Organize Your Warranty Information - What You Should Keep
Today we’re going to start a warranty series - a series, because I’ve got about five different ideas of how you can get your warranties organized. Well, five or six give or take.
From toasters to desk chairs, to your computer, cell phone, and juniors remote control car, life involves warranties and lots of them. Over the next few days, I’ll post about the different systems for warranty organization I’ve seen; they all differ, except for one thing, what you keep. No matter which storage option you end up liking best, you’ll need all of the following.
Keep the following for the life of the product:
- Purchase receipts
- Owners manual
- Model number
- Serial number
- The actual warranty - even if it’s expired (more on this later).
- Any other company relevant info; say a card that lists their 1-800 number.
Toss:
Packaging - this is questionable. Some people suggest keeping all packaging for the life of the item. I’m not so sure that’s necessary. If you have a dedicated storage space for boxes then by all means save lots of boxes. Most of us though, will only end up with a messy pile of cardboard. Keep the packaging for a month or so, or at least until after you’ve used it a few times, just in case you have to take it back to the store. After that you still need the model and serial number which is sometimes located on the box, so before recycling it, cut out any info you’ll need.
Next up in this series: which warranties to keep, plus storage/organization solutions.
Tags: office-organizing, Organize Your Warranty, Owners manual, storage option, Warranty Information, warranty seriesRelated Stories
POSTED IN: Filing Systems, Office, Organizing Basics
7 opinions for Organize Your Warranty Information - What You Should Keep
linlu
May 21, 2008 at 9:36 am
I keep the boxes for large or expensive items in my closet or the attic/storage areas for the duration of the manufacturers warranty - usually a year. I date the boxes with a “throw out after “, so I don’t have to guess how long I need to keep it.
Michele
May 21, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Oh, I am looking forward to the warranty series! I just did a first pass at setting up the closet in my office (we’ve lived here 2 years, but are in the midst of a multi-year remodel) and the warranties are in better shape than they were, but I want to improve.
allison carter
May 21, 2008 at 5:49 pm
If you know how to use it without instructions, toss em. Also toss out the spanish, french, german and japanese translations (unless that’s your language).
N. & J.
May 21, 2008 at 8:49 pm
I keep the boxes for about a month which is long enough to figure out if it came to defective after that I chuck the box and packaging because they take up too much room. I keep the manuals in one file box and the warranty cards in a file in my file cabinet. For expensive items like the Ipods, computers, TVs I keep an excel sheet that lists the make, model, and serial number in case anything gets stolen.
This way everything is organized and I don’t have to go scramble for anything.
File Drawer Storage for Warranty Information
May 23, 2008 at 12:15 am
[...] Organize Your Warranty Information - What You Should Keep, I went over what to keep that’s warranty related, and readers added some good ideas in the [...]
Jennifer
May 23, 2008 at 3:46 pm
@linlu Good idea to date as throw away (on the boxes) at a specific time.
@allison Good point, I was trying to think of what other useless stuff comes in boxes - I haven’t bough anything for a while, so I forgot about instructions in other languages. Yeah, those can and should be recycled.
@N. & J. I like keeping the warranty with the manuals, but this is another way to organize, if you get overwhelmed with papers especially.
My WORST Idea for Organizing Warranties
Jun 2, 2008 at 12:01 pm
[...] Organize Your Warranty Information - What You Should Keep [...]
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