July 24, 2006
DL at My Money Path brought up the topic of long term care which has been on my mind … well, on the periphery anyway, and that reminds me that I should take a long look at the materials I have at home to see if this is something I need to consider setting up for my parents in the near future or if this can wait another year or two. I also wonder if the Cancer Expense Protection is just too paranoid, I just recall overhearing people at the orientation saying they’d used it and were very happy to have it offered again (or was that just a planted conversation to lure in the gullible??):
Long-Term Care Program
Benefits from this program help pay the cost of nursing home care, convalescent care, or home health care for patients requiring special care due to illness, injury, or the natural aging process. This includes expenses not normally covered by Medicare, Medicaid, and most other medical insurance policies. Costs for coverage are based on your age at the time you first enroll and do not increase as you grow older. Parents and grandparents of eligible employees and their spouses or domestic partners also may purchase this insurance.
For more information, contact your benefits office. Brochures and enrollment kits are available. You can enroll in this program at anytime with proof of insurability.
Cancer Expense Protection Insurance
This insurance provides direct cash payments to the insured who is diagnosed with cancer. It also pays for several types oexpenses associated with the treatment of cancer. These benefits are paid regardless of any other insurance you may have.
For more information, contact your benefits office. Brochures and enrollment kits are available. You can enroll in this program at anytime.
I received my first check from Pinecone not long after my first survey: $5! That was very quick, actually.
Another quick-click sort of thing I’ve been doing is just clicking on emails sent from MyPoints. At 5 points per email it does seem to take forever to earn enough points to redeem anything, especially since I’d resolved to earn point solely through the emails and not spending any of my own money to earn points by shopping through their website and merchants. We’ll see how easy it is to redeem for gift cards once I actually get enough points!
I work a TON and make about 30-50% over my normal salary in overtime, which sounds like a whole lotta luxury but in reality is not really much at all. The overtime has been a total lifesaver in allowing me to superfund my financial “holes” like my personal expenses, cover many family expenses, pay down parental debt ($XXXX! *sigh*) and still add the desired amount to the growing emergency fund. I do feel like I’m sitting on a prickly cushion because I know that I depend on a much bigger paycheck than would normally be warranted and if that OT ever went away I’d be in a pretty uncomfortable situation. However, the larger paychecks mean that I also have to be aware of my tax bill.
My primary fixes for this situation are to:
1) Fund a supplemental retirement account: 403(b). As I posted earlier, I increased the contribution rather drastically a few months ago because I realized that by the end of this calendar year I will still only have lowered my tax liability by a couple thousand dollars. Can I afford to increase the contribution? I’m not sure that I can. I know that each additional $100 I contribute pretax works out to something like $60-80 actual dollars out of my regular check and that might just not work for me right now.
2) Transportation Subsidy: I should have done this before/earlier, but I’m going to have the University take out $100 per month before taxes for my train ticket, with the remaining cost of the ticket post-tax. My office reimburses for the train tickets so the entire cost will still be nothing for me but reduce my tax liability $100/month. That’s good but since I waited so long it’ll only be effective for Aug or Sept-Dec of 2006.
The second solution is unique to my office because most other offices do not reimburse for transportation expenses – this office does that because it pays for parking for driving employees so the “equivalent” benefit for the non-drivers would be having their train ticket paid for. Our accountant doesn’t like it but I am NOT against this one bit.
I can’t think of any other solutions that won’t reduce my take-home pay right now – and I really can’t afford to reduce it anyway. How do other people reduce their tax liability – legally, of course?
July 21, 2006
Out for a few days indulging myself at Comic-Con!!!
Day One Total Costs:
45 – gas
15 – print – for me? for BoyDucky?
60 – Xmas gift for friend
17 – pizza for all (4)
———
137
Yikes! Ok, at least food and parking is going to be split 4 ways: I paid for dinner tonight and will pay my share of parking on Saturday. Each of the three siblings each take a day as well for each of the 4 days we go which makes ten dollar parking much more reasonable for all.
