Want to reduce paper waste and clutter? Start by setting up paperless banking, which also allows you to electronically transfer money online. We’re partnering with WesternUnion.com to show you how to get paperless banking going and to easily send money online.

Why Bother?

Paper is one of the largest sources of clutter at home and in the office. Bills and bank statements are some of the most constant sources of wasteful paper you probably have that you could get rid of. Going paperless will immediately reduce the amount of paper cluttering up your house.

Making paper also takes a big toll on the environment. The US EPA says the average American uses the equivalent of about one 100-foot-tall Douglas fir tree every year. Going paperless saves trees and stops the pollution caused by cutting trees down, turning them into pulp, bleaching them (often with toxic chemicals), and creating paper. Going paperless is a total environmental win!

Going paperless also may reduce identity theft. Many people don’t bother shredding their bills before they throw them out, or even recycle them. That makes their personal information vulnerable to anyone who wants to rifle through their trash or recycling bin.

Online banking and money transfers save time, too. Rather than file bank statements, pay and file individual bills, write and mail checks, or physically have to go to a bank, you can deal with it all online. Easy peasy!

Plus, you can download apps on your mobile device so you can bank, pay bills, and transfer money all from your phone, if needed.

How To Do It

Almost every bank in the U.S. now offers paperless banking. All you need to do to take advantage of it is create an online account and agree to have your bank statements emailed to you rather than paper mailed. Once you do, it becomes very easy to monitor your bank account, or accounts if you have more than one.

You can also set up online billing so that, not only are you getting bank statements mailed to you, but credit card and other bills as well. Then, you can pay those bills electronically with no need to write paper checks, mail them in paper envelopes, and add a stamp!

If you need to send money to someone, you can easily do that, as well. In the case of Western Union, you can electronically transfer money directly to a bank account with no paper involved. You can also send money for cash pick up or to a mobile wallet, all without needing to use any paper.

Paperless and Online Is The Name of the Game

If you worry your electronic bills and transactions might get lost among your other email, you can set up a new email address just to receive your bills and billing statements. You can also set your calendar to notify you when a particular bill is due and payment must be made.

Here’s one more benefit: convenience. You can download your bank statements and billing history to your own computer, so you always have access to your accounts. With your mobile apps, you can pay bills or send money from wherever you area.

It’s Quick and Easy

Every bank makes it easy to switch to online banking. Create an account, then just start using it. The system is similar for setting up an account to transfer money from an account to a recipient.

You can get more information from Western Union on how to easily send money online here.

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The post Cut Clutter and Easily Send Money Online With Paperless Banking appeared first on Big Green Purse.

Clutter drives me crazy almost any time, but it seems like it gets worse during the holidays. We’re working with the charity Boat Angel, which accepts boat and car donations, to offer what we think are the 6 easiest ways to declutter before the holidays hit.

They’ll help reduce the stress of trying to deal with all your anxiety-causing, space-wasting “stuff”  by helping you focus on what you can get rid of (the first secret to decluttering), while organizing what you want to keep.

1) Start With Your Clothes – Keep What You Love and Wear; Donate the Rest

Clothing is one of the biggest sources of clutter in my home and maybe yours, too. We have a tendency to hold on to clothes we’ve outgrown or whose styles have outgrown us. Little wonder that all those shoes, dresses, shirts, pants, sweaters, scarves, coats and jackets end up in big piles at the back of our closets, or falling off hangers, or stuffing up drawers.

Here’s how I keep my clothes clutter under control.

At the beginning of every season, I make a big pile of the past season’s clothes that no longer fit, that are no longer stylish, or that I just don’t like any more.

For example, with winter arriving, I’ve put the fall season sweatshirts, sweatpants, jeans, flannel shirts, blouses, skirts and dresses I never or barely wore into a pile. That created room in my closet and drawers for the winter clothes I think I want to wear.

Next, as I put my winter clothes away, I’m looking at them critically and trying on some things before they automatically go into a drawer or get hung up.

From that lot, I also put aside the apparel I just don’t think I’m going to wear anymore.

It probably takes two hours to go through my closet and all my drawers.

I make the time go faster by playing some music and having a cup of tea on hand to sip as I sort. When all is said and done, I have more room, my clothes are better organized, and I have a bag full of garments to donate to Goodwill or the local thrift store.

