We were one of the unfortunate families who ended up receiving our IRS economic stimulus payment (aka bribery money) via check instead of direct deposit, despite my best efforts of e-filing and allowing the IRS to deduct what we owed on our taxes from our bank account. (See if I e-file the next time we owe money, damned IRS!!!)
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My company has decided to have its employees start using American Express cards for business expenses. The AMEX card will have rewards just like my normal credit card so that isn’t a problem for me.
The problem that I see is that, while I heard this may be happening ahead of time, no other mention or information on credit card terms was given out. I received a letter in the mail over the weekend saying I was approved for this credit card and I simply wasn’t expecting it.
Apparently, my company passed along a whole list of employee names with their social security numbers in lieu of an official application for each person. While the credit cards were arranged through my company, they are 100% in the employees’ names and the responsibility of the employee.
I’m thinking this is not legal but when has that stopped a company from doing something that they want to do with your personal information?
When I check my credit next, I’m going to be looking for a hard inquiry (vs. soft that wouldn’t impact my score), plus the listing of new credit, which could also negatively impact my score.
Stay tuned…
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I know I’ve been MIA now for a couple of months. I’ve had a lot going on.
My sister has been dealing with cancer now for almost a year and recently had to have a brain tumor removed. Fortunately, that’s starting to look up. Unfortunately, it looks like the first hospital she was at made a huge mistake and missed an opportunity to prevent that brain tumor. If you haven’t lost faith in small hospitals before now, this is definitely something to give pause.
My job has been leaving me feeling less than satisfied as of late. While I really need to take some measures to fix this, I’m not one to deal with multiple major life changes all at once so if there are any I can delay on resolving, I will. This problem is temporarily on hold and will be addressed when life calms down a little.
Finally, and this is in the major life change but very good department, my husband and I have added a new member to our household recently. My 16YO step-daughter decided to move in with us. We’re very happy that she’s here but it also presents many challenges that make me want to dust off this blog and discuss, such as the monetary impact of a single new household member.
So anyway, that’s my story. While I’m still very, very busy, I figure it’s time to come back here and discuss further how money is impacting my life. Stay tuned…
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Courtesy of Oprah, you can download Suze Orman’s Women and Money book for free. It looks like it’s a today-only deal so if you’re interested and like Suze books, go download. Below is the link to the Oprah message board thread with various download options.
http://oprah.com/community/thread/21066
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If you’ve been keeping up with the latest economic stimulus package, it looks like we’re going to be getting checks in the mail in a few very short months.
The legislation would deliver rebates — $600 for individuals, $1,200 for couples — to most taxpayers, plus an additional $300 per child. Individuals making up to $75,000 a year and couples earning up to $150,000 would get the full rebate, with those making more than that or too little to owe taxes getting smaller checks.
People who paid no income taxes but earned at least $3,000 — including through Social Security or veterans’ disability benefits — would get a $300 rebate.
Not that I’m happy about the country adding $168 billion to the deficit, but I’m certainly not going to turn down my own money. At this time, the plan is to promptly put the money into savings or a Roth IRA, which is totally against everything the stimulus package is about. Yeah, yeah, call me un-American.
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