In case of emergency you really need to be able to grab certain documents quickly – think of a fire, cyclone or flood.    First of all you need to get family members (I’m counting pets in here) to safety, but if you only have time to grab one other thing what would it be?   In my case it would be an innocuous looking box file.    This file contains important information and is my emergency kit.

 

Identity records – this is really important if everything gets destroyed.

 

Passports

Photo copy of driver’s licenses (originals are kept in my purse and hubby’s wallet)

Photo copy of Medicare cards (for Australians)

 

You could also keep birth and marriage certificates here, although I don’t as I have all of our passports here and our certificates are kept with all of my genealogy research.

 

Insurance Records

 

Health insurance details

Home and contents insurance details

Car insurance details

 

Legal Documents

 

Power of attorney docs

Wills

Mortgage docs

Vehicle registration details

 

Financial Records

 

Bank account details

Credit card information including their 1800 numbers to cancel any that may or may not have been destroyed in the emergency (all you need is someone to find them and run up huge bills while you’re trying to organize shelter for your family.)

 

Medical Details

 

Phone numbers of doctors and specialists

Copy of all medications the family is on and who prescribes them so that you can get new prescriptions.

Written details of any illnesses and allergies that family members may have, if something happens to you while you’re getting to safety your family may not be able to remember what allergy you have – trust me that really happens, you can read about it here!

 

Photos

 

An external hard drive is also in this box with copies of all of our digital photos.    Before we got our digital camera we always got double prints and sent one lot to my mum so that if anything happened we would still have baby photos etc.

 

 

Cards

 

I keep a pack of playing cards in here as well…..they weigh hardly anything, but can be used to keep children (and adults) occupied should you have to sit around in emergency shelters.

 

Money

 

A little bit of cash is always handy to have so if you can afford to have $50-$100 in your box then you’ll be able to buy water and food should the worse happen and you’re unable to get to a bank.    If your cards are destroyed and it’s the weekend then you’re not going to be able to get any funds.