Surviving Dystopia: Important Documents

By Tim Gamble

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This is a repeat of a recent article. Sorry about that, but it fits in with this series, too.

Show me your papers.

Whether in normal times, dystopian times, or post-disaster, there will be the need for documentation and paperwork. It is the bane of modern society, but it is a reality we face. Two questions we must answer now are: What important documents do we need? How do we securely store and protect them?

Important documents may include:

• Birth Certificates
• Marriage Certificates
• Death Certificates 
• Wills, Powers-of-Attorney
• Military discharge papers
• Copies of credit cards, bank numbers, and other financial info
• Contact information and account numbers for insurance, investment accounts, utilities, etc. 
• Tax, insurance, and other financial records
• Copies of driver's licenses and social security cards
• Title & Registration information for your vehicles
• Passports
• Medical and immunization records
• Insurance information (health, property, auto, other)
• Pet Records (registration, vaccinations, etc.) 
• Copies of your high school diploma and collage degrees
• High School and College Transcripts
• Contact information for family, friends, co-workers, etc.
• Home and Property deeds
• Mortgage information  

This is only a partial list of possible documents you may need to keep. There may be other documents you'll need depending on your own particular circumstances. Spend a few minutes thinking of what you and your family may need.  

You probably already have paper copies of many of these documents at home in desk drawers or a file cabinet. Your first action step is to collect everything together, look through what you have, and see if you are missing anything. If so, start collecting copies of the missing documents. 

Next, organize and store your important documents together in a secure place, probably in your home. A lockable, fire-proof safe, file cabinet, or document bag will work nicely. 

Why not just use a bank safe deposit box?

I don't like using bank safety deposit boxes for important paperwork for several reasons:

• No 24/7 access to the documents, as banks are generally closed at night, and on weekends and holidays.
• Banks may not always be open during normal business hours because of inclement weather, natural disasters, civil unrest, or "bank holidays" during financial disasters. If the bank isn't open, no access to anything in my safe deposit box. 
• If I have to suddenly bug-out, it is doubtful I'll have time to go by the bank to collect my documents, even if the bank is open.

Make copies of important documents.

Copies of important documents should be included in your bug-out bag. These can be digitized and loaded on an encrypted USB memory stick (for a free and easy encryption method, see my article) which will take up little space in your bag. I carry a USB memory stick on my key chain and a back-up in my bug-out bag. You could also put an encrypted copy of your documents on your smart phone.

However, in a disaster, you may not have ready access to a computer, so it is wise to have physical copies of some documents. I have two 9x6 clasp envelopes containing copies of documents that fit easily in my bug-out bag without adding a lot of weight or taking up much room. Insert the envelopes in a plastic zip bag for waterproofing.  

In your bug-out bag, you don't have to have everything as paper copies. That would just take up too much room. For example, when I refinanced my home, the mortgage paperwork was over 160 pages long. No problem on a USB stick (the mortgage company emailed me the entire package as a .pdf), but I'm not lugging a hard copy of all that around with me in my bug-out bag. Instead, I just put the two-page summary (which has all the important numbers and information) in the 9x6 envelope I previously mentioned.
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