the documents, such as a master folder for "2008 Accounting", with subfolders for each month of the year below that.  When you save the documents using CutePDF, it will prompt you for a name for the document.  For those routine documents, such as accounts payable registers, come up with a short, concise recognizable name for the document and use it consistently, perhaps just changing the date at the end of the file name each time. And don't forget to start using the 2nd monitor that now sits on your desk (see my previous post) to pull up these electronic documents from your easy to navigate electronic filing systems...