Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Who pays, the boyfriend of the girlfriend?

I have a question I thought I would ask people who are concerned about financial issues and you are a female. My girlfriend, who I have been with for about 1 and a half years, always thinks I should pay for pretty much everything we do. She is a student in law school and currently does not have a job or internship that is paying her. I work full time, making a decent salary, and also go to grad school but part time. Almost every other week we will go out for dinner and I pay. This is even for when we meet up at a Starbucks for a drink or go to a not so fancy restaurant. I have not really been in a relationship before, so this is all new to me, but my girlfriend was once in a 2 year relationship. There have been times when we would go out to eat with her friends and they would pick some fancy place and I would have to spend more than normal. For example, one time when her cousin took us out they paid for dinner and I paid for the drinks. I thought my girlfriend would have covered such costs, since was her plans with her cousin. Then more recently we went to her best friend's birthday dinner and after splitting the bill I had to pay $100 for the both of us and then at the lounge for drinks I had to pay $50. Thus $150 went in one night. I am pretty frugal and try to save as much as I can. Unlike most of our friends around our age (23 years old), I have my own house, two cars that are paid off (they are nothing fancy like a BMW, but 1 of them is pretty nice), and with a house comes rest of the bills (utility, mortgage, basic cable/internet, etc). As far as gifts/presents we have spent an equal amount overall.

My girlfriend seems to think that I am always supposed to be paying for us when we out. Out of our relationship she has maybe covered the bill for dinner about 3 times, and has on occasion paid for things like drinks at Starbucks. She says all of her friend's boyfriends always pay for themselves and their girlfriend. Also none of her friend's boyfriend's have a house or any other costs, since they still live with their parents. Plus some of her friends if they are out of school do have a job and if they are in school most have a paid internship.

Every 3 months we have this kind of talk and we end up arguing over it. What is your take on the whole perspective? Don't get me wrong, I buy her nice jewelry, take her to nice restaurants, etc. Some people have told me that everything should be split until you guys are engaged/married and then everything is pretty much being shared. Relationships, don't always last and I know that is a risk of having a relationship, but I also don't want to spend my money unnecessarily.

Mail In Rebates

So yesterday I received an $80 rebate check for some items I purchased back in early January from Linens-N-Things. They had several Black & Decker items for $10 after rebate and being a new home owner, I figured I could actually use the products that were on sale. This was one of the fastest turnovers I have had for a mail in rebate. This rebate did not have any electronic filing process involved, which was great that I got my rebate so fast!

I know a lot of people are not bent about purchasing items that offer a mail in rebate, since majority of the times you do not get a rebate back. The processing center "accidentally" messes up and with time, one will forget about that paper they mailed in. I have a process that I use for mail in rebates, which may help others as well. Before I send any information related to the rebate, I photocopy everything (the receipt, the rebate form, the UPC, whatever is requested). If I made more than one photocopy that is related to a particular rebate, I staple all of the papers together. Then at the top of the first page, I mark the date when I mailed the rebate. I have a filing cabinet with a folder just for rebate. The photocopies are sorted by the date I have sent the forms out. Each month I go back and look over what outstanding rebates I have not received and if it has been over 8-10 weeks (the normal rebate wait period listed on most forms) I pull the photocopies out. Eventually I make a call to the processing center and find out what is going on. I notate on the photocopies, who I spoke with and when I spoke to them. Once I receive a rebate I will shred the photocopies that pertain to the rebate. If I didn't have to send in the original receipt, I keep that. This process has worked well for me so far and hopefully someone else can benefit from it as well. The key is to organize your information.

I was thinking about digitizing this process and instead of having photocopies I could scan everything into a pdf file. The problem with this idea is that if I had to call a rebate processing center over a rebate in question, they normally ask for copies of the forms submitted or at times they may ask for an original, which is rare, but possible. I am still contemplating this idea, especially since it would save cabinet space and such.

Tuesday, February 27, 2007

AAA - They Will Reimburse Me

This morning I faxed over a copy of my receipt to AAA that was related to the blown fuse problem. About 4 hours later I called AAA's member service's line and spoke to Annette, who said AAA will reimburse me for the expenses related to the incident. In the next 8-10 days I should receive my check.

