YES – IF you use your debit card as a credit card to pay the bill. Using your account’s bill pay service online is a fast, easy way to manage your bill payments, but you will not earn cash back on those payments.

NO – BUT it depends on the company who’s billing you. Some companies will let you pay bills online or over the phone with a credit card. When you use your PerkStreet Financial Visa Debit Card to pay your bill, you can earn cash back. You can check with Visa’s bill pay site to see what billers will accept your card for payment.

Here’s my personal example:

YES: My cell phone service is through Verizon Wireless. They offer me the option of paying on their site with a debit or credit card; they’re also listed on the Visa bill pay site as a vendor who accepts Visa for payments. I earn cash back every time I pay my cell phone bill. Woohoo!

KIND OF: I use RCN for cable and internet, which you may already know from my post on BillShrink’s blog today. They will take my card for payment, but I have to call them and they charge a convenience fee. I’m not going to pay a fee to earn cash back – that’s just silly.

NOPE: My student loan lenders will only take money directly out of my checking account. They are very happy to do so. Sigh.

Was this helpful? Have other questions we can answer on our blog? Let us know!

photo by Marco Belluci

Can I Earn Cash Back When I Pay Bills? is a post from: PerkStreet Blog

photo credit: _e.t

A company sponsored 401(k) can be a powerful retirement investment vehicle. But do you know many employees either choose not to participate or don’t contribute at least to the company match? This could be serious long-term money left on the table for retirement. I’m here to tell you three simple reasons you need to contribute to your 401(k):

1. Company Match

Most 401(k) plans have what is called a “company match.” What this means is your employer will match the amount you contribute in your 401(k), usually up to a certain limit. An example would be an employer match of 50% of your contribution up to 6%. What this means is if you contribute 6% of your salary to your 401(k) your employer will match 50% or half the amount you put in.

Why is this important? The company match is basically FREE MONEY. The company is giving it to you! Using our example, if you invest 6% then you will make a 50% return right off the bat for retirement. And this money gets to earn and grow for your retirement.

Think of it another way – Who hasn’t complained about how much they get paid? If you don’t contribute up to the company match then you are missing out on a bonus your employer is offering up to you.

Suggestion: Consider contributing at least up to the company match to maximize the bonus for retirement.

2. Money Contributed in Gross Dollars

When you contribute to your 401(k), the money taken out is from your gross income. This means it’s taken out pre-tax, lowering your taxable income base (read: you pay less taxes). Let me give you an example: Say you make $50,000 in salary a year. For simplicity’s sake we’ll say you get taxed on that entire amount. Now if you contribute 6% (a typical company match amount) your taxable income drops to $47,000. That’s $3000 you don’t have to pay taxes in right now! (Note: because a 401(k) is pre-tax dollars, you will get taxed on the money when you take it out at retirement. But the money will also have time to grow tax-free.)

Another way to look at it is you get to stretch your investing money further. Say you contribute $100 to your 401(k) and your tax bracket is 25% (I’m using easy numbers for example’s sake). Because the money is taken out pre-tax, it’s really only costing you $75 for a $100 investment. That’s pretty cool.

Recap: Money invested in a 401(k) is pre-tax and will help lower your taxable income.

3. Automatic Investing

Want to know a great way to make sure you always invest? Make it automatic! Automatic investing is an inherent feature of 401(k) plans. Every time you get paid a percentage of your paycheck goes to your 401(k) without you having to do anything. What happens to most people is they say they are going to invest for retirement but after bills and expenses and such there’s nothing left over to invest. The automatic investing feature of a 401(k) makes sure you will always contribute to your retirement.

Here are a few other benefits of automatic 401(k) contributions:

-Many company plans allow you to set up your account to increase the percentage you contribute every year. Year one you contribute 6%, year two 7%, and so on… Before you know it, you are putting in a nice chunk of change towards retirement!

- Since what you contribute is a percentage, when you get a raise, the dollar amount you put in goes up exponentially. As you make more money, the base of your retirement savings goes up.

- Some company plans offer re-balancing. When you set up your plan investments you set up what percentages you want invested in different plan funds. Over time, the overall percentages can get out of whack as certain funds do better. With re-balancing you can keep your investment choices in your desired percentage range. With re-balancing you get to keep your portfolio set up with the asset allocation you originally set up.

Recap: A 401(k) provides automatic investing for your retirement.

