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Having a merchant account can provide an expanded customer base for small business owners. A merchant account allows business owners to accept credit cards. For small business owners who operate websites for the businesses, a merchant account is almost a necessity to ensure customer activity. Small business owners can set up a merchant account with their bank in only a few steps. Once the account is set up, the small business owner has a few more steps to complete in order to be able to use the account and ensure that all customer transactions are safe.

Supplies Needed:

Merchant account

Instructions:

Step 1: Select the credit cards that you will accept with your merchant account. Bear in mind that the credit card company takes a percentage of each transaction, so read the fine print carefully before agreeing to accept a type of credit card. Some merchants choose to accept only the types of credit cards that patrons use most often (i.e., Visa and MasterCard) to avoid excess fees from cards used less frequently.

Step 2: Add Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) to your website, for completing online transactions with your merchant account. SSL provides encryption to websites so that the customer’s credit card information is protected during the transaction. When you sign onto a website and notice that the URL changes from http to https, you are seeing a website with SSL encryption for transaction safety. To add SSL, contact your website provider, your Internet Service Provider (ISP), or VeriSign.

Step 3: Add an order form to your website. Once you have your website secured with SSL, you will need to add the order form that will enable customers to complete their transactions. Your hosting service should provide you with a form template, or you can make a simple one for free (see resources).

Step 4: Purchase access to payment processing software that links the completed transactions to your bank account, via your merchant account. Companies like VeriSign, Monetra, and VeriFone offer payment processing services.

Step 5: Add a feature to authorize payments. Authorizing payments protects you, the merchant, from accepting credit card purchases from bad credit card accounts. Your merchant account provider should be able to include an authorization service to your account. If you prefer to look elsewhere, Authorize.net provides a credit card authorization service.

Tips and Warnings:

In addition to adding SSL, you will need to obtain an SSL Certificate that shows your website and the transactions that are completed on your website are safe. You can obtain an SSL certificate from VeriSign (even if you don’t acquire the SSL from that service).

Set up your savings safety net

It is absolutely vital to have a savings safety net. Everyone needs to have a saving safety net made up of enough money to cover your expenses for at least three months, ideally for six months. To work out how much you should have as your savings safety net, write down your essential monthly outgoings – things like mortgage or rent payments and food bills – and multiply the figure by three to give a three month safety net amount.

Of course, it’s not easy when you’re only just coping day-to-day, but it really is important to set up this savings account. That way, if you suddenly lose your job or you can’t earn because of sickness or other problems, you can at least pay your bills and keep the roof over your head.

Effectively you’re insuring yourself against financial disaster. The best part it is that if you don’t lose your income, you still have a nice wad of money quietly growing in a savings account.

If you don’t have a savings safety net yet, the way to do it is to open a good, easy access savings account now. Put into it any spare money that you have each week. Even if you think you don’t have free cash day-to-day, you’ll be surprised how even your small change can add up.

Consider income protection insurance

The next best thing to self insuring is to take out income protection insurance (IPI). It won’t protect against unemployment but it will replace some of your salary if you have an accident or illness that stops you working for a while.

The pros of income protection insurance are that good policies will pay out until you’re ready to return to work (even if that’s in a few years).

If you never recover enough to work again, it should then pay you an income until you reach retirement age. You get paid weekly or monthly, and the payments are tax-free.

On the downside, you usually have to wait quite a few months before you start to get the benefits – around 13 weeks (three months) is the norm. You can get policies that will pay you from the moment you have to be off work – but the monthly premiums for those are much higher.

Be careful of redundancy insurance. It should be avoided by most people as it’s generally expensive to buy and, in many instances, it doesn’t pay out when you need it.

Get Mortgage Payment Protection Insurance

If you’ve set up a savings safety net for yourself, it should include enough to pay your mortgage each month.

However, if you don’t have money in a savings account and you do have a mortgage then you should have mortgage payment protection insurance (MPPI)

If you decide to take out MPPI, it’s vital you shop around – don’t just get the insurance offered to you by your mortgage lender. Figures from the Council of Mortgage Lenders show that of the borrowers who have MPPI, three-quarters took out the cover with their mortgage provider. These ‘bolt-on’ policies tend to be more expensive, and like any other type of insurance you can usually make big savings by shopping around.

You can get cover for around £5 a month for every £100 of monthly repayment – but a policy from your lender could cost three times as much.

As well as looking at the price of MPPI, you need to be aware of exclusions with the cover. Most MPPI policies will exclude stress and back trouble – two of the most common reasons for claims – so ideally you should find a policy that includes these conditions.

MPPI normally pays out between 30 and 60 days after you become unable to work and continues to pay the benefit for 12 months (sometimes 24). Be aware that claims will not be met if you knew you were likely to be made redundant when you took out the policy.

Get Critical Illness Cover

A lot of people are unable to work for long periods – over two million in the UK currently claim State incapacity benefit for more than six months at a time. Critical illness insurance will give you reassurance in these circumstances, if you can afford it.

Some types of insurance will give you ‘level’ or the same pay-out during the policy term (in other words, you could get a lump sum pay-out if you get ill at any time while the policy runs).

However, it is possible to buy cover where the lump sum gets smaller over the five years – and this sort of cover is cheaper. This type of ‘reducing’ critical illness cover is designed to be used with decreasing home mortgage repayments. Less and less cover is needed as the mortgage gets paid off.

