Set up is easy on AnywhereVault – of course the first thing you need to do is head over to the website. They recently had a site redesign. I like the new site a lot; it’s a much cleaner, more modern look. I like good aesthetics.

If you want to try the AnywhereVault service out, you need to go to their trial set-up page. You can try the service for 30 days for free. You’ll be asked for your name and email, and you’ll need to create a user name and password. On the next screen it’ll ask you to choose a plan. For the purpose of trying the service out, I went with the Bronze plan, which allows, “You to store up to 50MB of total information, including up to 25 items with images and up to 10 documents.”

Now I’ll walk you through the vault set-up. I thought it was pretty simple.

1. Insurance information – you don’t have to give this, but it’s recommended, because it keeps track of your policy limits and limitations for you.
2. Along the top of the screen you’ll see tabs that allow you to move about the service. The tabs include: My Vault, Locations, Categories, Items, Documents, Notes, and Help.
3. Locations: Lists all typical possible rooms in your house. You can also add your own rooms.
4. Categories: Lists all sorts of item; electronics, toys, furniture, etc. You can add on your categories.
5. Items: Lists your items of course. This is actually where you fill in any item. For example, you simply click on “add item” and choose both the location and category the item belongs in. For example, you’d choose electronics and den for your television. After that you can fill in everything known to man about this item. It offers spaces for things like purchase date, model number, city purchased in, and much more.
6. Another feature of the “Items” page is you can upload a picture or the item. Uploading a picture is super easy. You just click on upload, and it allows you to search your computer for your picture. If you blog and use images, picture uploading will be a snap, and even if you don’t it’s very easy.
7. Lastly about the items page; you don’t have to fill everything in at once. If you don’t have all your info together, you can simply jot down television, and come back later to fill in or change info or upload your photo. That’s very handy. As you fill in items, the total cost of all items is figured and posted on your main item page.
8. Documents: This tab is straight forward. One quick upload and your document (say a scanned warranty) is uploaded your your account.

Overall:

Technical aspects: I thought the service was extremely straight forward and easy to use. That said, I’ve been blogging and writing web copy for years, so I’m pretty computer savvy. I asked my friend (who is much less computer inclined) to look at the service. She knows how to send emails and sort of turn on a word document and that’s about it. She thought the tabs looked a little confusing, but after walking through each tab in order she picked up on it pretty quickly. She also doesn’t know how to upload documents, but after reading the help section figured it out.

Help section: The help section is very well done, with nice bulleted lists and indented headers. It’s easy to find the tip you need to help you out. There are helpful screen shots on the site as well. For example this shot below is from the help section, and shows your typical inventory item page set-up:

Cost: Cost varies depending on the plan you choose, but honestly I think the prices are reasonable, and I’m pretty thrifty.

Could you make your own inventory system?: You could create your own inventory on your computer, one that closely resembles this service, but it would take quite a lot of time, and you’d have to create forms, instead of simply fill in pre-made forms. Unless you’re pretty good with form creation, it’s going to be tough to create a nicely organized page like that screen shot above. You also won’t have the luxury of having your info saved online, securely. If you’re computer dies, your inventory will still be saved in AnywhereVault. Lastly, you’d have to add up all inventory worth totals yourself. Sure you could make your own inventory, but this is a heck of a lot faster and simpler.

Score: I’d say five points out of five for ease of use. I’m a list girl. I like things all tidy and in one place; especially when there’s a way to attach a picture. I think this is a great way for anyone to create a home inventory. It’s inexpensive, really fast once you get going, and you get the free trial. You can’t really lose by giving it a shot.

To learn more read my previous posts:

• Anywhere Vault – One Home Inventory Solution
• AnywhereVault – Digital Home Inventory Tips

Enter to win your very own subscription to this great service.

[image via AnywhereVault]

Post from: Blisstree

AnywhereVault Review & Last Chance to Enter Giveaway

If you’re thinking that AnywhereVault sounds like a great solution then you may be interested in some tips that can help you to maximize the service and make it even more useful for your home inventory needs. Bobbi, from AnywhereVault sent me the following cool tips. These are extra nice because they also give you a good idea of how this digital home inventory service works:

Create a video home inventory:

“A great way to quickly document your belongings is to create a video inventory. AnywhereVault makes it easy to create and have your video inventory stored somewhere safe within 30 minutes. Just stand in the middle of each room and span the entire room, don’t forget to walk over and open closets and drawers and span the video over the contents inside. Upload each short video and you have taken a giant first step!”

