US Finance World

Im fed up with my local bank. They close at 6pm, I usually work til 6pm.

So Im looking for an online checking account that I could use as my wife and Is primary checking account. Id prefer to have something with no fees and some sort of mobile deposit option. Heres the options Ive researched so far

Online Checking Account Options

*List of online checking accounts and their fees, advantages and disadvantages. Assumes a $1,500 daily balance, no direct deposit.

My Thoughts

• Ally No ATM fees is awesome. Rate is decent. No overdraft fee with a linked savings account, nice.
• BankSimple Looks really sweet, already signed up for waiting list
• Citibank Pass
• E*Trade Pass
• Everbank No ATMs where I live. $8.95 fee unless
• ING Direct Electric Checking Lots of ATMs but no refunds on non-partner ATMs is a bummer
• Nationwide Bank 3K to avoid $10 fee. No thanks.
• PerkStreet Way too many restrictions for me. Doesnt seem worth the hassle.
• USAA Great customer service, nice mobile options for iPhone/Android
• Schwabb Billpay restrictions no cool.

Any recommendations?

We all know it’s expensive to use your debit card abroad, but why should it be? And it isn’t expensive to everyone. The changes to its Gold current account in January 2011 have saved Norwich & Peterborough Building Society (N&P) customers thousands of pounds in overseas debit card transaction fees and charges over the last 12 months – and won N&P “Best Debit Card For Use Abroad” in the prestigious Moneynet 2012 Awards – the building society announced today. Because of fees holiday transactions can prove to be a bit of a bonus day for UK banks building societies. Many high street banks and UK money providers are charging substantial fees for overseas transactions and it has been discovered are hiding details of those fees on their websites and statements – thus not making it clear.

One customer, who used their debit card to withdraw cash while travelling extensively abroad in 2011 saved themselves a whopping £504! If t Read more…

Mar 19, ’12 8:55 PM Author Tony Robinson OBE Categories Business Funding, Business Ideas, Business Marketing, Business Startup, Finance, Freelancer, Getting Things Done, , SOHO/SMB/SME/Micro, Self-employed, Small Business / SOHO, Start-Up, be successful, do a reality check, market and sell, plan your business, start-up in business, start-up in business

Entrepreneur Conferences need a business health warning. November and March are always the biggest months for Enterprise and Entrepreneurship conferences. Last week, I was lucky enough to be in Liverpool for the Global Entrepreneurship Congress. Last year it was in Dubai and next year its in Rio de Janeiro so we were lucky to have it in the UK. Liverpool is awesome, as is the Beatles Story, but Im afraid the Congress didnt float my boat. H

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It is increasingly important for small business owners to use technology to brand not only their businesses, but also themselves so they can confidently step into their business leadership roles. It can be challenging to organize all of this in a way that simultaneously serves your customers and preserves your sanity. But you can do it if you have laser sharp focus on who your customers are, on exactly what they want from you, and on what you are trying to achieve with your business.

I find it helpful to see how other entrepreneurs handle Twitter, and I am constantly sifting through ideas to see what works and what doesnt work (so you dont have to ). Over the years, Ive made many changes to how I negotiate Twitter. I will continue to do so, because my business is constantly evolving. For now, I have settled on a particular system and I thought Id share it with you in case it provides you with useful ideas and inspiration.

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Make your spare room make you money: get a lodger!

Taking in a lodger may seem pretty radical, but there are obvious advantages for both landlord and tenant. For the landlord, renting out a spare room can help you earn some extra money, while the lodger has a better chance of being offered good quality accommodation because the landlord is living there too.

Demand from tenants is strong as would-be first-time buyers are being forced into delaying property purchases. These days, lodgers are often professionals who want a decent place to live, but simply can’t afford to buy themselves.

And foreign language students often prefer to lodge with a family rather than rent – they get the benefit of family life when far from home, and the family can benefit from a housemate from a different culture. A Read more…

I recently received my Chase Freedom $200 bonus check for charging $500 ($508 to be exact) in 3 months, and deposited it right into my checking account.

If you have or will get the Freedom card, a new quarter of the year starts in April, and that means new rotation of Chase Freedom 5% bonus categories.

For April 1 June 30, you will get 5% cash back on grocery store and movie theater purchases, up to $1,500 in purchases.

Movie theaters are a pretty wear rewards category, in my opinion, but groceries? We all buy them and we typically use some form of credit/debit to pay for them. If you dont already have the American Express Blue Preferred card, the unchallenged best grocery rewards card at 6% cash back, then you wont be able to find better grocery cash back rewards.

Assuming you spend $500 per month on grocery store purchases from April through June, that equates to a cash back reward of $75 for those three months.

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There’s been a movement by the insurance industry to make insurance, whether life, disability or critical illness, easily to obtain. While the concept in great in the abstract, these efforts remind one of the old saying that you get what you pay for in life. Take the following two examples.

Guaranteed issue life insurance policies are life insurance policies aimed at providing access to insurance. You may have heard of this policy in television commercials where insurance is being offered to an older gentleman without the need for a physical or medical questionnaire.

Most guaranteed issue life insurance policies will also insure a holder even if they have pre-existing conditions (cancer, diabetes etc) which typically results in an insurance payout being denied (emphasis on the word “most”. Details vary from carrier to carrier). Premiums also will not increase. In ot

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Perhaps for as long as the federal government has reported which of its contracts have been awarded to small businesses, critics have charged that many of those contracts have actually gone to large companies — often very large companies.

Recently, the American Small Business League, perhaps the loudest of those critics, tried to outline the scope of diversion. The association issued a report that studied the 100 companies that won the most federal small-business contract dollars in 2011 and found that at least 72 of them either had too many employees or too much revenue to be  eligible for government assistance to small business. (S.B.A. size standards vary by industry and sector, but generally a company must have fewer than 500 employees or less than $7 million to be considered small.)

The federal government, the world’s largest buyer of goods and service, is obliged by law to try to direct 23 percent of its purchases to small businesses, though there are no penalties for failure. The

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