Put Extra Money In My Account - Make The Best Use Of Your Money
December 26th, 2007 by moniesMost of the people prefer to put extra money in a bank account when they start making money. This is the most prudent thing that you can do with the extra money you have. Putting your extra money into a bank account carries a plethora of advantages. The banks not only provides you an easy and secure way to store your money, but you also get increments in your saved money from time to time in the form of interest.
Actually, when you put extra money in the bank, the money goes to a huge pool of funds provided by the thousands of existing customers of the bank. The bank keeps a portion of this money as deposit and invests the rest of the funds in various financial ventures. This way, whenever you require some money, you can withdraw it from your deposit. Also, when you keep your money for a long time with the bank, the bank also shares a certain part of the profit earned by the investment it made with your money. This part of profit is termed as interest. Most of the banks fix a certain percentage of interest.
Author: John Gutenburg
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Easy Mode Of Online Money Transfer
December 26th, 2007 by moniesThe need to transfer money has become a regular requirement for us. Transferring money to children studying abroad, transferring money back home for those working abroad, making payments for goods and services purchased abroad are some of the general requirements that necessitates fast and secured money transfer services. Online money transfer services are the best solution for these types of requirements. Fast, secured, and affordable, the popularity of online money transfer services is steadily growing.
Online money transfer is the best choice for online businesses. Fast, reliable, and affordable, online purchases, auctions, sales, etc can be easily transacted with reliable online money transfer services such as epay. Security is the prime concern as far as online money transfer is concerned. This is why some online money transfer services have excelled while a huge lot of others are striving for recognition. An authentic and reputed online money transfer service provider will allow you to transfer easy money online in the most secured way. Epay.vg, for example, is a secured online money transfer service provider. Epay works on the lines of some of the most reputed online money transfer services and incorporates all the leading technologies to ensure that money transfer with epay is reliable.
Author: Anirban Bhattacharya
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Making the money men accountable
December 25th, 2007 by moniesIF a company’s annual report doesn’t reflect the true state of its finances, the consequences could be serious. It might create a false market in the company’s shares, causing investors to get their fingers burnt. But who would be to blame? Would it be the company itself or the firm of auditors responsible for scrutinising the financial information.
These are some of the many questions that have been driving Frank Harding, the former KPMG chartered accountant who is now president of the New York-based International Federation of Accountants.
On a flying visit to Edinburgh last week, Harding explained that his three key goals as IFAC president are: to ensure that over- zealous US regulators are kept in check; to raise the quality of financial reporting worldwide; and to ensure that the profession plays a lead role in stamping out corruption worldwide.
In May, IFAC, the umbrella organisation for the accountancy profession on a global basis, will stage its annual conference in Edinburgh’s International Conference Centre. The theme? “The needs of capital markets - a measured response”. Speakers include Richard Grasso of the New York Stock Exchange, Howard Davies of the Financial Services Authority and Sir David Tweedie of the Accounting Standards Board.
The conference comes at a critical time for the profession. Not only are most of the “big five” accountancy firms - PriceWaterhouseCoopers, Ernst & Young, KPMG, Deloitte & Touche and Andersen - increasingly discovering that it is virtually impossible for them to operate in the US without contravening government regulations. But the US regulators are also flexing their muscles and seeking to impose their standards on other markets around the world.
Harding said: “The regulators’ job is to ensure there is quality financial reporting, so that investors and others taking economic decisions can make appropriate decisions based on appropriate knowledge. That’s motherhood. The profession has exactly the same desire. We want to see quality stuff out there.”
But Harding questions whether the rules being imposed by the Securities and Exchange Commission, the US body which is increasingly seen as global “lead regulator” are either practical or sensible.
In recent months the SEC has been directing its wrath towards the “big five” firms of accountants. It is particularly concerned that their auditing arms are less than fully independent and that the “chinese walls” between the various parts of these enormous multi- disciplinary firms may be inadequate. Already the companies are responding by demerging or selling off their consulting arms. In February, PwC said it was breaking itself up into “two or more separate operating units.” PwC chief executive, James Schiro, said: “Growing regulatory and legislative scrutiny demand that we vigorously focus on the basics that built the accounting profession.” Last week Ernst & Young confirmed it will sell its consultancy business to Paris-based Cap Gemini for #7 billion.