Picked up the Car, Dropped Off Another

Last night I picked up my Toyota from the mechanic's. I had them check the breaks since the car was already there and the last time I was at the Toyota/Lexus dealer for an oil change they said I needed to get my front brakes/rotors replaced. What a bunch of BS since my mechanic who I trust more said the breaks will last me another year without any problems. I gotta admit my mechanic is pretty good, he has often given honest advice, which in turn has saved me money. Granted if he wanted to make a quick buck he could have told me that my breaks do in fact need to be replaced. He charged me $24.50 to get them checked, saving me a few hundred that the Toyota/Lexus dealer wanted. Not a bad deal.

I also got the bill for all of the battery related issues due to the stupidity of the tow truck driver who AAA sent, which came to $80.60. This morning I spoke to Annette, a rep for AAA, who advised me to fax her the bill and upon her review she will send a check to reimburse me. I have faxed her the receipt, but will probably call her later today to get an update and to verify she received the fax, even though I have a fax receipt as well.

I forgot to say this earlier, but yes I know not to let my battery drain. A lesson learned I guess.

Since I went to pick up the car by myself I figured it would be a good chance to drop off my Honda to get the oil changed and to get the breaks checked as well. Around November my mechanic said that I should come back when I get time in the next month or so to get my breaks replaced, thus I have dropped that vehicle off for him to perform the required work.

Monday, February 26, 2007

Brick & Mortar Bank vs. Online Banks for Checking Accounts

Recently with the launch of ING's "Electric Orange" checking account I have started using this service more so rather than my checking account with Bank of America (BoA). One thing I disliked about BoA is that when the company bought out or merged (I forgot which one it was) with MBNA Bank, the billpay system on the site changed. This forced some of my payments to be send a day or 2 in advance when I didn't have enough funds in the account. My BoA checking account doesn't offer any interest, thus I normally transfer money over to an account at an online bank, who is offering a high interest rate. I eventually drilled down the BoA billpay system, but still did not like it too much. To protect myself from overdraft fees I opened a savings account just to play it safe and only keep the minimum amount required in it to avoid fees. I like that BoA has a lot of ATM locations, which are near almost all of the major areas I am in. After getting used to ING's checking account, I began to use it more and more. I just started using it last week and I am still testing the waters, but overall everything seems to be perfect. Billpay payments are sent on time. ING has a network of ATM's in many convenient locations as well. The only drawback of ING's checking account is that they do not offer any paper checks or allow you to print paper checks. To combat this I will probably keep my BoA checking account, but I hardly write any checks. I like to have paper checks as a trail for various payments or donations. Again I hardly use paper checks. I am going to probably close the savings account I have at BoA, since I hardly use it for the billpay service now. I must admit, I am getting hooked onto using ING's Electric Orange checking account. The best part is that ING offers a decent interest rate even for their checking accounts.

Tuition Reimbursement

So my employer provides tuition reimbursement, but they do not pay the employee back until the company's HR dept receives a copy of the employee's transcript. For this Spring semester I had $2,293.00 due. Yes, I know it looks like a bargain for grad school, which is partially due to the fact that I am going to a state university as well as only taking 2 classes a semester. I made the payment and paid it off. I was thinking maybe I should use a 0% credit card BT offer, but I didn't go that route. In the end I can not wait to get reimbursed.

AAA - Is it worth having?

