Shock and awe


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When *I* visit the ATM, it’s definitely more shock than awe.

Balancing Your Personal Finance

It is said that the intelligent finance planner never becomes a victim of financial deficiency. The statement is no doubt true as validated by thousands of examples and those revealed by personal finance news. Personal finance is all about your individual finance, spending your money wisely and saving as well as investing the same for future gains. The scope also encompasses your credits in the market like the loans you may take for buying a home, a car or for sending your ward to a foreign university for pursuing a bright career-oriented course. It also includes your investment portfolio like investing in stock market, mutual funds, etc. in addition to life insurance, retirement planning, and lots more.

Using financial calculators enables the planner to calculate the exact amount and maintaining a record of the same so that overspending or wasteless spending do not take place and that all loan amounts are paid as scheduled. There are different ranges of financial calculators, viz. credit calculator, insurance calculator, real estate calculator, etc. A credit calculator enables one to calculate the amount required to pay unpaid balances, i.e. the real cost if the minimum balance is cleared. An insurance calculator enables one to calculate the life insurance required including estimation of drug savings, medicare prescriptions, etc. Calculating housing investment amount, mortgage payments, credit card payments, etc. are other aspects that financial calculators cover. If you are doing your personal finance planning, do watch personal finance news regularly so that you stay updated about what is happening in the world of personal finance. You can also watch financial news online if you have access to the Internet.

Personal finance news in India covers all facets related to finance including financial institutions offering loans that may differ in interest rates, mutual funds offered by different companies, and related paraphernalia. If you want to get a house loan in India, watching personal finance news will help you choose the most competitive loan deal with low interest rates. Financial news online can be viewed at news portals like Reuters India and other financial online sites.

Choosing Checking Accounts With the Lowest Bank Fees

Banks make most of their money through convenience fees charged to customers. When you are in the market for a new checking account or want to move to a new bank, there are a number of things you should take into consideration before selecting the bank to open your checking account with.

Insurance

It used to be very rare for a bank to fail. The current economy has increased bank failures though, and when looking to open any bank account, it’s important to take the possibility of a bank failure into consideration. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp insures deposits from eligible banks and financial institutions in the US up to 0,000 per depositor. Make sure your bank is covered by the FDIC before you open an account with them.

Choosing a Checking Account

Most everyone relies on a checking account in order to pay their bills and hang on to their money before it’s needed for a purchase or expense. You have a number of checking accounts from which to choose, from free accounts (no maintenance fees) that don’t require a minimum balance; to accounts that offer interest if you maintain a certain minimum balance; to money market deposit accounts with higher interest paid but higher minimums required and a limit to the number of transactions you can make in any given month. There are specialty accounts for groups of people, too – like student checking, or senior citizen accounts.

Compare your local bank checking account options with online checking account options to find an account that will charge you the least amount of fees and provide the most interest for how you are likely to use the account.

Avoiding Overdraft Fees

People who live paycheck to paycheck often end up paying hundreds of dollars each year in the form of bank overdraft fees. At an average of per occurrence, overdrafts are costly fees that you should do everything in your power to avoid! What happens when your account falls short is the bank will honor the largest debit or check that’s outstanding first, which means each of your smaller checks will result in individual, overdraft fees. Instead of bouncing a single check, you end up paying an NSF (non sufficient fund) on each of the individual transactions.

While many banks will cover the non sufficient funds for you under “overdraft protection” all that means is your money is paid out to the person or business you wrote the check for or used your debit card for; but that the bank will charge you for that privilege. See if you can get standard overdraft protection, and link your checking account to a savings account. If your account is overdrawn they can tap into your savings account for the funds instead of charging you for the NSF.

Some banks hold your deposits for 10 business days for larger or nonlocal checks. Standard wait time for a regular check deposit can be 2-4 business days. This can make it difficult – if you are cutting things close, always find out when a deposit will come available so you know when you can use the money from the deposit.

Understand Your Debit Card

Almost all checking accounts include a debit card, but this is another way for banks to make money off their account holders. Sometimes if you use the debit card as debit at the retailer, you pay a fee – but if you chose credit instead at the same retailer, it wouldn’t cost you anything more than the cost of whatever you’re buying.

Using your debit card in an ATM machine owned by another bank will result in paying fees to the other bank, and your own bank as well. Paying or to take out in cash is never a good idea, but you may not even realize it since the ATM only announces the fees of their OWN bank (not what your bank will add at the end of the month).

Using a debit card to reserve travel accommodations or purchase gas sometimes puts a hold on your account that’s more than what you actually spend. It can take a week or two for the hold to be lifted, and meanwhile you don’t have access to any of those funds which can result in overdrafts if you’re not aware.

Checking Account Vs HELOC


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Choose the Right Banking Account for Your Needs

I just saw the commercial of that bank down our street. It is offering a free bank account! Lets take it, my wife cried out. It sounds like a great idea but before you go sign up for that account and start banking with any specific bank you should know that bank accounts are not one size fits all.