Happily, thousands of workers receive critical illness cover as part of their employment package, so they don’t have to pay out of their own pocket. If you’re self-employed and the only or main earner in a household however, it might be worth considering this type of cover, if only for a few key years. The cash can be a major boon if your health goes wrong.

During the recession many people have experienced that their salary, even though it’s still the same amount of money, is buying them less groceries. Getting by is harder than it used to be.

For some people this is just a minor difference, for other people it’s affecting their every day life. Whether you are in need of generating some spare cash or really need to focus on what you buy, these few tips will help you save money when doing your daily and/or weekly groceries.

1. Know what you pay for; compare prices.

This may sound silly, but the same product can be cheaper in another store close by.

If you need to travel a long way you must not forget to calculate the cost for you to get there and back. With price differences from a few cents up to a whole dollar or more, you can save up to $30,00 on your weekly groceries just by being picky where to shop.

2. Know what’s going on; buy groceries that are on sale.

Supermarkets have special discounts on certain items every week. It can be worthwhile to keep an eye out for flyers and folders of supermarkets to keep track of their discounts.

If you see a certain dish on sale, you can make a profit by buying that dish in that specific week.Please remind that certain food and drinks are always more expensive than others, even when they are on sale. You will want to avoid those or buy them once in a while as a special treat. You can save up to $5,00 per dish.

3. Keep it cool; buy in bulk.

When you are with a large family this is a handy thing to do. When you buy in bulk, the products you are buying will most likely be cheaper. Lots of food including vegetables, bread and meat can be frozen to keep them fresh for weeks to come. You can buy the product when it’s on sale and freeze a couple of portions of it for later use.

For example: a family eats chicken on a regular basis. The chicken breast filet is on sale for $4.99 instead of $6.99 and the family decides to buy in bulk (let’s say, 3 kilos) they will save $6.00 in the process. When doing this regularly with different items, the total easily adds up.

4. Resist temptation; make a shopping list

Some people find it hard to resist certain items when grocery shopping. Making a shopping list can help you with that. On top of that you are sure not to forget anything when you are at the store. Be firm with yourself and only buy whatever is on your list.

If you correctly follow all of these tips, saving money at the store should not be too much of a task. Just remember, if you do not need it then do not buy it. It really is as simple as that when you think about it. Good luck with your next trip to the store where, hopefully, this information will pay its dividends to you.

What do we all want when it comes to attaining and securing wealth? We want a sense of long-term security and the peace of mind that it brings including lifestyle and advantages to our family.

What do millionaires do that others don’t? They do not over consume. They are ready to sacrifice something today in order to achieve greater wealth and prosperity in the future.

Does this paint a good picture of who we are and what we want? This then leads me to say that money must be managed and if you spend more than you make, you surely are heading for trouble, that simple. So where to begin? Many people would say to make a budget and save money. However, in addition to that, I would suggest that prior to making a budget; you should set realistic and attainable goals. Once goals are set, you can then set a budget that will enable you to reach them whatever they are. Make sure that you write your goals down and put them up where you can see them every day.

To begin with, you should monitor your expenses over an entire month. This little exercise will give you the framework for your budget template. Ultimately, you want to reduce your debt load so you must put serious thoughts into curbing bad spending habits, differentiating between good and bad debts and establishing an emergency fund.

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Everyone wants to save money these days. Take some time to examine your monthly household bills. For example, look closely at your monthly electric bill. You may be able to save money by buying your electricity from a supplier other than your utility for a substantial savings.

Your electric bill is actually a composite of many charges associated with delivering electricity to your house. To simplify — you can lump all charges into three categories:

1. Supply charge. The electricity delivered to your house is either generated by your utility, purchased by your utility from another company, or is a combination of both internally generated and purchased electricity. That is your supply charge. Somewhere on your bill is your “price to compare” — given in cents per kilowatt-hour of electricity. It is the rate you are being charged just for electricity — sometimes referred to as “commodity charge.” Multiply your “price to compare” times the number of kilowatt-hours of electricity you use to determine your supply charge.
2. Fixed charges. Every month your utility charges you a fixed amount for being a customer. This amount does not vary depending on the amount of electricity you use. It covers the utility’s costs of maintaining you as customer, even if you used “zero” electricity. Your state may also impose a fixed tax on your bill, regardless of the amount of power you use.
3. Variable charges. All other charges on your bill vary depending upon how much electricity you use. For example, take your electric transmission and delivery charges. Your bill calculates this charge for you by multiplying the kilowatt-hours you used by the rate for electric transmission and delivery. Other charges are computed in the same way.

Here’s how you can save on your supply charge

Call your electric utility and ask if they offer supply choice. If they do, ask for a list of alternate suppliers and their rates that you can compare them with your own utility’s “price to compare.”

You may find that you are already getting the best deal. Or perhaps the savings will be so little that it’s not worth your while to contract with an alternate supplier.

If you do find that your savings justify switching to an alternative supplier, you’ll have to contact that supplier in order to sign up. Read the terms of the contract carefully. How long will the supplier guarantee this rate? What happens at the end of the contract period? If everything looks o.k. and your potential saving looks good, go ahead and sign up and save!

Take the time to dig into the rates you are being charged on your electric bill. Contact your local utility and explore your options. You can save money on your electric bill.

Install a whole-house electric feedback meter

You can easily and conveniently monitor the total power being used by everything in your house with a whole-house electric feedback meter. One particularly good inexpensive meter has a transponder that you place on your utility’s electric meter and a receiver that gives you the data you need to know in order to analyze power requirements of everything in your house.