Create a detailed inventory:

“If you take the time to do a detailed inventory with AnywhereVault, you’ll instantly have reports of the total value of your belongings. This will help you determine the correct amount of insurance to buy to be properly protected. You will also have customizable reports at your fingertips, so you’ll be able to sort your belongings by category or location and will be able to quickly create a PDF you can email or print.”

Store your inventory somewhere safe:

Back to me – now, creating a video or even a detailed inventory is all peaches and cream, but it’s not very useful if you don’t store it somewhere safe. If you’re comfortable with digital storage, then AnywhereVault is a good solution (hence the giveaway). With AnywhereVault, you’re not storing stuff at your house, where a fire or other issue might damage it, you’re storing your inventory in a place that’s easy to access 24/7. Should something happen at your home or office, your personal home inventory is still saved and safe.

Learn more about AnywhereVault and enter to win a year’s subscription of this service.

[image via AnywhereVault]

Post from: Blisstree

AnywhereVault – Digital Home Inventory Tips

Anywhere Vault is offering a great giveaway prize to three lucky Declutter It readers. To keep this giveaway post nice, short, and sweet, I won’t be talking about the company right now. No worries though, in the next few weeks we’ll take a closer look at the Anywhere Vault company, the services they provide, and discuss tips that can help you maximize the service. I’ll be doing a review as well.

What you can win:

Three readers will each win a Platinum level Anywhere Vault subscription. That’s an $80 value, one full year of service, and a total of 1GB of inventory space. A great prize! This prize will get your home inventory situation safely and securely under control. No more worries about where you put those holiday receipts; no more wondering when you bought the DVD player. Nice!

Contest duration:  

Now through July 7th, midnight, West Coast time.

Who can enter:

If you’re not blogging at Declutter It, you can enter. Yup, that means I’m the only human disqualified; lucky for you.

How to enter:  

1. Please visit our sponsors website: Anywhere Vault
2. Check out the company FAQ and read my intro post about Anywhere Vault.
3. If this service would help you to streamline your home inventory, let me know why in the comment section of this post.

Three steps – easy. I just want to make sure you’re interested. This is a great prize if you’re looking to create a safe and secure home inventory online. If online inventory is not for you – don’t enter, because someone who could really use the service may not get to.

Winner’s rules:  

On July 8th, I’ll announce three randomly drawn winners. I’ll email you to let you know, and to get information that Anywhere Vault may need to sign you up, such as email and name. If I don’t hear back from you within five days, I’ll draw an alternate winner.

This is a super cool prize if you’re looking to get organized, so good luck! As noted look for more posts about Anywhere Vault during the next three weeks.

Post from: Blisstree

Get Organized With This Great Anywhere Vault Giveaway

Unless you’re decently tech-minded, a website inventory might be more stress inducing than useful; unless, someone else can handle the online inventory for you… That’s where Anywhere Vault comes into play. This company offers one great solution for your home inventory list.

Some basics:

Anywhere Vault offers a safe place for you to store insurance-related information. Your itemized lists can include photos, scanned receipts, documents, and other important information that families need to keep track of.

How they roll…

Anywhere Vault explains the storage info so much better than I could, so here’s what they note on their company information page: “Your information is stored on a dedicated server housed in a state-of-the-art secure data center with backup power, backup air conditioning and multiple Internet connections. Since your information is stored on our server and not on your computer, even if your computer crashes or is stolen, you still retain all of your information. In addition, backups of the data are taken to a completely separate data center. The process is completely automatic, encrypted, and takes a fraction of a second.”

Because Anywhere Vault is up and running 24/7, even on holidays, you’re information is accessible when and how you need it. If you’re online, you’re connected to your inventory information, and when you’re not online, you can feel safe knowing your inventory is safely stored.

Is it safe?

Security is a big deal to Anywhere Vault. Besides a dedicated server behind a dedicated firewall, any traffic between your web browser and the Anywhere Vault server is encrypted. Of course, all billing and credit card information uses secure HTTP protocol and is not stored with your personal vault.  The company notes, “We are committed to continually reviewing and testing our security, by using third-party security testing and certification organizations.”

Now, this is just a quick intro. We’re actually going to be looking at this company a little closer over the next few weeks. Why? Well, Anywhere Vault has been nice enough to offer Declutter It readers a very special offer that I’ll be posting about next. You won’t want to miss it.

Stay tuned for the surprise offer, a review of Anywhere Vault, more info related to storage sizes available, guides to how this whole system works, and more.

Post from: Blisstree

Anywhere Vault – One Home Inventory Solution