Harding predicts that none of the big five will retain their consulting arms. “They all need capital to meet their needs for expansion and technical development.”
However, Harding wonders whether some of the SEC’s rules in the area of professional independence may be somewhat over-zealous. Some are virtually impossible to comply with. For example, according to SEC rules, an accountant is expected to resign the account if his brother-in-law is the financial director at a client company. The same applies if his brother in law owns shares in the client company. IFAC advocates a less prescriptive approach to the issue of professional independence which is contained in a “principles-based approach”. This will be elaborated in Edinburgh in May.
The international accountancy body has also set itself the ambitious task of harmonising accountancy standards in 180 countries around the world. “Developing and emerging countries in particular need greater accountability,” explained Harding. Following meetings at the World Bank, Harding’s organisation recently launched the International Forum on Accountancy Development.
Harding said: “The quality of financial reporting worldwide is critical to decision-making. We think there’s a need to improve it and are looking at the quality of financial reporting and examining each country where there is a lack.”
National teams - who could be drawn from local trade ministries, regulators and professional bodies - will be appointed to assess the current state of financial reporting and corporate governance in their domestic market, before seeing how this compares to international benchmarks. IFAD will later finance consultants to visit countries to help plug the gaps wherever these have been identified.
Author: Ian Fraser
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Making money with electronic files
December 25th, 2007 by moniesOur clients unfortunately believe they are the almighty creators and that we are merely their servants. In truth, we are servants to their dollars. But, we are really unaware of the actual cost required to accept and manage our client’s electronic files. Charging for our services has always been a matter of debate. In the end we are dictated to, mostly by changing markets and client’s expectations. But it is in all our interests to understand the true total operating cost of our computer systems.
This discussion is not about preflighting; it’s about the underlying cost of managing electronic files: the capture, manipulation, archival and restoration of every piece of digital information that passes through your company.
The best place to begin understanding this is to identify the path or stream that information takes in a typical shop. It looks something like this: customer gives file to printer either on disk or over internet, printer loads file onto their computers, preflight, job is RIPped, proofs are made, job is outputted and files are archived.
Most printers do have a preflight charge (I hope), but that’s usually where the billing stops. Now let’s see what the actual associated costs to the printer are:
1. Hi-speed internet: $200-$1,800/month,
2. Time to create directory: load one CD is five minutes x $60-$120/hr = $5-$10 per job,
3. Preflighting computer: $2,000 to $6,000 every 18 to 24 months,
4. Software to work on jobs: initial cost equals Quark $1,500/Photoshop $600/Illustrator $700. Then upgrades at least $500 and up every year or two per computer,
5. RIP computer: $10,000 over three years = $277/month,
6. Proofing RIP computer: $10,000 over three years = $277/month,
7. RIP and proofing RIP software with upgrades: $1,000 to $50,000,
8. Hard drives in RIP (should be replaced annually): at three to five SCSI HDs x $500 = $1,500 - $2,500/year,
9. CD burner: $250(PC) or $500(MAC SCSI), Blank CDs $0.30 each, DAT $1,500, DAT Tapes $30-$60,
10. File server: $10,000 over three years = $277/month.
Initially your file execution systems do not seem like much of an investment, but when you add all the little bits and pieces together it costs thousands of dollars per year to manage your customer files. This of course assumes that you have a superb filing system and can instantly find files that are stored. Realistically, a lot more time is usually spent finding files and making sure that graphics are linked properly than most owners realize. And then there’s the whole font issue, which I will not even broach in this column.
The ultimate question then is how do we charge for this? Back in the old days (five years ago) we would have a preflight charge and RIP charge and don’t forget a CD-burning charge that were high enough to cover other costs. But that was then. Today, we have a whole range of issues. The largest is, in my mind, competition.