My parents are AAA Platinum Road Service members. Pretty much for $50 a year (my mom got added for free) their membership includes up to 4 calls, which includes towing (I think within a max of a 50 mile radius) , jump starts, etc. About a week and a half ago there was a snow/ice storm around where I live. I normally drive my older car, which is my daily commuter/beater car. When the roads are slick or when they are covered with salt I avoid driving my newer car, just because I guess I am obsessed with keeping my car clean. A haven't driven or even turned the car on for the past 9 days. Last Thursday I was about to take my newer car out for a drive to my parent's place. I went to disarm the alarm via the remote and I didn't hear the normal beeps that I usually hear when arming/disarming the alarm. The doors didn't unlock, so I went to manually unlock the door, which is when I was thinking man not the battery! I went to start the car and it didn't have enough juice to even start the car. I ended up calling AAA and they sent over this guy to jump start my car. This tow truck driver was very young, maybe my age or even younger. I was surprised to even see that he could drive a fairly large tow truck. Anyways though he got out his cable to jump start my car. He connected the cable to my vehicle, but then I saw him fumbling with the cables when he was connecting them to this box on the side of his truck. What do you know? This guy mixed up the positive and negative cables, and when he went to start my car it blew the fuse for the alternator. The driver did not have any fuses with him, nor did any of the spare fuses that came with the vehicle match the blown fuse. It was around 10pm, thus no shops or stores that sell a fuse would even be open. The driver gave me his cell phone number and said he could stop by the next day whenever I was free. On Friday morning I called the driver and told him that I would be free around 4pm. I went home and waited till 4:30. Since by this time I have not heard back from the driver I called him and asked about his whereabouts. He said he was at a sop picking up the fuse and will be on his way. I waited till 5:55 and have not heard back from the driver, so I call him but got his voice mail. At that time I left a message for him. Around 6:00 the driver calls me back and says he will be over around 7. I had some errands to run, so I went out to do those but was back around 6:45. It was now 7:20 and yet the driver was not here nor did he call me. I then started calling him, but he would not answer his cell phone. I repeatedly tried to call him and could not get through. By now I was fed up and I called AAA. I spoke to a rep named Pat, who was very helpful. I explained to her what has happened and that I am not happy with their service. She was willing to send out another truck, but I had other plans that evening, so I told her I would call back on Saturday. I also asked if I could get a credit for the first call from Thursday, so it won't effect my 4 free allowed calls. Pat put the request through. I woke up early Saturday morning and figured I would try replacing the fuse myself, thus I would not need the car to be towed to my local mechanic. I went to my local Toyota dealer and they did have the fuse, which was for $10.49 after taxes. I asked the rep at the parts counter if he knew how to replace the fuse. I could not get the blown fuse out, thus I had to ask. The rep said that supposedly the fuse is held down by a bolt. He was friendly enough to print out some schematics, which I tried to use to assist me. The funny thing is a guy at the parts counter who gave the rep the fuse, sarcastically said "did he mix the cable when jump starting his car". I told the rep at the counter what happened and they surely guessed right. I went back to the service area to ask a mechanic if such a job was easy. The first young mechanic, who was probably also in his early 20's said it shouldn't be anything too hard, but he is not too sure since these fuses hardly blow, thus he has never had to replace one. This mechanic took my to talk to another mechanic, but this mechanic wasn't helpful at all. He was like if you have skills you can change the fuse. I went home and went to try to change the fuse. I got the covers around the fuse holder off and was able to see where the bolt holding in the fuse is. Unfortunately I could not pull the fuse cover out much, thus I could not get to the bolt. I tried tugging for a bit, but did not want to continue this, since I didn't want to accidentally damage or loosen a wire. I gave in and called AAA for a tow truck. This driver was wonderful. He was very nice and he surely knew what he was doing. He transported my car safely on his flat bed tow truck and dropped it off at the mechanic who I go to. I told my girlfriend about what happened and she told me that I should complain to AAA and ask them to cover the bill for fixing the fuse problem. She is a law student, so she is very upfront with a lot of things, which is great. I took her advice and contacted AAA. Melody, the rep who I spoke with added this request to my original complaint and asked for my mechanics address and phone number, which I provided. She said that most likely AAA will cover the bill in such a case, since the blown fuse was caused at their fault. The car is in the shop and hopefully AAA will call me today or tomorrow. If not, I will surely call them.


Previously I had a problem where my sister's car, which was parked in the student lot of the university she attends, was having a problem where the check engine light was on and the speedometer was not working properly. She drives a Honda Civic. My dad and I went check the car out and then we called AAA. It took AAA about 5 hours before they came on site. This driver and his assistant were total idiots. They looked as if they were 2 of The Three Stooges. My dad and I followed the tow truck on the beltway. The truck was probably driving at 40mph and was emitting strong exhaust fumes. With traffic and the storm, we lost site of the tow truck. My dad and I continued and we reached the mechanic's shop where the car to be dropped off. We get there waited about 30 mins and the tow truck still had not arrived. I called AAA, the located the driver and told us he ran out of gas about 8 miles down the road from the shop. By this time it is nearly midnight and I was frustrated. AAA sent out another tow truck to pick up the car. This tow truck driver who came for the 2nd time, was great and got our car to the shop without any problems.

