Owner: Beyond the Consumer URL:http://beyondtheconsumer.blogspot.com/ Join Date: Thu, 21 Jun 2007 18:26:47 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: Personal finance, consumerism, and business news. Site statistics:Click here
Motorola honors my supposedly voided warranty 2007-06-28 14:09:00 My wife, last year, upgraded her old phone to one of those RAZR phones. It's a thin silver flip-open phone with flat buttons. A nice enough phone, but several months after owning it the hinge broke off. A plastic bit actually cracked from the case and the little screw holding it together fell out. Otherwise it still worked.
So she took it in to Cingular, our provider. They refused to fix it Read more:Motorola
Reverse Mortgages 2007-06-28 11:35:00 The pros and cons of reverse mortgages. What is a reverse mortgage? It is a loan available to home owners ages 62 and up, that taps into home equity to provide a monthly or lump sum payout. The main difference between a reverse mortgage and a regular home equity loan however is that the payment is deferred until the homeowner dies or otherwise leaves or sells the property. Like any mortgage Read more:Reverse
The Gift Tax explained 2007-06-27 10:14:00 Many people may be confused about what the IRS' gift tax really is. I myself was pretty confused about it. The common misconception is that every year if you give a substantial gift, you have to pay taxes on it if you give over a certain amount (excluding certified charitable organizations). You can certainly get that impression when you read the IRS gift tax summary, specifically:
If you gave
Hollywood Video free movie 2007-06-26 18:28:00 Want a free rental? Go to Hollywood
Video every once and a while. I personally use Netflix (renting videos was getting expensive), but if I ever have the urge to rent something on the spot I give my business to Hollywood Video. First, they give you a dollar credit if you return a new release the following day. I almost always get that credit, so my rentals are cheaper than they would be at Read more:movie
A revolutionary printer - and I want one! 2007-06-26 15:59:00 This is an absolutely revolutionary little printer that can fit right on your desktop, called the Desktop Factory. Okay, so it's way out of the price range of most sane consumers, but the prices will come down as more companies pick up on the technology and begin mass producing them. Remember how expensive laser printers were back in the day? I now have a great little laser on my desk that I paid
Paying taxes on forgiven debt 2007-06-26 15:04:00 Free Money Finance recently had a post regarding paying taxes after your house is foreclosed on.
This is true, any debt you are forgiven is subject to taxation as regular income. There are several exclusions however, so one may apply to you to remove you of such an obligation. As one FMF commenter pointed out, you are excluded if you are insolvent.
To read all the rules of this exclusion, refer
Credit card interchange fees 2007-06-26 11:55:00 At least one group is concerned with the rising credit card fees, in this case a website called Unfair Credit Card Fees. The site focuses on a lesser known fee that is charged every time you swipe your plastic: the interchange fee.
Most people, I think (though the group disagrees) know that the card companies get a cut of the transaction every time you swipe your card. Honestly, until I had
Earth Day Footprint Calculator 2007-06-25 15:52:00 I had long lost track of this site, but found it once again! From Earth
Day is a carbon footprint calculator. They call it the "Earth DayFootprint
Quiz". You answer a bunch of questions and it tells you, based on how you live your life, how many planets we would need to support everyone to live like you do.
I remember taking this quiz a long time ago, and its a shame I didn't keep the results Read more:Calculator
Consumerism at its best 2007-06-25 11:17:00 Here's consumerism and overconsumption at its best.
iPhone cravers
Some people are just dying to get their hands on the new iPhone. They are willing to pay hundreds above the already ridiculous retail price to have it, and they are willing to stand in line for days to be the first to have one. Are we going to see a repeat of the Playstation 3 mess?
No doubt there is a team of advertising
A mirror on the cover wasn't enough 2007-06-25 10:50:00 Wired magazine is offering a new service. You can now have your own face on the cover of its magazine issue. I have to write it again just so it sinks in. The magazine is personalizing its issues to include your face on the cover.
Ahem. Apparently having a magazine put a mirror on the front so you can look at yourself and say "I'm the best person of the year!" wasn't enough, now we need to have
Toll road authority cuts costs, takes everyone's deposits 2007-06-25 10:41:00 Our local toll road authority has been pushing heavily for people to sign up with a tag system that allows people to travel the toll roads without stopping. At each toll point it is automatically charged to a pre-paid account.
I signed up myself, because we do use the toll roads and it is quite convenient. When I did, we were required to put a small deposit ($40) for each car, for which we get a Read more:everyone
, deposits
Banks love automatic drafts 2007-06-30 12:45:00 Banks and companies are in love with automaticdrafts
. Some even go so far as to require them. I firmly stay away. Why do banks love them so much?
It guarantees them payment. They control when you pay your bills, not you. Usually when you get your bill you have at least a week to pay it; with automatic payments they have the control.
It increases the odds of an overdraft. Your bank wants you to
Friday Linkfest 2007-06-29 10:00:00 How to go green on a budget - Personally I feel being "green" is mostly marketing hype. Does paying double for a head of lettuce that wasn't sprayed to keep bugs from ravaging the crops save the world?
Supreme court okays price fixing - So retailers can no longer offer discounts on certain products below the manufacturer's suggest price? Another great reason to buy used!
New era for cable Read more:Friday
What if a collector calls you? 2007-07-05 19:45:00 What would you do if a collector called you? First, assume that this isn't a case of identity theft or a wrong number. You just got a call from a collector, they say you owe such and such, and you know it to be true. What should you do? Here's what I would do...
1) Don't admit to the debt. Get their phone number, case number, and mailing address. Hang up, ignore all further calls
.