So you can see, there are some great reasons why you should be contributing to your 401(k)! If you aren’t putting money into your plan you can be leaving retirement money on the table. If you are contributing, you may not be putting enough in to maximize your company match.

Can you think of other reasons to contribute to a 401(k)?

Three Reasons You Must Contribute To Your 401(k) is a post from: PerkStreet Blog

photo credit: Triple Tri

If you’ve ever followed me on Twitter you’ve noticed my profile photo is me standing outside the glorious Neyland Stadium in Knoxville, Tennessee. I’m sporting my UT hat, and (you can’t see it) a UT sweatshirt.

There’s a great personal finance story behind that photo that I’ll get to in a minute.

But as you can tell I’ve got a passion for college football just like millions of other Americans. The question remains: how do you balance your passion for sports with the ups and downs of your personal finances?

Have no fear sports fans because I’m here to tell you it can be done. You can enjoy your team without going broke.

When Is It Okay to Spend on Sports?

It is never okay to splurge on any hobby or passion if you can’t afford it. You’ve got to have your budget and personal finances on the up and up first. As Dave Ramsey points out you need to start with the basics: food/water, shelter, clothing, and transportation. Then move on to your emergency fund and the rest of your saving categories.

When my wife and I decide to integrate a sports event into our budget we simply start saving up for it. It feels a lot better paying for tickets when we know we already have the money. No worrying about payments or credit card interest for this family.

How to Support Your Sports Team Without Bankrupting Your Home Team

If you’re the person with season tickets in the first row on the 50 yard line this post is simply not for you. You’ve got more money than I can imagine.

For the rest of us that can’t afford a $10,000 donation to a university each year, there are a couple of different strategies you can use to avoid paying through the nose while still getting to enjoy a game or two.

• Buy and Split Season Tickets

This is a strategy my wife and I used in 2008. She surprised me by wanting to take me to our first Tennessee football game. Since we live in Alabama and have to listen to their smack talk all year long we thought we’d go see the Vols play them in Knoxville.

Unfortunately tickets were running $200 to $400 per pair — and for terrible seats. We weren’t ready to pay that much.

Then I learned there are two different types of season tickets: renewable (you get the same seats each year) and non-renewable (your seats could change from year to year). While both season ticket types require a donation to the University the non-renewable donation was 50% less ($250). The total cost for 2 tickets to 7 home games was $880.

We hatched a plan.

We did some research on eBay and found that Florida at Tennessee tickets were going for upwards of $400. That was well over face value and would cover 45% of the cost of the tickets. If we sold the rest at face value we would at worst pay face value ($70 per ticket) for the Alabama game. That alone would save us $60 to $340 dollars based on what we were seeing tickets go for.

We ended up giving some tickets to family, selling a pair to a couple of friends, and eBaying the rest all successfully. We got to go to the game for about $25 per ticket — well below what we would have paid elsewhere.

It was a calculated risk and we planned ahead. It worked out really well!

• Buy Individual Tickets Close to Gameday

If you aren’t comfortable with taking a calculated risk with several hundred dollars just hop on the other side of the equation and buy some tickets from friends that are looking to split a season. At worst you can hop on eBay or StubHub to buy tickets. You obviously won’t make money off of this, but you can limit your financial risk by getting a set price.

• Enjoy Big Games from Home

One thing to know about college football tickets is that the while smaller games are usually still available directly from the University for face value, big games may end up costing you way more than just the cost of one ticket. Tennessee requires you to either buy a mini-pack of the big games or season tickets to get access to the really big games.

So you’re not comfortable paying $300 for a lower end zone ticket? No big deal. Just stay home. With all the technology available today staying home can be a better experience than being at the stadium.

Even if your game isn’t covered on any of the networks you can always Pay Per View it for $20 to $30. Invite 4 friends over and split the cost of the game (and the snacks) — everyone wins.

Keep Your Perspective… If You Can

Sure, everyone wins. Everyone, that is, except for Tennessee when Alabama came to town. We got rolled 29-9.

You know what took a little bit of the sting out of the loss? It was our first Neyland experience together and we didn’t pay through the nose to watch our team get beat.

That and a little bit of perspective… because it’s just a game, right?