It’s easy to cut a few hundred bucks off of a job by throwing in the prep charges. It also makes you look like a star in the customer’s eyes. Unfortunately it’s very short-sighted. On smaller jobs in the $1,000 to $5,000 price range, the preflight and setup costs are around 10 per cent of the job, which is usually the margin where most of us lose quotes. It’s tempting to believe that we can throw it on just the big jobs to cover the small ones or simply tell management that we’ll spread it over the next few jobs. But we all know it just isn’t happening.
There’s a better way. Charge a minimum set amount on each job on top of your preflight charges. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a large amount, but it must be constant. In fact you can have two set amounts: a lower one for smaller jobs and another higher one for normal jobs.
If your customers don’t like it, explain to them that you have to pay for all this wonderful technology that is making the rest of the job that much cheaper. Over the course of a year even a $20 minimum adds up.
The alternative to charging is obsolescence. You may be the top dog today with the latest whiz-bang toy, but tomorrow your competition will have version 2.0 of the same thing with better features. This means you eventually have to upgrade and it also means that if you don’t you will become obsolete. If your clients are not being charged even a small amount you will not be able to afford to replace equipment when it is needed.
Author: Broomhead, Ian
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Make money on the Internet, maybe
December 25th, 2007 by moniesThe conventional wisdom about the Internet is that its hype has exceeded its hope and help.
The demise of the online magazine Web Review was characterized by Newsweek as “the latest road kill on the Infobahn.” Another article: “So far, few retail sites on the Web have made back their start-up costs.” A recent Doonesbury cartoon strip about Vietnam’s economic potential had one character saying, “It’s too soon to tell, really,” to which another replied “Vibnam sounds a lot like the Web.”
But checking with Vermont Internet providers and users found that the World Wide Web, whose astonishing growth in the past two years has made the Internet a byword, is only one aspect of the Internet’s usefulness. E-mail is rapidly becoming a standard way to communicate, discussion groups can offer the kind of business advice that conferences traditionally provide, and the amount of information available in databases continues to amaze even those who know how to navigate and find what they need.
As for the Web, its proliferation of homemade and low-budget sites has created the equivalent of traffic congestion on the Information Superhighway. But the slowdown comes only when browsers are uncertain where to go, and sites that establish themselves as interesting to visit can do very well.
Also, a market is opening up for those who can organize separate sites and make them easier for users to access. The travel and hospitality industry, where the Internet is increasingly being used by people planning vacations, excursions or just visits to restaurants, has developed some of the most advanced forums.
While computer users remain in the minority, a new generation that grew up with school, home and library computers is giving a strong demographic push toward business Internet use. If that trend is backed by a new generation of microchip devices, such as equipment that would link television sets with the Internet, and if the new deregulated marketplace brings them to the fore, the question for business owners wondering about going online might not be whether, but when.
“We’re increasingly living in an information society,” observed Timothy Palmer-Benson, publisher of the online magazine Scenes of Vermont. “Not to be part of it could be folly for some businesses.”
There are no exact figures on how many Vermont businesses have addresses on the Internet, of either the Web or e-mail kind, but various sources suggested that the number is significant and rapidly growing.
CRITICAL MASS, CAUTIOUS MASSES
At VTel, a Springfield-based branch of Vermont Telephone that provides Internet services, Internet manager Jonathan Babb said 30 to 40 percent of those accounts are businesses. The number is somewhere in the thousands, he said, and at the current rate of increase, it will take two to three years to reach 10,000.
“Probably half the businesses out there are doing it to find out what it is and how they might use it,” Babb said.
Sovernet, a Bellows Falls-based Internet services provider, was incorporated in February 1995 and now gives clients local telephone access to the Internet in all areas of the state except the St Johnsbury area, and across the border into New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York and Quebec. The one omission wasn’t for lack of interest, according to vice president Tony Elliott, but rather was “a cooperative kind of thing” to avoid a clash with a couple of local Internet businesses.
