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Assisting Recovery, Inc. “Survivors Helping Survivors” • 888-216-8264 •
carehelp.org
This
Week’s Meeting Schedule:
Scanning
Receipts Ever since our fire in 2003, I’ve been obsessed
with scanning everything. I’ve started scanning samples of my kids school
work, pictures people give me, any bills or statements that can’t be
retrieved online (although that is significantly less than a couple of
years ago) and receipts. Yes, receipts. I
think before the fire you would’ve thought this was insane (and maybe some
of you still do) but as soon as I got fed up with paper (about 2006) I
started scanning every receipt I got. For two years I’ve been scanning
everything on my flatbed scanner, but this past year I got busy and I have
an entire years worth of receipts piled up on my desk just begging to be
scanned. I dreaded the thought. It was then that I decided to break down and buy a
receipt scanning system from Neat Co. It’s a tiny little scanner (about
10.5x1.5x1.25) that is powered solely by a USB cable (a selling point on
it’s own if you want to scan on the road). It comes with it’s own custom
software called NeatReceipts.
It “reads” the receipt and enters the information in a proprietary
database that allows you to organize your receipts very nicely. The OCR
software isn’t 100% perfect, but it’s close enough. I sat down, installed
it and did almost ½ of my pile in just one
evening. By the way, the IRS has allowed the use of digital
records (including scanned receipts) since 1997 and Rev.
Proc. 97-22 (see page 9, column 2 of the linked
document). One thing that is starting to make me a little
upset is the sales tax category. It automatically reads how much sales tax
is on each receipt and puts the amount in it’s own category. I’m not upset
at the software, but the amount of money I’m spending on sales tax (and
sales tax on gas is not called out on the receipt)!!! It’s disturbing, but
it might also be helpful when you go to take the sales tax deduction on
your taxes. Something like this might also be very helpful
when tracking things like a large insurance claim. For example, if you’re
tracking all of your replacement items to get the depreciation holdback,
this software allows for you to organize your receipts, total them and
print them back out. It even squeezes more than one receipt per page if
the receipts are small enough to do so. If you can print to PDF from your
computer you can print and email them to your adjuster or tax
preparer. Although there are a few quirky things about this
scanner, all in all I think it’s another great way to keep
organized. ______________________________________________________________________________________________ Meetings
in
Please
see the above grid for times, dates and locations. Hope to see you
there! ______________________________________________________________________________________________ Oakridge
Mobile Home Park residents make do during
Christmas Jody
Miller is doing her best. The only
tree she could squeeze into the temporary apartment she is sharing with
her husband this Christmas was too tiny to decorate. So she strung up
lights above the fireplace, pinned stockings to the front door and lined
up three glowing reindeer on the patio
wall. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-oakridgexmas25-2008dec25,0,3901216.story Check for
“Ashes of Oakridge” from Jan 3 http://www.scpr.org/programs/offramp/
______________________________________________________________________________________________ Allstate
gets OK to hike homeowner insurance in
California California
Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner has granted a request from Allstate
Insurance for a 6.9% increase in its rates for homeowner coverage,
according to the state Department of
Insurance. http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-briefs6-2009jan06,0,6356876.story
______________________________________________________________________________________________ Check your
supplies regularly Tip from
the Red Cross, from their tip of the day on
iGoogle: “Go
through your calendar now, and put a reminder on it — every six months —
to review your plan, update numbers, and check supplies to be sure nothing
has expired, spoiled, or changed. Also remember to practice your tornado,
fire escape or other disaster
plans.” ______________________________________________________________________________________________ January
13, 2009
Fire
chiefs in tinder-dry Southern California, faced with lean budgets while
more people squeeze into the region, are starting to rethink long-standing
policies on ordering mass evacuations in a wildfire, debating whether it
may be wiser in some situations to let residents stay and defend their
homes. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-firefighting13-2009jan13,0,2201880.story
______________________________________________________________________________________________ “We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of
the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the
light.”
- Plato ______________________________________________________________________________________________ ... Help CARe provide
assistance to disaster survivors and continue our free
services: http://www.carehelp.org/contribute/contribute.htm ... For removal or
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