Back Up Your Wallet

Have you ever had that panic feeling of, "where's my wallet"? I just got a call from a friend who misplaced her wallet.  I've had that same sinking feeling of,  "did I leave it at the store? Has someone run off with it? Are they somewhere charging up thousands on my credit cards? Yuk—it's just an awful feeling of violation, but it got me thinking... If I lost my wallet, would I have a total meltdown (probably), but how quickly could I get up and running again if it were really gone. Here are some tips to keep a bad situation from getting worse:Know what you have in your wallet. What credit cards are in there and what the numbers are.

• Create a list or make a copy of all of your cards on a single sheet—if you can't, you may want to consider paring down the number of cards you have.
• Don't keep too much cash in your wallet. It's not a storage space for cash, it's only for what you need handy that day.
• Remove loyalty cards. Most stores can find you by giving them your phone number or email address. You can also store the loyalty number in your phone
• Transfer other critical information to you phone. Contacts vs business cards, email receipts etc...
• Do a regular wallet clean out. Remove receipts, and extra papers that accumulate.

I was thankful that my friend had just misplaced her wallet and it wasn't stolen. She didn't have to make all those exhausting calls to replace credit cards etc. You never know if this misfortune could happen to you. Take some steps today and back up your wallet!