organizing and storing important documents

[georgina]

Places like your doctor's office may ask for your SS# when first becoming a patient, but I can't recall anywhere that has ever asked to SEE the actual card.

There is NO valid reason for your doctor's office to have your SSN. Just another place a hack can turn into identity theft.

 

[tvguy]

Do you often need to present your passport?

I don’t even keep my passport in my possession when traveling in foreign countries. It’s always back at the hotel/cruise ship.

More often than any other document I have, but not often.
Non-travel uses, I most recently needed it 4 years ago when I got my Real ID Driver's License.
Before that, in 2005 when I switched jobs to provide citizenship/ right to work in the U.S.

Passports were a huge help for my kids when they were kids. They are physically a more durable document, unlike a birth certificate. We used Passports for proof of age when they signed up for Little League and Soccer and enrolled in school and got jobs.
And when my daughter got her Driver's License, I took both her birth certificate and Passport and the DMV clerk wanted the Passport, which they are allowed to accept at face value as proof of your age and citizenship. A birth certificate , there is a greater risk of it being counterfeit. At DMV three different people that need to examine the document to certify it is legit. The Passport bypassed that process.

 

[kdonnel]

More often than any other document I have, but not often.
Non-travel uses, I most recently needed it 4 years ago when I got my Real ID Driver's License.
Before that, in 2005 when I switched jobs to provide citizenship/ right to work in the U.S.

Passports were a huge help for my kids when they were kids. They are physically a more durable document, unlike a birth certificate. We used Passports for proof of age when they signed up for Little League and Soccer and enrolled in school and got jobs.
And when my daughter got her Driver's License, I took both her birth certificate and Passport and the DMV clerk wanted the Passport, which they are allowed to accept at face value as proof of your age and citizenship. A birth certificate , there is a greater risk of it being counterfeit. At DMV three different people that need to examine the document to certify it is legit. The Passport bypassed that process.

Those don't seem like reasons to keep it in your purse or back pocket 365 days a year.

When comparing the cost of a Passport to the cost of a driver's license or state id card and the comparative difficulty of replacing either, I would much rather take the risk of having my driver's license or state id card stolen or lost on a daily basis rather than my Passport.

I have presented my Passport many times throughout the years but I always knew it was needed days or months in advance.

 

[tvguy]

Those don't seem like reasons to keep it in your purse or back pocket 365 days a year.

When comparing the cost of a Passport to the cost of a driver's license or state id card and the comparative difficulty of replacing either, I would much rather take the risk of having my driver's license or state id card stolen or lost on a daily basis rather than my Passport.

I have presented my Passport many times throughout the years but I always knew it was needed days or months in advance.

No, I don't carry it with me except when I anticipate needing it.

 

[princesscinderella]

There is NO valid reason for your doctor's office to have your SSN. Just another place a hack can turn into identity theft.

Insurance companies used to use it as an identifier to look up coverage but now the companies all have their own member numbers. Everyone should have their credit frozen so if someone does get a hold of your SSN they cannot use it to do financial transactions.