Paper shredding reduces if not eliminates the risk of identity theft, a crime affecting millions and millions of people each year and costing several billions. As daunting as it may seem, some people painstakingly scour through rubbish bins to gain information. Companies and businesses are most susceptible of identity theft and intellectual property theft, so they either purchase shredding machines or hire shredding services. However, private individuals too need the same amount of protection.
Sensitive and compromising documents are practically anything that can be used to impersonate you or compromise your privacy. All types of documents that contain personal information need to be shredded and destroyed, and then disposed of properly to ensure privacy and security.
Subscription Documents – Those magazines and dailies you’ve subscribed to usually contain your name and address, so be careful when disposing of them. Use a paper shredder to destroy old copies.
Receipts – All receipts that bear your name, signature, address and other personal information can potentially be used against you by identity thieves. It does not pay to discard them without thought.
Tax Documents – If you’re filing tax returns each year and keeping them, then you are required to maintain those documents for 6 years as per the Revenue Commissioners guidelines. After that you can get rid of them.
Mortgage Papers – The same with tax returns, don’t hoard mortgage papers too long. Shred them after at least five years of the sale of the property. Check with your mortgage provider what security measures they impose. It’s great to know they’ve contracted with a reputable shredding services company.
Junk Mail – Those credit card offers that you get may contain compromising information about you, or it may be used by someone else in lieu of your disregard, so shred them immediately.
Pay slips – Shred all documents about your pay after one to two years or as soon as they balance with your tax statement.
Medical Records – Some people are keen about keeping their health condition confidential, but regardless if you have an illness of sensitive nature or not, do shred your medical records because they contain not just facts about your physical and health condition, but also other personal data.
Utility Bills – Feed your utility bills to the paper shredder once they’re paid. But if you’ll use them for tax deductions, keep them only for a year. These need to be kept for 6 years if used in connection with the Revenue.
Bank Records – Shred paper statements after a year, but whenever possible, use electronic statements.
If you have a house full of documents that need shredding, you may not be able to shred and dispose all of them properly. It is likely too, that you don’t have storage that’s safe and spacious enough for all these documents. Hiring a paper shredding company is a more convenient and practical option than in-house shredding.
All-Star Shredding was set up by Sean Bergin in 2008 after selling his existing Waste Disposal Business (Bergin Waste Disposal Ltd).
All-Star Shredding provide a high quality, competitively priced Shredding Services. They provide a Confidential Waste Disposal service and enable paper shredding, document shredding, document destruction and Shredders which are reliable and secure.
All-Star Shredding’s Shredder Trucks enable Onsite Shredding and provide Secure Shredding for all clients.
For more information please visit http://www.allstarshredding.ie/
