How to Get Cash After Your Debit Card is Stolen

Stolen Debit Card

The following is a guest post by Kelly Kehoe. If you’d like to submit a guest post to Money Q&A, check out our guest posting guidelines.

Stolen Debit CardCredit and debit card fraud happens all the time, but if you’re traveling abroad like I did recently, it can be a nightmare to deal with. After withdrawing money from an ATM just once in Barcelona, I received an email two days later about a withdrawal that had posted to my account amounting to $540.

Another transaction from the same vendor with the odd name (it was Russian, according to my frantic Google search) was pending for $285. I immediately emailed my credit union (it was 9pm back home) and within 12 hours, my ATM card was completely shut down.

While I was grateful that no other fraudulent charges would show up, I was now in trouble because I had zero access to my bank accounts (except online), no cash (a lot of places I went to in Europe, especially Germany, were cash-only), and 8 more days left of my trip with just a credit card to help me pay for expenses.

How to Get Cash After Your Debit Card is Stolen

To save you a headache and anxiety of confronting the same problem I did, here are some things I learned while dealing with debit card fraud abroad:

What to Do When Your Debit Card is Stolen

The Federal Trade Commission outlines your legal rights in cases of credit or debit card fraud. If you’re lucky like I was – even though I didn’t feel “lucky” at the time! – and you still have your debit card in your possession, then you won’t be liable for any of the fraudulent charges as long as you report them within 60 days.

If your debit card was lost or stolen, however, you could be liable for up to $50 of the charges if you notify your bank or credit union within 2 days. If you notify them after 2 days but before the 60-day mark, then your liability increases to $500. If you wait longer than 60 days, then you could be liable for the entire amount of fraudulent charges. Even if you have to pay a couple dollars to call your bank from abroad, it’s worth it to report the charges as early as possible.

Once you report the fraudulent charges, your bank or credit union will likely email you a dispute form to fill out and return (ask a representative how long you can wait to submit this if you don’t have access to a computer or printer while traveling). Depending on your financial institution, you could get your money back within 48 hours to 3 weeks, on average. To ensure other aspects of your personal identity are safe, keep a close eye on your credit report for the next couple months as well.

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The Quick ROI Calculation for College Education

Should You Take Out Private Student Loans for College?

The following is a guest post from Douglas Boneparth and Heather Boneparth, the authors of The Millennial Money Fix. If you’d like to guest post on Money Q&A, be sure to check out our guest post guidelines.

Ultimately, understanding the return on your college investment isn’t as easy as plugging numbers into an equation. After all, the college experience is much more than just what you learn in the classroom and what job you land after school. Yet, some basic math can actually teach us if choosing a certain school is a good or bad financial decision. Yet, for all the AP math classes out there, no one seems to be doing the simple addition and subtraction needed to figure out if pursuing a college degree is really worth it.

Calculating Return on Investment for a College Education

Calculating Return on Investment for a College EducationAs our book, The Millennial Money Fix (Career Press, 2017) points out, we know that those with a college education earn more than those who don’t have one – something like $17,000 more a year on average over a 30-year career. While this statistic is compelling, this is only one-half of the equation.

What we fail to show young people is how the cost of obtaining that education affects their ability to go into the world on solid footing. The average college graduate leaving school with close to $37,000 in student loan debt, making it obvious that one of the main sources of paying for college for many people is through loans. And in some extreme cases, students are borrowing hundreds of thousands of dollars to enjoy the college experience but no know exactly what it is they want to do. Yikes!

In order to help those thinking about going to college or those already in school (it’s not too late for you older Millennials), I am going to share with you the simple real-world math that anyone can use to quickly determine if they are making a smart financial decision regarding higher education and borrowing loans to make it happen.

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Trading or Investing: Where is the Money?

Trading or Investing?

Trading or Investing?At first glance, it seems like a pretty innocuous question: Should you trade or invest your money? However, upon closer inspection, there are significant differences between trading and investing. In fact, these two financial activities are worlds apart and you’re about to understand why you need to have a clear focus on your personal financial profile. A quick distinction between trading and investing is important to differentiate the two.