Sovernet has a little over 5,000 accounts, some of them multi-user, Elliott said. “I have a feeling it’s going to be very broad-based,” he said. “There are servers being connected all over the world every day, with gigabytes and terabytes of information.”
At Burlington-based Together Networks, marketing coordinator Jeff Gauthier said they started in November 1994 with 17 accounts, and now have several thousand.
“I’d say there are more private than business, but the number of business accounts is growing,” he said.
In college cities and towns, the numbers may be higher. In Middlebury, Frank Burkle, the owner of the store Computer Alternatives, said, “This is the year that it is happening.” He expects that in the next six months, the proportion of people on line in the communities near Middlebury College will go from 5-10 percent to perhaps 70 percent.
In Burlington, a city where coffeehouse customers browse the Internet as well as read papers and talk, there is even a business selling pizza via the Internet.
“A lot,” said Michael Kalin, the owner of Kalin’s Italian Gardens, thanks in part to the presence of the University of Vermont and several area colleges.
Author: Barna, Ed
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WHO’S MAKING THE MOST MONEY?
December 24th, 2007 by moniesBut it also takes us longer to get to work, we spend more of our money on housing, and we need more care for young children because in more households both parents are working.
The first up-close look at how Chicagoans live was released by the census Tuesday.
The Chicago area’s median household income was $51,680. Adjusted for inflation that’s an increase of 12 percent from the 1990 census. The state’s highest median income was in Kenilworth, where half the households reported making more than $200,001.
Some 29 suburbs had median family incomes of more than $100,000. Ten years ago, only 13 suburbs could make that claim.
Adjusted for inflation, north suburban Bannockburn saw a 127.9 percent increase in median household income–the highest increase in the region. Newly suburbanized towns on the edges of the Chicago area, such as Lake County’s Hainesville, saw the upside of sprawl by registering increases in household income as high as 75 percent.
DuPage County remained the wealthiest county in the state with a median household income of $67,887.
Median home values in the Chicago area also increased to $166,200, a 16 percent jump when adjusted for inflation compared with 10 years ago.
* Details, Pages 6-8
Author: Mark Skertic
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Migrants make us money
December 24th, 2007 by monies“People in HR should keep a close eye on developments in immigration policy,” says Fran Wilson, international HR manager at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD). “First because companies can benefit hugely from changes made in the last few years to make it easier for overseas nationals [ONs] to work in the UK. And second because it’s HR that has the ability to ensure the interests of companies are properly represented in future policy making.”
Most ONs enter the UK under a scheme administered by Work Permits (UK) in Sheffield. WPUK recognises certain shortage “occupations” - including some IT and healthcare positions - and processes applications for these jobs without employers having to show that they have tested the resident labour market (usually done by advertising) before offering the position to an ON.
One recent initiative is the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme (HSMP), set up by the WPUK in January this year to allow international high-flyers to enter the UK without a job offer. It is innovative in being a points scheme - with points granted for qualifications, experience, salary and significant achievement - and is a natural progression from the decision last year to add an immigration category for “Innovators”. That scheme encourages talented individuals with a track record to apply for leave to set up a business in the UK.
Nevertheless, of around 800 HSMP applications submitted to date, 70 per cent have been refused. “It appears WPUK underestimated what would be involved,” says an Eversheds spokesperson. “To its credit, however, it is seeking to iron out teething troubles which are, to some extent, inevitable in any new scheme.”
Jay Cheth, policy adviser at the CBI, believes that, among British employers, small and medium-sized firms are most likely to be lacking in awareness when it comes to immigration policy. “Yet immigration has a key role to play in alleviating current skill and labour shortages and has brought significant benefits to the UK economy,” he says.
It is a myth that migrants damage British jobs and drain the public finances, he adds, pointing to Home Office research showing that a 1 per cent population rise through migration can lead to an increase in GDP of 1.25 to 1.5 per cent. Moreover, in 1999/2000, migrants made a net contribution of pounds 2.5bn in taxation.