1a) If they
Account Flowchart 2007-07-05 18:10:00 Above is an example of a flowchart of my various accounts, not including retirement and investments. Basically, this shows where our paychecks go. Since we have stopped our Roth IRAs until we are out of debt, do not fund any other investments, and our 401ks are taken out pre-tax, this is a distribution chart of our net take-home pay.
We have a brick and mortar bank that we use for our everyday Read more:Account
Detailed account information in unsealed envelopes 2007-07-05 17:57:00 Very rarely have I ever received mail that is in unsealed envelopes. So when my investment financial institution sent two, I started to worry. The financial institution that I have my Roth IRA with sent two account statements, complete with my name, address, balances, and account numbers in them completely unsealed. I considered that perhaps someone had opened them, but they did not show any Read more:information
Why the iPhone reminds me of a Zune 2007-07-03 13:58:00 When I think of how the iPhone
was implemented, I immediately think of the Microsoft Zune
. Both MS and Apple were new players in well established markets. They both came out with a heavily marketed device with the auspices of revolutionizing said market. They both suffered a serious problem; rather than revolutionizing the industry, they tried to just produce a flashy product that would sell.
Online safety: test your passwords 2007-07-03 11:01:00 After reading about an ebay hacking on Consumerism Commentary, I was reminded of the importance of having a secure password. Having your ebay account broken into may not be the end of the world, but your online banking? Your vanguard account? Worse, many people use the same password for all of these services. If one site password is stolen, the thieves have access to them all!
I use a password Read more:passwords
Dispute your credit report 2007-07-03 08:59:00 If you don't know where to start to dispute an item on your creditreport
, here's some helpful tips from Bankrate. First, get your report from annualcreditreport.com and get it nowhere else. All the other sites are, frankly, just trying to sign you up for some service or another. annualcreditreport.com is the only way to get a true free credit report.
Bankrate lists 5 ways to dispute your report Read more:Dispute
Take care of your family first 2007-07-03 08:31:00 Here is my list of priorities:
1) the family
2) spouse
3) the kids
4) ourselves
And here's an example of some people who have it all mixed up, parents who go wild for their kids.
when it comes to their 2-year-old daughter, the young parents -- she is 21, and he is 23 -- simply can't say no.
Why can't young parents say no to their little kids? Are they putting their kids first? I'd say no. The
Interchange fees House hearing scheduled 2007-07-02 15:49:00 Triston from unfaircreditcardfees.com has commented that there is a house meeting scheduled for July 19 on interchange fees. Check the weekly schedule in a couple of weeks to see when this is going to be discussed. The House
Financial Service Committee website also hosts a live webcast service, so we may be able to watch this live. Very interesting!
Want a receipt? Too bad! 2007-07-02 11:52:00 Do you use a debit card? I sure do, it's a lot easier than carrying cash and frankly I don't buy that much. But when I do buy something, I stick my receipt in my pocket and keep it for a couple of days, just in case there is a dispute between myself and the merchant. Now if you make purchases with your debit card under $15, you may not get any receipt at all. That's right, for a product purchase
iPhone nothing but trouble 2007-07-02 09:26:00 Here's a blog post about activating an iPhone
and all the trouble people are going through. This one is chronicled in pretty good detail, so I'll use it as an example. Some memorable quotes:
I gave her my phone number and she told me that the SIM chip in my phone was incompatible with my phone number.
Huh? The iPhone doesn't use a sim card, or at least one that the customer can access. But the
Call the CSR in the morning 2007-07-02 08:45:00 When is the best time to call customer service? The level of service you receive, and often the options that are available to you, are mostly dependent on the customer service representative that you manage to get on the phone. Get a CSR that just handled a Customer-from-Hell and you may not get very far asking where your refund is that you were promised 2 months ago.
So to increase your odds of
My debt free goal 2007-07-09 11:15:00 We have been chipping away at our debt for a while now, trying to find as much money in our budget to become completely debt free (with exception of the mortgage for now). Finally we have come up against a brick wall. We are still managing to eat and keep the electricity on while affording a few luxuries to keep us sane, but doubt that we could afford to hit the debt any harder. Our debt consists
Misleading marketing has made me cynical 2007-07-09 08:15:00 I am utterly cynical and untrusting of just about every single company I do business with. It's the big companies that have ruined me. All their fine print, twisty service agreements, bundled restricted packages, and outright lies have left me scrambling to look for the asterisk. The asterisk on all "Free!*" deals that read in fine print on the bottom, "* free with annual contract, see form 293-D Read more:Misleading
ING checking 2007-07-09 08:04:00 Having used a brick & mortar bank and their online bill pay for so long, here's what I like (and don't like) about ING's direct online checking
(primarily their bill pay service).
:) - 4% interest. I haven't found a local brick & mortar checking account that earns you interest (thanks to Wendy in the comments for this link!).
:) - Verifies its bill pay addresses with large companies. This isn't
Out of reality birthdays 2007-07-06 17:35:00 This consumerist post about a crummy birthday cake reminded me about a number of parties in my neighborhood for little kids. On any given weekend, you can spot them by the huge inflatable playground in the background, streamers and balloons everywhere, and at one house; a donkey tied to a pole in the front yard.
I'm not concerned with the difference between the photo and the actual visual Read more:reality
Setting up a readjustment account 2007-07-06 15:03:00 I am a firm believer in what I call a readjustment account (maybe I need a catchier name?). It's really a simple concept; you have a separate account (preferably an interest-bearing checking or savings) that you fund each week. Say you have a $500 car insurance payment every 6 months. You have lawn service for $60 every 3 months. This is a total yearly expense of $1240. You divide this by the Read more:Setting
Investopedia 2007-07-06 14:49:00 This is a little gem, an online "encyclopedia" of investment/financial terms.
Investopedia.com
It has some articles, but I found the dictionary most useful. List of Personal Finance Terms.
Very nice.
Recommend Site To A Friend