3 Tips for a Frugal Football Season is a post from: PerkStreet Blog

PerkStreet customers are no strangers to spending smart. The difference is the cash back perks they get for making those smart decisions. So they can reward themselves with that super duper large extra hot four sugar with skim milk coffee, or a great new song by their favorite band, or whatever their hearts desire without having to dip into the rent fund to do it. From where I sit in PerkStreet customer land, those little things sure are adding up to a whole lot of awesome.

How about you? Are you ready to join us in PerkStreet Customer Land? We’d love to see you here.

Little Things Mean A Lot is a post from: PerkStreet Blog

A few weeks ago my wife and I had our first child, our little boy named Carter John. We’re both overjoyed at becoming first time parents, and we both agree that there’s nothing quite like welcoming a new life into the world. The overwhelming joy and happiness that comes along with being a parent can’t compare to anything I’ve ever known.

While becoming a parent has been a wonderful journey for us, it hasn’t been without it’s surprises. As any parent can tell you having a child isn’t all rainbows and unicorns. It does have its costs, some of which I hadn’t really anticipated.

Unexpected Financial Costs Of Having Children

My wife and I are probably above average when it comes to financial preparedness. We had anticipated quite a few costs associated with having a baby, which I wrote about in my post “What Expenses Should I Expect When Having A Child?“. In the post I talked about a lot of the expenses new parents can expect including baby furniture, diapers, baby clothing, formula, medical costs and the cost of child care.

While I think the post nailed a lot of the expenses to expect, what I didn’t anticipate for some of them was just how much they would be.

Diaper Costs

For example, I underestimated just how much diapers, wipes and other associated diaper products would cost us. Since day one our son has had quite the robust gastro-intestinal tract, filling his diapers in excess of 10-12 times per day some days. While I expected to be changing a lot of diapers – I didn’t expect to be changing quite as many as I have. In fact, we’ve already gone through a couple of packs of diapers, 2 packs of wipes and an entire tube of baby butt salve. In the end I think we’ll be spending a lot more on diaper care than we first realized.

Eating Out Costs

Another place that we knew we would be spending some money after the baby was born was in our eating out budget. As with diaper costs, however, we grossly underestimated just how much we would be spending. We didn’t realize how tired we would be, and how unmotivated we would be to start cooking right away. Because of that we’ve spent quite a bit on eating out. Thankfully we’ve been saved to a degree by friends and family who have pitched in to bring us several meals.

Lost Opportunity Costs

One cost I hadn’t anticipated was the lost opportunity cost because of the restrictions on your time. I don’t think I appreciated before just how much time it takes to care for an infant. Caring for a baby is a full time job, with constant feedings and diaper changes, and reduced sleep on top of that. It is extremely hard work!

Because you have less free time, it also means less time to devote to sideline income generating pursuits. For me that means less time for blogging, less time for graphic design and less time for researching new money making ventures.

The Financial Costs Are Worth It

So those are a few of the places where I was surprised by the financial impact of having a child. While the increased expenditure (and reduced income potential) haven’t been overwhelming, it has been enough to be noteworthy. If you’re thinking of having a child – be ready. You too will most likely have some unexpected costs that you’ll need to factor into your budget. As long as you’re flexible and are able to adapt, you’ll come out ahead in the end.

What are some other costs associated with having a baby that you were surprised by? Tell us in the comments!

Oh Baby! Financial Costs Associated With Having A Baby That Took Us By Surprise is a post from: PerkStreet Blog

In the flurry of wedding and honeymoon planning, many couples forget to plan for their financial future. According to a PayPal survey conducted last year, at least 10 percent of the couples surveyed said they have ended a relationship at least in part due to money. The survey also found that money causes more arguments than sex or any other issue.

I talked to Manisha Thakor, personal finance expert and co-author of Get Financially Naked: How to Talk Money with Your Honey, about how to improve finances and achieve matrimonial money bliss:

photo credit: Photos by Lina

1. Get Lovey-Dovey Over His & Her Paperwork
If the bride is changing her name, she’ll need to update her passport, Social Security card, driver’s license, and other documents. Thakor suggests doing this ASAP. “Early in your marriage is a great time to sit down and make a comprehensive list of all your assets, accounts, important papers, etc., – something both of you should do and share,” even if the bride is keeping her name. Start with the most important documents, then move on to routine items like magazine subscriptions and utility bills. Both newlyweds will also want to name new beneficiaries on their retirement plans in an effort to take control of finances.