July 17, 2006
I’ve never been very good at the Zen mentality. In fact, I’m an obsessive obsessive. So when I’ve seemingly achieved balance or established a system, the very first thing I do is poke holes in the whole thing or find new problems to obsess over. At the very least, when I’m anticipating change, I dream up all sorts of disastrous scenarios. A sort of negativity-warding, you know, like reverse psychology on the universe at large, even though it just sounds like self induced migraines and ulcers. Naturally, when I last talked about my work situation (where’s my raise/promotion?!?), I had imagined all kinds of terrible possibilities that would unfold instead of the best-case scenario. (In case you’re wondering, I try not to have one in mind. Just a rough idea of what would be nice, hypothetically speaking.) Of all the problems I had dreamed up, I hadn’t expected THIS.
Sunday nights we receive an emailed version of our paystub that will be deposited the coming Wednesday. This generally reminds me that we’re getting paid this week and gets me all riled up about which bills should be scheduled and when. This is my need to obsess over minutiae; I can’t just let the Rube Goldbergian construct run itself.
I knew that there was some issue with the processing of timecards because the first two days of the pay period were the last two days of the fiscal year. Our payroll coordinator couldn’t explain what ramifications this would have but I didn’t think anything of it. Last night, I found that this Wednesday’s paycheck shall have in it, two sets of regular time and overtime, at two different rates!
Apart from adding up to an astronomically high number of hours in two weeks (209!), it shows that two days worth were paid at my normal rate and the others were haphazardly paid at [a paltry] 5% more (50 cents anyone?) And none of the hours quite fit the calculated totals I had online — 2.5 hours of overtime and 21.5 hours of regular time in two days? 46.5 hours of overtime? 118 hours of regular time? In eight days??
It just doesn’t really quite make sense. I’m definitely not going to just hold on to it and hope that they never come after me for it; I would not want to take that large a hit further down the road as it’s rather a substantial amount. But who would have thought that I’d get blindsided because of an increase?
By the way, speaking of being blindsided by an increase, if that IS my raise? 5%? They’d better be kidding. After 6 months of newbie service I got a 6% raise, after another 8-10 months of ridiculously dedicated work I’d better be getting a higher raise than that!
July 15, 2006
So I have my own car, which I bought in my pre-Fatwallet/PF Blogging days. I have to say that though the buying process was not as bad an experience as it could have been, I definitely could have done better for myself. Don’t get me wrong, she’s a great car, with great gas mileage and she will be kept forever, but I still could have struck a better bargain, gotten a used car for much less money against my parents’ wishes, or not fallen for a couple of the finance department’s little “deals.”
Older and wiser, I had my chance to do better, though not for myself, last year when the family/Sibling needed a new car, preferably a new truck. As the person in the family with no debt to her name and excellent credit to boot, I was asked to consider financing the truck in my name to get the lowest rate possible.
I was hesitant for a few reasons: this was another chunk of debt.
This was asking me to trust Sibling to get his act together and make the payments.
This was asking Sibling to get it together, and be responsible FOR A LONG TIME.
This was making myself vulnerable to Sibling’s irresponsible ways for at least 4-5 years.
This was putting my hard-earned credit at risk.
Frankly, I didn’t think it was a good idea. But the primary reason I caved was because I knew how to play the Fax attack game, I knew I could be more aggressive than the rest of my fam, I couldn’t bear the thought of them going out and getting scammed by unscrupulous car salesmen and because if I didn’t do it, my parents would be the ones to shoulder the burden of collecting from Sibling. And I’ve learned that it’s far easier for Sibling not to follow through on promises to my parents than to me.