Since Goodwill, the Salvation Army, and Purple Heart all do pick-ups, I simply call them to say the goods are ready, then put them on my porch and voilá, they’re gone before I know it.

2) Work Room by Room, One Room at a Time

The same sorting process works well in every room in the house. In the kitchen, pull out items from the pantry you no longer use. Donate old housewares to a community kitchen or half-way house. Donate unopened food to a food pantry.

In the garage, collect excess tools and sporting gear, and consider whether now is the time to donate your car, boat, trailer or motorcycle.

A quick internet search will provide you a list of groups that are always looking for these types of goods and will allow you to even donate a boat without title.

3) BOGO – Buy One, Give One

Once I’ve made room in closets, cupboards and drawers, the trick is to keep them from filling up again. I make a practice of trying to give away the old version of something when I replace it with the new. It helps to keep a “donation bag” handy to put the old items into, rather than stuff them in some out-of-the-way place.

4) Recycle electronics

Among the biggest sources of household clutter are old electronics. Smart phones, computers, lap tops, tablets, printers, fax machines, cables, chargers – who doesn’t have a drawerful of electronic clutter they’d love to see emptied? Fortunately, electronics are as easy as clothes to unload, since pretty much every big box store that sells them also takes them back. Staples, OfficeMax, and BestBuy all make it easy by having drop-off boxes so you can just walk in and leave your old gear. Just make sure to swipe the data drives and remove the sim cards before you do.

Here’s our post on 15 Things You Can Recycle to Ease Christmas Clutter Clean-Up

5) Cancel Catalogs

Retail catalogs are a constant source of clutter in my home. They’re also a scourge on the planet because they want so much paper! You can cut that way back by refusing to provide your address or phone number when you shop in person (of course, if you buy online, you’ll have to provide your address). Another option is to call the 1-800 number provided in the catalog and ask the operator to remove your name from the company’s mailing lists. This will only take a couple of minutes. You can also sign up with CatalogChoice, and they’ll help you cancel the catalogs you no longer want to receive.

6) Give Everything a Place

Once you’ve gone through your home and removed the unnecessary and unused bits and pieces, you can organize what’s left.

But don’t be random about it. Put shoes in an over-the-door hanging shoe rack. String ties on hangers or tie racks. Use shelves so you can see what you have where.

Visit the Container Store to get ideas for the best way to organize your belongings, and pick up some baskets, shelves, or boxes if you need them. Clear boxes and bins are best for seeing what’s inside, but you can also label them on the side or top to keep track of their contents.

By the way, if you have kids at home, make sure you teach them to keep their clutter to a minimum, too. Even when they’re still quite young, kids can be taught to place dirty clothes in hampers, hang their back packs in a mud room, put their toys in the toy box, and place art supplies in a container when they’re finished using them. Setting aside 15 minutes before bedtime for everyone to put away their things is a good way to get the entire family involved.

Don’t forget to ask the kids to recycle and donate the toys, books, and gear they no longer use.

NOTE: Our partners helps us bring you the expert content you need to live the greener life you want. Our editorial opinions remain our own.

The post The 6 Easiest Ways You’ll Want to Declutter Before the Holidays Hit appeared first on Big Green Purse.

Do you hate clutter? I sure do! 

In my house, clutter is a “five letter word” that actually means “paper – and too much of it.” Yes, that’s a picture of my office, above, before I got clutter under control.

Where does it all come from? Too much junk mail I won’t read. Too many newspaper advertising supplements I don’t use. Too many coupons I don’t clip. Too many business cards from people I don’t know. Too many receipts I don’t need. Too many empty cardboard boxes I can’t fill. Too much throwaway packaging I can’t use. (Yes, this is what my desk looks like every now and then…cluttered!)

Maybe all this papery nonsense served a purpose at one time, but it becomes clutter in my eyes when it physically gets in my way. It’s especially annoying when it covers my desk or makes a mess of my coffee table. Then, it can take me HOURS to go through it, sorting, shredding, tossing, WASTING precious time. To add insult to injury, all this wasted clutter weighs down the recycling bin I have to lug out to the street every week.