Ms Wilson at the CIPD says other benefits to business of managed immigration policies include “greater cultural understanding and sensitivity, reflecting the communities you serve in a global economy, and the potential to learn about ways of working. Indeed,” she says, “research shows ethnic diversity is excellent for company performance. Unfortunately, there are more administrative tasks involved in employing people from abroad, but we’ve found that companies say it has paid off.”
In the future, there is likely to be a greater focus on lower- skilled workers as well as asylum-seekers and refugees. Sam Chapman, an HR manager at the Boston Consulting Group, is among those who hope to see HR at the forefront of discussions: “Our role is pivotal because we’re the part of any business that co-ordinates, researches and evaluates recruitment and retention issues.”
Noel O’Reilly, editor of the HR magazine Personnel Today, agrees: “Although public policy focuses on skilled workers, there is at least as big a demand for lower- skilled workers in industries including agriculture, building and hospitality.”
Author: Kate Hilpern
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Making money in a vacuum
December 23rd, 2007 by moniesMcHENRY, Ii.-Make money in a vacuum? Well, actually, vacuum is only part of it. There’s also high pressure, exotic gases, abrasives, heavy loads at high speed, and temperatures cycling over hundreds of degrees. Short of a nuclear “accident,” it’s perhaps the worst environment on earth for a large electric motor.
And the motors (up to 400 hp) that are operating successfully in it are being designed and built not by a specialty motor manufacturer, but by a service center-McHenry Electric & Supply Co. of McHenry, Ill. (pop. 18,000), 35 miles northwest of Chicago. A typical medium-sized operation employing two dozen, the firm was founded 50 years ago as a motor repair shop.
The application is the turbo-blower drive for a line of vacuum heat-treating furnaces developed by Abar Ipsen Industries of Rockford, Ill. Established in the 1940s, Abar is now a unit of Ipsen International Group, in turn part of the Industrial Furnaces Division of Ruhrgas Industries headquartered in Essen, Germany.
The development of a motor to cope with such severe operating conditions highlights a niche marketing strategy that can be a lucrative business builder for traditional motor shops, as conventional rewind/repair business nurtures little growth.
Many motor manufacturers have given up the diversified expertise, marketing flexibility, and widespread application engineering staffs to deal with small quantity users of special products. That leaves some fields open to local entrepreneurs such as Bryce Klontz, McHenry Electric’s President.
He buys partial motors-unwound stator/frame assembly, bearing brackets and caps, and rotor core without shaft-from a motor manufacturer in another state. McHenry Electric then winds the stator, makes the shaft, and completes the assembly for Abar Ipsen, located 30 miles away.
The most common ratings are 125, 200, and 300 hp, 230/460 volts, 3600 rpm, TEFC horizontal foot-mounted. Nothing unusual there-but the actual construction is another matter. The duty is intermittent, typically involving only an hour or two of running time per day. What really hurts the motor is the idle time. Here’s how it’s used:
Hot environment
The Abar Ipsen “Turbotreater” electric heat treating furnace, marketed internationally, consists of a horizontal cylindrical chamber with a loading door at one end. Inside, a series of ring-shaped resistance heating elements, built up of graphite bars, heat the materials being processed to temperatures ranging from 1900degF to 2300 deg F over a period of several hours. The exact cycle depends upon the material-typically automotive gears, cutting tools, or nickel and other alloy components being brazed together for jet engines.
At the opposite end of the “hot zone” is the motor. On its shaft is mounted a fan wheel, surrounded by concentric stationary rings of heat exchanger tubes. During the heating cycle, the motor does not run. But the hot zone, and the motor as well, are under vacuum down to one ten-millionth of an atmosphere. When the cycle ends, proper metallurgy of the treated parts depends upon rapid cooling down to no more than a few hundred degrees. The cooling agent is inert argon or nitrogen gas.
During that “quench” phase, the gas is forced into the hot zone by the blower, building up internal pressure as great as ten atmospheres (130 psi). The motor typically runs no more than half an hour to complete the cooling process.
