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Maya Fisher-French finally gets around to opening tax-free savings accounts for her kids. It may be tedious, but if you break it down into steps, it’s a task easily managed
Last week I completed the herculean task of opening tax-free savings accounts for my kids and myself. I have had the forms ready to fill in since April, but they just sat there on my to-do list, making me feel guilty.
My procrastination was due to the tediousness of the task. First, I had to fill in all the forms – there are four pages per application. This also required deciding which funds to invest in because the industry has managed to still make tax-free savings choices complicated.
Then I had to find all the supporting documentation: proof of residence and a bank statement that could not be more than three months old. I had to get a copy of my ID, copies of my children’s birth certificates and, it turns out, bank statements of my children’s bank accounts on their bank’s letterhead.
No wonder I felt overwhelmed by the sheer idea of going through all that admin. But I put some time aside and spent an entire morning sorting it out. Who has a whole morning to open a savings account?
Then I read about a study conducted by behavioural psychologists at Pennsylvania State University in the US, which found that people had a tendency to complete tasks quickly just for the sake of getting them done sooner. This suggested that people were more likely to complete tasks if they were broken into smaller individual tasks they could do quickly.
Smaller tasks are easier to complete and create a sense of accomplishment on their own, and bring you closer to completing your goal.
So if you are determined to open an investment account during this Savings Month but feel somewhat overwhelmed by it all, take a tip from the psychologists and break it into the following simple, short tasks.
Day one: Select the investment and print the forms.
Day two: Fill in the forms and see what documents are required.
Day three: Decide what document you will use for proof of residence and locate it.
Day four: Obtain your proof of bank account, either by printing off your emailed statement or going to the bank,
Day five: Make a clear copy of your ID book and any other supporting documents – you are now ready to fax/scan that document and start saving.
It may seem trivial to put time aside just to locate a document, but trust me, you are more likely to start that investment if you set aside 10 minutes a day for a week rather than trying to find a whole morning to get it done
