John just been retrenched by his company beginning of year and without any income for the past 6 months.  The only financial resources that John has are couple of credit cards and it has been burst.  John cannot even remember how many bills have been outstanding.  He has thought of seeking help on a bill consolidation exercise but did not know how to start.

Remember I did write about bill consolidation exercise before and the best option to turn to is resources from Internet, such as secureloanconsolidation.com. All these companies are very helpful and knowledgeable.  Not only they advise you on the debts consolidation, they will also tailor made a complete package inclusive of refinancing, tax advice as well as bankruptcy procedure.

I hope John will take a bold move to face all this problems by engaging a professional company.  Once the debts consolidation exercise is done, you will have a clear visibility of your debts and it is always easier to deal with a single debts account.  Not only that, you might even get a lower interest rate in your new refinancing exercise, that means lower instalment and Interest payment.

It all happens when I received an email from a friend about RMCN credit service that she engaged months ago.

From: xxx
Sent: Thursday, July 30, 2009 1:26 PM
To: xxx
Subject: I improve my credit rating

July 30, 2009

First of all let me say that I am ECSTATIC about my credit repair progress. Vicky has been great ALL THE WAY, extremely efficient in all her efforts. I starting working with RMCN around May 11th, 2009 and just received my second credit score update today, overall between all 3 credit bureaus I have increased my score 86 points………………………………………………………………..

All the while I have been very conscious with my spending especially credit card, so I do not have much problem with my credit card payment nor it affect my credit rating.  But after received the above email, I understand that a lot of people are in debts with credit because it is the most convenient way to spend money that you do not own, just a swipe with a signature and you are done, the problem will come at the end of the months when the payment due.

If you are having problem with your credit card payment and that’s affecting your credit score, you might want to have a look at various option that may help you to get back your good credit scoring so that you will not be penalized with higher interest rate in the future.  You may get more information at www.repairmycreditnow.com on how to get back your credit scoring.

It looks tempting to me as my current credit card charge me annual fees, even though I do not need to pay for it as my annual usage allowed me to waive the annual fees automatically.

Beside considering the free annual charges and longer interest free period, which does not sound attractive to me as both does not benefiting me, I am looking for more before I take up the offer.

I look through the offer letter and I notice that it did not mention about the amount that I need to responsible should I lost my card and report it within 24 hours. This is a grey area as credit card fraud case has been increasing daily as I do not wants to be a victim with tons of charges which I do not purchase anything at all.

I am very careful about using my credit card online, what I did was I had a credit card with maximum credit limit of $1000 specifically for Internet purchase. The is to assure that if there is any Internet credit card fraud happened case to me, my maximum lost is limit to $1000 only.

Let’s get back to the topic, buying a car is not expensive but maintaining it could cost you thousand of dollar in insurance alone each year.  Being a smart consumer, I told John to look for a car insurance comparison chart online so that he can get the best deal.

Auto insurance company usually offer 2 types of auto insurance, a minimum of 3^rd party coverage or the comprehensive coverage.  The first type covers only the 3^rd party should anything happened in an accident, that means you have to bear your own repair cost for your car. The 2^nd type is comprehensive coverage where it covers everything related to the accidents.

After deciding which type of insurance you are going to purchase, you have to look at a few items that possibly reduce your car insurance rate.   The first company you should check is your existing insurance company, they usually offer discount for their existing customer, be it life insurance or household insurance.  Secondly, please look at other optional items such as wind shield coverage, natural disaster coverage etc, reducing those option coverage will significantly reduce your car insurance rate.

Have you ever wonder getting a free annual credit report so that you understand your financial health status ?

It is very important to understand your credit rating as it is one of the most important factor deciding if you can get a loan from a finance institution.

If you have a good credit rating, then you will not having any problem getting a loan from a bank. Not only that, you will also able to enjoy much lower interest rate.

Likewise, if your credit rating is bad, you will be penalised by paying high interest rate, higher instalment and your loan amount will be lower compare to those who hold better rating.

Before you approach a bank for a loan, it is always better to get a credit report about your financial health.  Some times you may overlook some of the credit card payment and that indirectly affect your credit rating.

A credit report contains confidential information such as your personal information like employment history, assets and property, social security number, your payment history of all your credit card, debts, loan or mortgage.

The most important detail to look into the credit report is the debts that you have such as house mortgage, car loan, personal loan and credit card.  Please confirm you are the rightfully owner of the account, if there is a dispute, please report to the authority immediately as someone else could have been using your identity without your knowledge.