Overall these have been my past two experiences with AAA during the past 6 months. Now I have been starting to wonder if the membership is even worth having? It came in handy once about 3 years ago when my sister's car's muffler fell off and was dragging on the road. AAA came out to DC and towed the vehicle to our mechanic's shop. One out three calls has gone well. Our insurance (Erie) does offer road side assistance reimbursement, so I am going to get more info on it and see if that would be a better option. Supposedly though their service will reimburse you for any towing related expenses. I'm not too sure if that includes if I need to call a tow truck to have a flat tire changed (for when I am lazy/tired) or for a jump start. What do others do when they are in a similar situation? Do you guys belong to AAA or have any roadside assistance plan through your insurance company? I know more expensive cars such as Lexus, BMW, Acura, etc offer road side assistance for free during the first few years of vehicle ownership, but being cheap I doubt I would buy any of those cars at the moment, plus a $30k will cost more than a $50 annual membership.

Favorite sites for finding deals

I am a big fan of getting a good deal on items and plus if I buy something that is on sale or for a price lower than normal then I don't feel as bad for spending my money. My favorite web sites that I check piratically everyday are Fat Wallet and Tech Bargains. Both sites are updated throughout the day with various deals that are going on. Currently I am not in the market to make any specific purchases, but if I come across something that I know I need or will need, then I will go ahead and purchase an item I found through one of the mentioned web sites.

Sunday, February 25, 2007

Introduction

Hello. Being in the IT industry I probably should have probably started this blog with a post titled "Hello World", but I figured I wouldn't think too much about anything work related when I am not at work. I am a male in my early 20's who has been working full time in the IT industry since graduating with a BS degree roughly 2 years ago. The fall semester right after my graduation I was accepted into a local state university's MBA program, thus I have been attending grad school part time.

So this blog is meant to be for sharing and feedback of any financial related material. I guess I will start by giving some financial background about myself. As mentioned earlier, I work full time in the IT industry. The salary I earn at this job is definitely good, especially for when I have only been with this company for a few months. An added benefit of my employer is the great benefits that they offer their employees. Granted my first full time job after graduation did not pay too well, but it opened doors for me, which till this day I greatly appreciate. Due to my first full time job not paying as well as I wanted, I started working part time at a local company's NOC. This was mainly an evening/weekend job. Once I got my current full time job, I still kept my part time job, but strictly only for extra income by working a few hours over the weekend. Honestly the part time job is something that looks good on my resume as well as it is a job that is not too stressful or busy. An added benefit of the part time job is that I have a lot of time to work on my grad school work. Back to some financial information. I am a big fan of "rate chasing" when it comes to keeping my money in a bank. Before working full time I started a Roth IRA account since I was earning income from a paid part time internship. Overall I never really got into trading stocks. I have a few stocks, but their overall value is less than a $1000. As one of the benefits of working with my current employer I am funding my 401k account, as well as earning the employer match. Last year I was in the market for a house and ending up negotiating a wonderful deal on the house that I now live in. One bad part was that I did not have my current full time job at the time when I was in the market to buy a house, thus the interest rate on one of my two mortgages is not the best rate. I am hoping to eventually refinance my mortgage. By reading various forums I did also participate in another financial game, which is the 0% credit card game, where you can take out a certain amount of your available credit and put the amount into a high interest rate bank account. This wasn't a bad game, since I was making a few hundred dollars a month. On my spare time I also troubleshoot and fix computers for friends, family, or people who I have been referred too. I have made a decent amount from this small side business, which is nice. It's a job I enjoy and can do when I have time, plus I have earned a decent income from it. I am greatly interested in cars and have always been into them. Unlike my friends I did not blow my money on a fancy/sporty new car. I kept my car at the time, which I now use as a daily driver/beater (even though I keep it in good condition) and I also have a fairly new coupe, which is not anything fancy. I bought it used and ended up getting a good deal on it. Overall this is pretty much where I stand in terms of my own personal finance. I always am on the lookout to save money and cut any of my expenses. It is in a way a hobby of mines, which also helps my personal finances. Don't get me wrong though I do like to enjoy my money once in a while and I feel that everyone should enjoy some of their hard earned money.

So I gave some information on what my financial situation is like and yes I know it was not specific, but I hope to hear some input/feedback from others as well as learn more ways to save money and even make money. Again thanks for visiting my blog and I hope it soon can be a blog that benefits all of my readers.