How Long Should You Keep Tax Documents?

If I ran the country, filing things in envelopes would be punishable by something very nasty. You must get rid of envelopes when they arrive. Take the document out, discard the envelope. Recycling, make yourself feel better. There is actually no statutory length of time, as far as I can find anyway, that you should keep documents. The Inunrevenue, or HMRC, here in the UK suggests that you keep any tax-related documents for 22 months after the end of the tax year to which they apply. This is really what it comes down to and this is why people keep more stuff than they need because they don't know how long they need to keep