[murph]

I have owned my own home for 8 years and basically, have kept all documentation pertaining to mortgage, insurance, bills and banking - basically every letter I have, I file. You can imagine over time that space may become an issue and I want to know if I needed to produce any item of correspondence, for example, a claim of some sort, would a digitised copy be acceptable as far as the law permits? I live in the UK and have no dealings with any foreign service providers.

[RickJ]

You'd better keep that stuff. Even if 90% of anyone you might have to provide it for down the road will take a digitized copy, you'd hate to have even one person not accept it if you really needed it.

Box it all up labeling it by year and subject and stick them in a corner of your basement or attic if you have either.

[murph]

Thanks for your response.

[RickJ]

I've got an attic full of stuff that I add to every year, but as I'm boxing up each year, I scan stuff and add to my "important docs" file that has tax returns, social security cards, mortgages, loan stuff, etc. just in case I need quick access to it... and occasionally I've needed it. I guess I've been lucky in what I've chosen to scan, as the few times I've been asked for something, they accepted the scanned copy.

[ScottGem]

I have owned my own home for 8 years and basically, have kept all documentation pertaining to mortgage, insurance, bills and banking - basically every letter I have, I file. You can imagine over time that space may become an issue and I want to know if I needed to produce any item of correspondence, for example, a claim of some sort, would a digitised copy be acceptable as far as the law permits? I live in the UK and have no dealings with any foreign service providers.

Check with the institutions. In many cases you would be required to produce a copy not the original. So a printout of the digitized image should suffice. I would keep hard copies of documents like your mortgage agreement, inurance policies, etc. But much of your correspondence could be imaged.

In these days when banks are providing imaged versions of cancelled checks the consumer should be able to provide imaged documentation.