When you start a business, you have to deal with customer payment.  Credit card payment is very popular now and almost every shop on line or off line accepts credit card payment.

In order to accept your customer payment via credit card, you need to have a credit card merchant account.  Please take note that there are different types of credit card in the market, you need to have at least a Visa Merchant Account and Master Merchant Account.

Once you have the merchant account, you will be able to accept credit payment from your customer. If you are new, here is the scenario, you have a website selling goods or services, when the customer purchase the items and check out, the customer will be directed to a secure page where they will key in the credit card information. Once they submit the credit card information, your merchant account provider will verify the credit card and charge the customer accordingly.

All the above setup perfectly integrated to your website as one. It looks professional and it provides a very good shopping experience for the customer.

It is a fix term insurance where you pay a fix amount of premium in return for a sum of money paid to you in the event of loss of assets due to crime, fire or others natural disaster. It is a yearly renewable insurance.

Recently ABC news portal reported that the crime rate in New York is in an increasing trend especially house break-in cases.

The above cases create a demand in household insurance and one hottest topic in town is who to reduce the household insurance premium.

We did an enquiry recently with ADT NY and found out that those houses install with ADT Alarm system which includes smoke detectors, burglar alarms as well as dead-bolt locks will entitles some discount from insurance company.

Are all insurances company provide discount to any alarm system installed? The answer is No.  Only alarm system with communication center and local police office will entitle for such discount.

Why ?  Because when you house alarm trigger, a signal will be sent to the monitoring center via your telephone line, once the monitoring center received the signal, they will contact the house owner.  In the case where the house owner cannot be contacted, the monitoring center will contact the nearest police office for further investigation.

The above action will deter the crime rate tremendously and reduce the risk for the insurance company.  As such, insurance company provide discount to encourage the installation of household alarm.

HO-1 is a very basic home insurance, it covers against fire and lightning damage.

HO-2 cover more damages such as theft, explosion, smoke, storm, riot, ice, bursting of water pipe, gas pipe etc

HO-3 insures your house and structure against loss or damage from any caused except those specifically excluded in the policy.  This is one of the most popular home insurance. Please pay attention on the excluded item as it may be required depending on the location and surrounding of your house.

HO-4, also a tenant’s policy insures your household contents stipulated in HO-2, it also provide additional coverage for living expenses reimbursement, medical treatment and third party liability.

HO-6 is specifically tailor made for condominium owner who would like to insure their household contents and personal belonging on top of the master insurance policy cover the building structure.

HO-8 is making for older house. The policy is mainly taking care of the old building where original items may not be available anymore.

Please take note the above is just a basic guideline, you are recommended to consult your insurance advisor to determine the necessary coverage needed for your house.

1)  First, you need to make a police report for the accident.  Insurance company will not entertain any claims without a complete police investigation report.

2) Determine what kind of insurance coverage you had purchased and determine if it is worth making a claim.  Please take note that you need to pay an excess fees under some circumstances, it might not worth pursue the claim.  In some country, insurance company practice NCB( No claim bonus ), it means if you do not file a claim in the coverage period, you will entitle for a discount for the next renewal.  So if the amount of the claim is much less than the discount you will enjoy in the coming years, it is not worth to file the claim.

3)  File the claim fast and provide all necessary documents.  Insurance company usually has a list of guideline that you must follow for a claim. Please follow all the necessary procedure and submit the relevant documents required.  Please also take note that there is a limited duration for a claim as well.

4)  Seek assistance from your auto insurance agent if you have one, or the insurance company or even the garage repair you car will be more than happy to assist you.

Generally, the longer the maturity period, the higher the interested rate paid. The reason is you are locking up your money for a longer period and the bank will make full use of your money earning higher interest through their mortgage product.

But the economy climate changing everyday and the overnight interest rate between banks does affect the CD rate daily. For example, 3 months CD rate is 0.8% and 12 months CD rate is 1.4% today, should you lock in the 12 months CD in 1.4% today ? That is a very tough question as nobody can predicts what will happen in the future.

As everyone hoping the get the investment return, there are a few methods the get the best CD rates in town.

1) Prepare a spreadsheet with Name of Bank, CD rates for 3 months, 6 months and 12 months respectively.
2) Look through the local daily, Discover Bank advertisement on CD rates.
3) Visit local banks, finance or any leasing or credit unions that offer CD product.
4) Internet is faster and most convenient way to find out the best CD rates offered by Bank, they usually provide detail comparison among their competitors.