Financial Fridays - indentity theft

A couple years ago I taught a student whose father's life had been wrecked by identity theft. It was a story I'll never forget. Here a few things we can do to protect ourselves from identity theft:

1) Remove your social security number (SSN) from your checks if it is on there. Use your driver licence number instead if you need an identifying number. I did this immediately after hearing the student's story!

2) Never send your complete SSN or credit card number over email. If you are shopping online, look for the padlock symbol indicating you are on a secure site, and log off as soon as you have completed your purchase.

Create an account at PayPal.com and use it to pay when online. Else, MasterCard Securecode and Verified by Visa offer special credit card services for secure shopping online. These require the user to input a password before they can use the card online. I chose one of these options for my online purchases.

3) Buy a paper shredder and shred any financial statements or records before throwing them in the trash. This is the one I've yet to do, so I'm putting this on my to-do list today!

4) Once a year get a free credit report. See www.annualcreditreport.com. Make sure you recognize all the accounts and balances listed there.

In 2006, The Federal Trade Commission received nearly 250,000 complaints of credit-damaging identity theft. (More cases will go unrealized or unreported for years.) In this down turned economy, people grow desperate. So let's take a few simple but wise steps to protect our identity.

The Bible says a good name is worth more than silver and gold!

Financial Fridays - lower monthly bills

Ever wonder if you are paying more than you need to for things like your phone service or car insurance?

For most of us, these bills are fixed amounts we haven't questioned or comparison shopped in years ... unless something like a job-loss has forced us to seek out cheaper alternatives. It is time to find out.

Sometimes you can score a lower monthly cost just by contacting your current provider and asking if there is a less expensive plan available to you. I did that recently with my home phone carrier and saved money without making any noticeable sacrifices in my service. I will look at my cell phone plan next and see about reducing it or switching carriers.

Consider the Geico slogan,"A 5 minute phone call could save you hundreds." It saved me money when I switched my car insurance to them from Progressive. Try popping over to www.lowermybills.com if you don't know where to start, and see if you could be saving some money on your cell, car, Internet service, etc.

And if you save some money this way - let us know! :)

Off to open this week's mail ...

Financial Friday

You should see my entryway floor this morning -totally covered in paper. Mail and bills to be exact. I've spend the last 30 minutes on the floor there opening ... sorting ... moaning occasionally ... tossing ... and filing.

I don't do this often enough.

Anybody else have an aversion to dealing with their snail mail?

I was soooo happy years back when my bank began online bill pay where I could set everything up to automatically pay on time - what a time, sanity and late fee saver! They write and mail the checks for me and I don't even have to keep stamps at home anymore. Yay!

But the downside to that is I don't open my mail - the bills part - with any regularity anymore. I assume all is taken care of by my bank - and 95% of the time it is. But then there are the occasional notices about billing addresses being changed, or rate or schedule changes. And I miss those until they've already taken effect. Then it usually it costs me money, which is frustrating and not smart.

So I decided I will open any bills that come in during the week on Friday mornings. That should be frequently enough. How often do you open your mail?

Guess what I discovered today? Evidently my utilities bill has been overpaid by $400!!! Now I clearly don't owe them money or late fees, but that's $400 that I've loaned to them unknowingly, interest free, for 2 or more months! I'm heading off to call them now and find out the deal.

For those of you who know me well enough to know I'm forever cutting myself somehow - I did get a big paper-cut across my thumb opening the mail today. Maybe that's the real reason I don't open mail daily or weekly. I need one of these!

Then again, I'd probably hurt myself with that too. Sigh.

So, here's to getting more intentional about managing my finances.

Want to join me? I'll post some easy-to-do tips here occasionally on Fridays.

Meanwhile - go open your mail and tell us if you discover anything surprising!