So I caved. Not without stipulating that this chance was his last chance to do right by me. Not without emphasizing that any missed payment sans communication regarding the situation that caused the missed payment would immediately force me to confiscate the keys and sell the truck I didn’t want, need or couldn’t afford. And certainly not without clearing stating that until the truck was paid in full, I would treat it as a lease to him. So long as he made his payments, he would have use of a car. This burden, I realized, could be an opportunity to improve the strained relationship between myself and Sibling’s spendthrift, careless ways. Or it could be a terrible mistake.
Still, I caved.
The rate offered through the dealership was pretty unbeatable, considering my relatively short credit history: 1.9% APR for 4 years. My credit union that financed my original loan could not match it. Month by month, Sibling managed to pay in full. Month after month, I started letting myself hope a little more than this could possibly last.
Last month, there was a period of radio silence from Sibling, lasting about 2 weeks. I panicked. Although I normally have a small surplus of cash intended for misc. bills and extra savings, my increased 403(b) contributions had just taken effect – I had no extra money to cover the $400 payment he’d been making, not after he’d borrowed a couple hundred to pay Dad immediately rather than driving 2 hours to make a cash delivery. I got very upset that he’d reneged on his promise to come through by Monday and was fuming at myself for trusting him by Wednesday. Things turned out ok by the end of the week, though, as Dad drove down to his apartment to find that he hadn’t returned anyone’s calls because he was sick and didn’t feel up to talking.
Amidst this stress, a train friend wondered why I didn’t just refinance the truck in Sibling’s name to get it off my credit. My reasons at the time were that his credit was so bad, the interest rate was sure to go through the roof and he would not be able to make those payments, and that for him to follow through on this loan was very important to reestablishing any amount of trust in him.
Having said that though, I have to wonder how long this peace will last, and if it does, how I’m going to transfer the truck to him. Since he’s making all the payments, including repaying the down payment my parents put down, he’s going to “own” the truck when it’s paid off. But legally, I’m not sure if I can just transfer ownership without any money changing hands? Would that be considered a gift that may be taxed as a gift worth more than the 10 or 11k that is allowed per year tax free? Would it be wise to refinance it in his name towards the end of the loan simply to have the title issued to him by loan’s end?
I realized after my first day of working from home (a perk I get occasionally after having to work weekends in addition to my usual 14 hour days) that this could actually potentially cost more than its worth (a few extra hours of sleep, no commute, 3-day weekend feeling).
The costs add up quickly because you figure, I’m home, I can lunch with friends who are in town, get work done, and not have to be in the office! What you don’t realize is that you spend more time on your cell or home phone rather mindlessly, you have to run the a/c during the day (still ridiculously 99-101 degrees), and you’re even more tempted to eat out.
I’ve been trying to combat all these little financial drains, or at least be mindful of them. I’m not sure that yesterday was an unqualified success:
Phone call to cheer up depressed friend (2 hours, $0 for a local call)
Several text messages trying to coordinate lunch (0.50)
Short lunch with a good friend whom I’ve not caught up with in forever ($12)
(almost) filled up my tank- this one stings more because I normally commute via train, and I only drive on the weekend. My parents use the car during the week ($35!!)
I packed a couple of Luna Bars and a bottle of water so we wouldn’t feel compelled to pay exhorbitant prices at the bookstore’s cafe for a drink or a snack (free)
4 hours in an air conditioned bookstore working/reading (free)
Ross, need to find a new wallet for under $10 as my old one is getting too shabby and will have to be presentable for October’s work trip, but couldn’t find one – (0)
found a shirt instead – (8.63)
The gas money I might have spent anyway as I usually fill up when I get the car and it’s empty, but having the freedom to wander cost me an extra 20 dollars I wouldn’t have been able to spend were I in the office. On the other hand, for getting to spend an hour with my friend, and a nice shirt that can be worn professionally which my wardrobe seriously lacks, 20 bucks isn’t SO bad….
Of course, this wouldn’t be at all applicable for someone who contemplated seriously working from home because I don’t have to do anything but lug my laptop home, use the readily available internet, or can abscond to Borders for the aforementioned free a/c and comfortable feeling of having people around.