The standard horizontal Turbotreater furnace comes in half a dozen sizes accommodating process loads from 1500 to 3500 pounds. Heating power ranges from 125 to 500 kilowatts. Several vertically oriented designs, with the blower motor on top, take loads up to ten tons.
The furnace was developed back in 1983-84, then redesigned in 1987, to supplant an earlier design that had gone largely unchanged for 20 years. Instead of a cylindrical hot zone, its chamber had been a rectangular box, leading to relatively uneven cooling of the load from top to bottom during the quench cycle.
Explained Craig Moller, Abar’s Manufacturing Engineering Manager, “The heat treating industry wanted more uniform cooling. That drove our redesign. Also, the new version is more compact, and it cools faster. Heat treatment quality depends on fast cooling.”
The first motors were dripproof (McHenry Electric was not involved at that time.) Not only did motors get extremely hot during their idle time, leading to burnouts and bearing failures; windings also suffered abrasion damage. The furnace hot zone erodes with use, and material may flake off the product as well. Abrasive particles even penetrated sealed bearings. That prompted a change to TEFC motor enclosures.
Abar then began looking into watercooling the motor. Because the motor doesn’t run during the heating cycle, measurements weren’t hard to get, and they showed shaft temperatures topping 400 deg F.
Author: Nailen, Richard L
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Gibson’s Passion for making money
December 22nd, 2007 by moniesThe replicas of the nails used to crucify Jesus are part of the official merchandise for Gibson’s controversial and violent new movie, released this week on Ash Wednesday. The movie has been attacked for stirring up anti-Semitism - an allegation Gibson angrily denies.
Some Christians believe the nail may become a new sign of faith superceding the cross. Others say it is just macabre.
The necklaces are selling like hot cakes across the US in Christian bookshops and other Christian stores. Made from pewter, the two and a half inch nails retail for $17.
The nail bears the inscription Isaiah 53:5 - an Old Testament verse which reads: “He was pierced for our transgressions.” Hundreds of stores across America are getting approval to sell items linked to the movie, such as books, lapel-pins, key chains, coffee mugs and T- shirts. Religious shops in the UK will follow suit soon.
Tina Weldon, who manages the Family Christian Store in Newark, said: “The response has been overwhelming. They want to buy it. It’s very symbolic for a lot of people.”
Gibson has licensed a Californian company to make the nail necklaces and other merchandise. Charles Houser, of the American Bible Society, said: “The cross has become such a benign jewellery item. The shock of its original form is lost to modern people.
“Choosing the detail of the spike would be to reinvigorate the image. They’re really trying to capture that this was that day’s form of execution.”
However, Rev Forrest Church from New York said the pendants were “macabre”, adding: “I expect the prominence of the nail reflects the prominence of the gore in the movie itself. That becomes the icon of identification.”
Author: Neil Mackay
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Making money on the Web
December 22nd, 2007 by moniesAt a time when the ranks of African Americans investing in financial markets are ever increasing, www.black stocks.com has become the first Internet site devoted to providing investment services and financial education to African Americans.
Visitors have access to the extensive brokerage and financial services provided by National Discount Brokers, a leading investment management firm with assets in excess of $5.3 billion.
The alliance allows potential investors to get basic information on the stock market, investing tips for first-time investors and insight into how to choose the best portfolio. The educational component will be developed by blackstocks.com, explains Alton Perkins, chairman and CEO of New Visions Inc. NDB enters the picture when a potential investor is ready to take the next step and become a true investor; it then guides them through the process of actually putting their money on the line.
“The African American audience, given the latest trends in investing and Internet use, is a group that we thought was being overlooked by the financial community,” says Dennis Marino, chairman of NDB. “Through this alliance we can provide a valuable service that will allow this audience a way to better manage their personal finances and investments.”
For those who don’t have access to the Internet, blackstocks.com is establishing offices across the country. Currently, it has shops up in several cities, including Atlanta, San Francisco, Houston, Washington, D.C., and Charlotte, North Carolina. In-office visits as well as information given on the Web are free of charge as part of a full information program. Fees are not assessed until clients are ready to place their investment money on the table.
Author: Paula M. White
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