When you understand the different types of bank accounts you can actually make your money work for you in the best possible way.

Different Types of Bank Accounts

The accounts offered on those commercials are usually the checking accounts. These are the most common type of bank account as they allow you to withdraw money from your account by writing checks and with a debit card.

People generally consider this as a great option as they get access to their money without having to jump through hoops or wait for a check to be cut, etc. Some checking accounts pay interest, allowing you to take advantage of average daily balances, but most typical checking accounts, also known as a demand deposit account, will not pay interest.

Money market accounts are those that offer interest on the accounts. It also allows you to write checks on it. A money market account allows for you to benefit from a higher rate of interest than your typical savings or checking account, but they do require that you have a higher minimum balance than you would have to have with other accounts.

Withdrawing funds from these accounts are not as easy as it is with a checking account. But you can still write checks on these accounts. In addition, there are usually more fees associated with this type of account, making it a good option for those that don’t necessarily need to access the cash.

One common type of account is the savings account. This is the type of account that most people use to keep the bulk of their money in. The difference is not having the benefit of being able to write checks. The benefit of interest still holds in these accounts. You may be limited as to the number of withdrawals or transfers that you are allowed to make each month and if you go over you may be charged a small fee.

Some of the other options include time deposit accounts, or certification of deposits or CDs. These accounts offer guaranteed interest rates and allow for the account holder to choose how long they would like their money to be on deposit, you can generally choose anywhere from a few days to a few years.

This account is not appropriate if you want to access the money but if you are looking to earn a high rate of interest on a specific amount of money then it might be the ideal type.

As you can see, there are many different account types for you to choose from. There are various choices of accounts that you ask your bank and then choose from them. If you still aren’t sure let them know what you will be using your account for and they will likely be able to help you make the right choice for your financial needs.

See how to do Linear Regression for determining what part of a mixed cost is a Fixed Cost and what part is a Variable Cost. Also See how to create a Scatter Diagram and add Trend Line. Excel Magic Trick # 265: Cost Accounting Linear Regression (Excel Magic Trick #265) This video is for a Highline Community College Cost Accounting Class. The SLOPE (m) function calculates the slope of the linear equation y = m*x + b The INTERCEPT (b) function calculates the intercept of the linear equation y = m*x + b The RSQ (r^2) function calculates the Coefficient Of Determination (how much influence x has on y) The symbol carrot ^ (Shift + 6) is used for exponents The ROUND function must be used when: 1) multiplying decimals; 2) you are required to round (money requires that you round because the smallest unit is a penny); 3) you will use your formula results in subsequent formulas To see how to use the Excel Add-in Data Analysis feature, see this video: Stats 08: Install Excel 2007 Data Analysis Add-in
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Saving Accounts – Getting Your Money Out

If your comparing online saving accounts you’ll find there are different types of accounts on the market with varying amounts of flexability and features. The most common account types are high interest savings, term deposits and instant access saving accounts.

Term deposits earn fixed rates of interest for the term, generally not less than one year, and require a substantial minimum amount to open the deposit. High interest savings accounts earn higher rates of interest but commonly use a variable rate, and are also very accessible mainly by linking it to a transaction account or a separate savings account. Although accessible, it is not unusual for high interest savings to place restrictions on the number of withdrawals or to require a minimum amount of deposit during the month in order to qualify for the higher rate.

In contrast, instant access savings accounts give you the convenience of access at any time to your deposit with the use of an ATM card. You will have to maintain a minimum balance on your instant access account and this may range from a low of to a high of 00. As a savings account, it will earn interest income, but the rate will depend on the balance you keep in the account; it will generally be lower than the rate you may expect of a high interest savings account.

It’s common for instant access savings accounts to be used as an everyday transaction account. If you’ve got a high interest savings account then you can link that account to your instant access account as your linked transaction account.

These two accounts may be linked even if you maintain them in different banks. It can be a smart move to have the two savings accoutns at the same institution as this way you can instantly tranfer funds from your high interest saving account into the instant access account and make withdrawals via that account.

Your instant access to the savings account is facilitated mainly by an ATM card, which allows you to have 24 hour access and maximum convenience. Other benefits beyonf the ATM and EFTPOS access include phone banking and 24/7 online banking.

ATM convenience is not limited to the ability to draw funds from the ATM networks operated by your bank and other financial institutions. Once you have a link between accounts then ATM access is a very convenient way to access cash anywhere you need it and at anytime. Other conveniences possible with the instant access savings accounts ATM are:

Making fund transfers to and from the linked accounts Making cash deposits (although this is possible only on selected ATM units) Checking the balance on your accounts

Aside from making deposits at ATMs, you may also deposit money into your instant access savings account by:

- Having your incomes credited directly

- Transferring funds from the linked account or your other savings accounts

- Transferring funds by telephone or Internet banking

- Sending cheque deposits by mail

- Depositing over the counter

For your everyday transactions, you may want to consider the conveniences available to you through instant access savings accounts.

Financial Accounting ACG2021 SFCC Spring 2008 Crosson Chapter 2