Plus, it pains me to think about the environmental impact paper clutter has. According to 41pounds.org, a group that works to reduce unwanted junk mail, more than 100 million trees are destroyed each year to produce junk mail. Just creating and shipping junk mail produces more greenhouse gas emissions than 9 million cars.

What to do? Reduce, Reorganize, Recycle

My anti-clutter crusade is based on these three strategies. I am reducing the amount of waste paper coming into my house as much as possible. I’ve re-organized my filing systems slightly so I can keep track of the minimum amount of paper I need to hold on to. And I’m recycling the rest.

Here are My 10 Sure-Fire Ways to Cut Clutter Now!

1) Pay bills and bank online. Many banks now actually charge their customers a monthly fee to send them a paper statement (my Bank of America outlet charges $8.95/month for this “service.”). So not only does online banking reduce the clutter in my house; it saves me money, too. Plus, paying bills online gives me longer access to my capital, since I can pay bills the same day instead of having to send a check a week ahead of time. In addition, I’m saving money on postage – not a lot in a month, but dollars that will add up over time.

2) Read newspapers and magazines electronically. Why? To avoid all the ads. The news part of the paper is actually rather thin; the advertising supplements are huge. If I bought what they’re selling it might make a difference, but I don’t.  When I want to know what a store has on sale, I check out their website before I go shopping, or pick up their sales paper when I enter the store. If I want the coupons, I can usually find them online: there are all kinds of mobile phone coupon apps so you can skip the print-out completely. (You can find coupons for green products here. ) Meanwhile, I read the paper on my laptop or my phone. I don’t have an e-reader, but you could certainly read newspapers and magazines there, too.

3) Share or go to the library. Sharing works especially well for for magazines. I share a variety of magazines with my neighbors, and drop in at my local library for others.

4) Stop junk mail and unwanted catalogs. You can use a service like 41pounds.org who will contact junk mailers on your behalf. What I’ve found, however, is that the most effective solution is to call the contact number directly on the mail or magazines I don’t want and ask them to remove me from their lists. You can also put a “No Solicitations, Please” sign on your door or mailbox so people won’t leave their sales fliers at your home.

5) Skip paper receipts. I don’t take receipts at the ATM, the gas pump, or the grocery store. I’ve discovered that grocery stores will usually take back a product they sell without a receipt; but honestly, I almost never take anything back to the grocery store, so why bother with the receipt? I only take receipts when I buy hard goods, like clothing or some kind of equipment. I keep all receipts in a file, just one file per year, so they’re not on my desk. NOTE: Whole Foods market gives its customers the option to receive receipts online, though I don’t want this clutter in my e-mail box, either.

6) Limit business cards. I recently threw away a shopping bag half-full of business cards I’d accumulated over the last couple of years because they were just cluttering up my office. I couldn’t remember who most of those people were, anyway – and I’m sure they don’t remember me. Now, I only give out business cards to people whom I really should be networking with, and I only take business cards so I can follow up with people I really want to be connected to.

7) Carry reusable bags. In addition to grocery bags, you can use small mesh bags for produce or grains you buy in bulk. I have a couple of snazzy shopping bags I use when I go clothes shopping, too. Plus, I just say “not” to the extra tissue paper some stores like to wrap around the items I buy.

8) Use a blackboard. Note pads and stickies are supposed to keep people organized, but they’re a big source of clutter for me, given how easily they stack up. A clutter-free alternative? Blackboards. Put one in the kitchen where you can leave “notes” for family members, put one in your office or workroom so you can write notes to yourself.

9) Consolidate.  Right now, I’m in the process of consolidating the contents of five different notebooks into just one. It will make my life sooooo much simpler. I’m also consolidating paper files into fewer folders that have only the essential papers in them. Everything else is headed to the recycling bin. Speaking of which…

10) Make recycling easy. Keep a recycling bin nearest to where the most paper comes into your house or where it creates the most clutter. Some options: 1)Near the front door, so you can deep-six unwanted mail before it makes it to the dining room table. 2)In the kitchen, so you can easily recycle packaging. 3)In your office, so you can keep paper from piling up on your desk.

The post Hate Clutter? 10 Sure-Fire Ways to Cut Clutter Now! appeared first on Big Green Purse.