Money and education often go hand in hand, and it all starts with the necessary building blocks from elementary school. At Inspirus Credit Union, it’s all about caring about students in the community. RewardExpert spoke with Collin Campbell, vice president of strategic initiatives, and Morgan Cole, public relations specialist, about what makes their credit union stand out from the rest and why after more than 80 years it’s still going strong.
When it comes to investing, many people incorrectly believe that you need to have a lot of time and a lot of money to be successful. In fact, you can get started on your road to financial freedom by investing whatever you have, thanks to companies like Acorns.
RewardExpert spoke with Manning Field, chief commercial officer of Acorns, which is a mobile investment platform that helps anyone and everyone invest their money. “We firmly believe that anyone can grow wealth,” according to Field.
The credit card market is very competitive. Card issuers are in heavy competition for your business. As a result, credit card companies are quick to offer perks to win consumers over.
However, not all perks are created equal. In fact, consumers need to take certain steps to ensure those perks don’t turn into expensive financial headaches that cause damage to one’s financial life for years to come.
Over the past two years more than 25 million Americans started or were running new businesses in an economy that continues to show moderately healthy growth, according to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) 2016 United States Report released by Babson College.
What if you could manage key aspects of your business while lying on the beach? Create schedules or finalize payroll while sipping an exotic beverage, or even get the low down on how the weather will impact your scheduling back home while watching the sunset?
If any of that sounds good to you then Deputy might just be up your alley. It is software designed to streamline scheduling and workforce management. Companies like Amazon, Nike, and McDonald’s are already using Deputy, and so is NASA, along with local mom-and-pop stores looking to get the most out of their money and time.
Not only is the Discover it card great for earning cash back, but it’s also an excellent tool for paying down existing debt due to its 18-month balance transfer offer. With this special financing, you’ll get 0% APR for a year and a half. Plus, you’ll earn cashback rewards on every purchase you make.
The icing on the cake is that this card is absolutely free. You’ll never have to pay an annual fee. Let’s take a closer look at what this card has to offer.
In the wild world of finances, it can be tough to get access to credit. For students who are starting out and having a hard time getting their first credit card, it’s hard to know where to turn. A company called Deserve helps make credit access possible.
Managing your credit cards can be time consuming, especially if you are in debt. There are a host of moving parts with credit cards, from the interest rate to the due date and annual fees. It can be easy to stumble and miss a payment or be tempted to take out a cash advance in a pinch.
Let’s face it, paying bills is not a fun activity, as you part with your hard-earned money. Even with the convenience of online bill pay, it still seems like a tedious process and takes time – not to mention having to remember each bill, each online password, each due date, etc. But the days of stressful bill-paying are over.
A company called doxo has made this process simple by allowing users to pay each of their bills in one convenient place, the doxo platform. According to VP of Marketing and Consumer Services for doxo, Jim Kreyenhagen, “doxo is the first crowd-sourced, customer-centered bill pay solution built around the consumer, and it’s already changing the way people manage their bills.”
Buying a home is one of the most important financial and personal decisions a person will ever make. Naturally, most buyers have lots of questions about mortgages, interest rates, taxes, down payments and more. A company called Mr. Cooper is aiming to answer those questions, working to make the home loan process simpler by putting the focus back on customers.
Closing down a credit card will usually hurt your credit score, especially if you’ve had the credit card open for many years. If you no longer want to use a particular credit card, you don’t have to close it down. There are other options out there to prevent you from using the card and accumulating high balances.
Let’s explore why it’s a bad idea to close down your credit card.
Finding your perfect home isn’t an easy task. It usually takes countless hours of research, time viewing homes, looking up listing agents, etc. Homesnap is an app that simplifies the process by providing accurate, real-time data on over 90 million homes in over 100 markets, representing about 750,000 agents nationwide.
With the New Year, now is a great time for consumers and businesses to think about protecting their financial data. North Carolina-based SAS is one of the analytics companies that businesses turn to, to stay ahead of fraud and security threats. Banking Fraud Solutions Manager at SAS, Ian Holmes, spoke to RewardExpert about some of his company’s products that help keep banks, merchants and consumers safe.
It’s that time of year where everyone is talking about the goals they plan to set for the new year. There’s a lot of talk about getting to the gym more and eating less junk food
While all this is well and good there is a three-digit number that may be getting sadly ignored. Not your weight. Your credit score. While you are going to want to keep that number on the scale low you are going to want to get that credit score to gain as much as possible.
If you’re looking to boost your financial returns and make more money, are interested in alternative investments and would like quick access to your newfound cash, consider peer-to-peer lending. One of the fastest growing companies in Europe’s peer-to-peer lending industry is Latvia-based TWINO.
It’s no secret that the invention of credit cards completely revolutionized the shopping experience. Now the payment experience is under a revolution of its own. Services such as Apple Pay allow shoppers to save their credit information on their iPhone and use it a payment method. You’ll find that with the availability of services such as Apple Pay and the iCloud keychain, the only thing anyone needs to shop is an iPhone.
Republicans accomplished a feat this past week that had eluded them for more than three decades—a sweeping overhaul of the U.S. tax system. Passed through the Senate and House on party lines, and celebrated outside the White House by Republican legislators and the president, the bill is less popular with the American public. According to a recent CNN poll, only 33 percent favor the GOP’s proposed tax code.
On the other hand, an earlier survey by Paychex, a payroll and HR solutions company, found that tax reform has a more favorable rating among the small businesses it was intended to stimulate. RewardExpert spoke with Mike Trabold, Paychex’s Director of Compliance Risk, about the survey results.
Healthcare in the U.S. is becoming increasingly expensive. According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, healthcare spending grew nearly 6 percent in 2015, reaching $3.2 trillion or $9,990 per person. In the next year alone, health insurance premiums are increasing by 50 percent or more for many consumers. Deductibles and out-of-pocket annual maximums are also growing, leaving more patients footing the bill for the majority of their medical expenses in any given year.
If you’re in credit card debt, you are probably all too familiar with how interest works. Any time you leave a balance on a credit card, the credit card issuer charges interest. The interest rate on credit cards can be as high as 15%, so a credit card balance of $500 can easily turn into $1,000 or even higher over time. Before you know it, the debt balance is so high that achieving debt-free status can seem hopeless.
Have you ever had to pay a fee to get your own money from an ATM? If so, you’re not alone. Nor are you in the minority if your bank has ever socked you with an unexpected overdraft fee. In fact, according to CNNMoney, in 2016, America’s three biggest banks alone raked in more than $6.4 billion dollars in these fees from their customers. Despite public outcry, there’s little anyone can do about it, either—except take their business to a more caring financial institution like Alliant Credit Union.
