Papers and cash

Copies, not the only originals

Photograph or photocopy passports, driving licences, insurance, prescriptions, pet vaccinations, and the deed or tenancy. Keep one set in a waterproof sleeve at home and tell one trusted person where it is. Do not email your only copies to a random cloud and forget the password.

Write down account numbers you might need and the phone numbers you actually call. In a long outage the contact app is a brick. A paper list in the kit is dull and sufficient.

Cash in small notes

Cards fail when the network fails. A modest wad of small notes buys bread and fuel when the terminal does not. It is not a fortune and it should not be your rent. Replace it if you dip into it, the way you replace rice.

If you keep cash at home, keep it boring and separate from the place a burglar looks first. This is not a challenge to hide gold. It is taxi money and milk money.

Maps and addresses

A paper map of your town, the route to a relative, and the address of a meeting point. Agree the meeting point before you need it: a specific door, not “somewhere in town”. Children old enough to understand should know a phone number by heart, one, belonging to a real adult.