Customer Record for Today

Reader Steve Morton has come through again. After I posted the scanned Customer Record page, he has given us the gift of Word and PDF versions of this useful page in A4 and A5 that all of us can download and print.

The Word and PDF documents are available for free at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/filofax/files/. (You will have to create a Yahoo account if you don't already have one, and join the Yahoo Filofax group, which is, in my experience, a well-managed and spam-free group.)

You can also find them on D*I*Y Planner at: http://diyplanner.com/node/6518.

Customer Record

Here's a Personal-size leaf from 1996 that showed up on The Daily Planner, so of course I snapped it up. I don't know how long these legacy leaves will be available. All I can recommend is checking back to the site fairly frequently as I do.

I'm fascinated by this form because it can hold so much information. Basically, there's a space for everything you need to know about one of your customer's accounts. I'm especially fascinated by the back side (click the image to get access to it). There's a table for tracking several years' worth of monthly purchase amounts, like a miniature Excel spreadsheet.

I've learned two things from this form:
1) At one time, it was truly possible to conduct all of your business with a Personal Filofax (this form is copyright 1996).
2) To be useful to me, I'd need this form on a larger sheet of paper. I know many Filofax purists decry the additional sizes like A4, A5, and the defunct Deskfax, but for me, I'd need this in at least an A5 to find it usable.

In other news, I calmed down on my format crisis when I realized that I don't have to do everything all at once. I've decided to stick with the A5 format "for now." I've ordered the pieces I need to implement the DayRunner forms that worked for me—a month-on-two-pages and a day-per-page calendar.

Free for All Friday No. 31

Talk about your Filofax...or talk about the weather! Whatever you like.

A commenter asked recently whether we can open up the discussion to other kinds of organizers, or planning in general. As far as I'm concerned, we've always been open to these topics!

Most of the time, I'd like to keep our focus on loose-leaf systems like Filofax as opposed to, say, M***skines, but that seems to be happening naturally. I've never had to ask anyone to change the subject.

So chatter away!

—Inky

Format Crisis

I guess it's no secret to anyone who's been reading between the lines in this blog or clicked through to Flickr that I'm having a format crisis. Me, Ms. Filofax A5 USA has taken an 8.5" x 11" DayRunner into her home.

My current system isn't working as well as it could. Which wouldn't be a problem but for the fact that I'm not working as well as I could. Just today a wise person said to me, "don't let the calendar overtake you," and I realize that's what's been happening. I haven't written down a new idea in weeks, and I'm starting to wonder whether it would help to have a Memo-ry page to write them down on. Would I be able to have better information at my fingertips if I were able to print and carry documents in the standard American 8.5" x 11" size? Would I take better notes if I had a full-size page to do it on? Why am I using a blank sheet of paper folded into my week-on-2-pages Filofax for a daily to-do list when I could be using a page-per-day? And if I had a big, month-in-view calendar to look at every day, would it be less likely to overtake me?

I'm thinking, yes.

When I joined this blog in 2006, I had been spending at least a year changing systems as often as every 3 months...Palm Pilot to Circa to Moleskine. Then I laid down some ground rules when it comes to switching formats:

1) I can only switch twice a year—in January, or, as a last resort, the beginning of academic year calendars in July or September.

2) I must commit to using any one system exclusively for at least 6 full months before switching at all.

Since I've been using an A5 Filofax for work consistently for 3—that's right, 3—years straight now, maybe I can change the rules and start the new format now.

Or, can I take what I need from the DayRunner system and do it with my existing A5? Most of the forms I need are in the DIY Planner's basic A5 kit. And NOT, I might add, in the 8.5" x 11" letter size. I could create the templates myself, but wouldn't sticking with my existing A5 format be the more elegant solution?

And yet part of me thinks that making the letter-size switch will make me feel free! Powerful! Creative! Maybe a change is just what I need in my life right now!

And so I'll go to meet the friends I'm supposed to meet right now. We'll all be having drinks, and we may all have an angel and a devil on either shoulder, but I bet only mine will be whispering to me about paper formats.

Memo-ries

Happy Easter!

You may have noticed the lack of a Free-for-All Friday this past week. I've decided to make them only every other week, to cut down on the number of posts.

In other news, I've been mourning DayRunner lately. It was my 2nd organizer, after my first Filofax, and, even though I run a Filofax blog, DayRunner still has a special place in my heart.

I especially miss the Memo-ry page. A DayRunner is more structured than a Filofax but less pre-programmed than Franklin Covey, and the Memo-ry page is the fulcrum on which the system rests. An idea that's brilliant in its simplicity. It's a to-do list, idea list, and tickler all in one. You just write things down as they come to you, with or without assigning a priority or due date.

One of the ingenious ideas is the box at left, where you can number the memos. Then you can simply use that number to refer to the memo in other parts of the organizer, without having to rewrite the entire item. Something else I love: the tab for the Memo-ry section is at the top, not the right, so you can flip to it instantly.

The DayRunner pages use light gray to delineate lines, rather than harsh black and white, which makes it easy to overwrite boundaries you're not using.

Here's a history of DayRunner: http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/Day-Runner-Inc-Company-History.html

Click the picture for a Flickr tour of a vintage DayRunner (8.5 x 11 size) that I found recently on Overstock.com.

Miscellaneous

A little while ago, a reader asked whether there's a bound, perforated pad whose pages are compatible with the Filofax Personal page size. I write in perforated A5 Miquelrius notebooks so that I have the option of punching and transferring the pages to an A5 Filofax. It makes sense that some folks might want to do that with a Personal Filo.

I thought the small Miquelrius spiral-bound, perforated 4 x 6 notebook might work, so I ordered one. I also ordered an A5 Rhodia top-bound notebook, to see if I can use it with my A5 Filo.

Well, the Miquelrius 4 x 6 doesn't work with Personal. Not only is it too vertically short, but the torn-off size is 4" wide. I was hoping that the 4" width included the spiral binding, so the perforation would be closer to the Personal 3-3/4" width. Nope.

With the Rhodia A5, I found the opposite problem. The bound pad is a perfect A5, so when you tear off the sheet, it's much shorter than A5 and not suitable for hole punching.

Oh, well. It was worth a shot.

Free for All Friday No. 30

Hi everybody!

I'm back from a week on vacation. I have some new posting ideas, and thought I'd share my handwritten version of the packing list we've been talking about recently.

Yeah, this was just for one week.

—Inky