2. Consider a (Financial) Three-Way
Some couples keep separate bank accounts, while others merge all their money. There’s also an intermediate option Thakor calls a “financial three-way,” which includes a separate bank account for each of you and one joint account, potentially requiring you to find a new bank. “I am increasingly seeing this as so many couples are marrying later in life and coming to marriages with income, assets, and habits that are fairly ingrained,” she explains. For whichever approach you choose, she says, communication is key.

Jennifer‘s note: my fiancé and I do this now. We have a joint account into which we put an equal percentage of our paychecks for household items and the occasional night out. That way no matter who makes what we’re both contributing equally, and I don’t have to feel guilty about splurging on a manicure when I have a little extra in my account.

3. Getting in the (IRS) Bed Together – Or Not
Not so fast – you don’t have to file taxes jointly. For instance, if one of you owns a business, the other may want to file separately in case any bookkeeping issues arise on the corporate level. The downside of separate returns is it lowers the ceiling for things like Roth IRA contributions and capital gains, which won’t help with budget issues. “This is definitely a discussion for you and your accountant.” says Thakor.

Did you get married recently or are you getting ready to get married? How are you and your betrothed handling finances? If you’ve been married a long time, what are your keys to successful financial communication in a marriage?

Financially Ever After is a post from: PerkStreet Blog

This was Kevin’s first post for PerkStreet. He is the creator of the blog No Debt Plan and he’s a debt reduction champion with a passion for teaching people how to budget and stay out of debt. He’s also writing an eBook for checking your free credit report.

How busy is your life, and how strict are you with your budget?

The answers to those two questions helped shape a change my wife and I recently made in our budget.

You see, we are diligent savers. We are cash flowing about 38% of our after-tax income each month. (I say “about” because it fluctuates with my commission-heavy job.) We’ve been blessed to apply this extra income toward growing our emergency fund, saving for retirement, and paying off our second mortgage.

We carry no consumer debt — no credit cards and no car loans. We’re even saving up to pay cash for our next two vehicles in 2012 and 2014. (Yes, I plan out that far. I am a spreadsheet and budgeting nerd.)

We’re also operating two small side businesses: blogging for me, and making cakes for her. This also adds to our bottom line and accelerates us toward our financial goals.

These side ventures also take up a lot of our spare time. So much time, in fact, that we noticed that we were spending less and less quality time in each other’s company. Yeah, I would take my laptop into the kitchen to work on blog posts while she baked up a storm. But we didn’t do a lot of talking. I sat and blogged. She baked.

It was time for a change, and time to re-connect.

Budgeting for Romance

Our budget provides money for eating out and some individual free spending money. We use some combination of each to go on dates.

But we hadn’t taken a real, dedicated date in a long time.

We decided to use our budget to force us to spend time being romantic. We set aside some money with one rule: the money had to be spent that month. It didn’t roll over into the next month. We had to spend it.

Turns out it doesn’t have to be a ton of money, either. We’re currently working with $20 per month for romance.

Our First Date in a Long Time

Starbucks.

Ah, yes. The dreaded land of daily lattes that supposedly cause financial ruin.

Could it be the starting point for us to reconfigure our relationship?

We went to the closest Starbucks location to our home on a Saturday evening. We spent $7.13 – venti hot chocolate for me and a tall white mocha for her.

We spent over an hour sitting across the tiny coffee shop table talking. Just talking, joking, laughing, and re-connecting.

Needless to say it was some of the best $7 I’ve ever spent. We’ll definitely do that again.

Additional Inexpensive Date Night Options

Maybe coffee isn’t your thing. (Notice how I drank hot chocolate?)

Or maybe coffee is your thing, but you want to mix things up a bit. Your dates don’t have to be expensive.

Here are some additional date ideas:

• You might try a wine tasting at a local winery.
• Or spend that $20 going to a matinee movie — though you probably can’t afford tickets and snacks for that price!
• Instead of coffee you can always grab dessert at a place like The Cheesecake Factory.
• With baseball season getting into swing you could spend $20 for a pair of tickets to a minor league game.
• Pick up concert or sport tickets to your local college or university.

Yes, $8 cheesecake, $10 movie tickets, and $3.50 coffee seem expensive.

But you’ve got to ask yourself: is the investment in my relationship worth it?

What are your favorite cheap dates?

Make Room in Your Budget For Love is a post from: PerkStreet Blog