Trading – is defined as exchanging funds (money) for a financial asset, typically stocks, commodities, currencies or indices. When you trade, you go all-in on the deal from the get go. Your objective in trading is to capitalize on an imminent change in market variables. In other words, if you expect interest rates to rise tomorrow, you would buy the USD ahead of the announcement. Or, you would sell gold ahead of the announcement. Trading has a short-term focus. You are not holding the underlying asset for the purposes of adding it to your financial portfolio over the long-term.

Investing – this is the opposite of trading. You’re not looking for short-term gains – you’re looking for long-term appreciation of the underlying financial asset. When you invest in something, you plough resources into it over a prolonged period of time, hoping for that asset’s appreciation. At the end of the investment period, you hope to accumulate gains in the form of profits. The perspective and the motive for investing are worlds apart from that of trading. As the world-famous billionaire investor/entrepreneur Warren Buffett puts it: ‘When we buy a stock we are buying a part of a tangible business and the future earnings it generates’. This is central to the concept of investing.

But at the end of the day – it’s all about money. How much of it you can make from putting your hard-earned resources into an underlying asset and hoping for it to generate returns. Buffet’s rule when it comes to investments is as follows: Acquire the asset at a sensible price, provided the management is able, honest and capable, with excellent economics and then monitor whether these qualities in the business are being preserved. It is quite an undertaking, but one that will pay dividends in the long term.

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How a Business Mentor Can Improve the Financial Health of a Business

Should I Get a Small Business Loan?

Are you a business owner who is looking for a way to improve the financial health of your business? If so, hiring a business mentor has the potential to help you achieve this important financial goal. Below are some of the ways a business mentor can improve the financial health of a business. You Will Avoid Common Financial Mistakes Avoiding mistakes that are costly for your business is just as important as making good decisions that make money for your business. Once again, an accomplished business mentor like Tai Lopez will show you how to identify and avoid many of the common financial mistakes that are made by business owners who take their eye off the ball. A mentor like … Read more

Combine Vulnerability and Credibility for a Powerful Marketing Message

Women Rocking Business by Sage Lavine

The following is a guest post by Sage Lavine, author of “Women Rocking Business“. If you’d like to guest post on Money Q&A, check out our Guest Post Guidelines.

A Note from Hank: Sage’s experience coaching over 100,000 women entrepreneurs shows in her new book that explains why the ability to express vulnerability is a key strength for women in business. In particular, women seeking to build businesses can leverage this gift to win faithful followers, and attract loyal, paying clients.

Ladies, have you ever felt like you have to hide the very quality that makes you a caring, sensitive individual – your vulnerability – in order to succeed?

If so, you are not alone. Even the most powerful women often believe they can’t express certain emotions and aspects of their personality on the job for fear of being perceived as weak, ineffective or wishy-washy.

Women Rocking Business by Sage LavineNot true. As a CEO and a coach of women entrepreneurs, I can firmly attest that the ability to express vulnerability is a key strength for women. In particular, women seeking to build businesses can leverage this gift to win faithful followers, and attract loyal, paying clients.

The world is hungry for more vulnerability, for leaders who’ve stopped claiming to be perfect, who don’t wear a mask and who own up to their own imperfect humanness. When you allow yourself to display your vulnerable side – especially as it relates to the product or service you are offering – people will tune in and pay attention because you’ve been there, too. You know how they feel.

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Why Facebook And Social Media May Be Ruining Your Career

Why Facebook And Social Media May Be Ruining Your Career

Why Facebook And Social Media May Be Ruining Your CareerSome estimates say that almost half of all Facebook users age 18 to 34 check their Facebook accounts right when they wake up in the morning. Over a quarter even check their friends’ statuses before they get out of bed. Twitter addiction isn’t much better. One study says that over 20% of Twitter users use their accounts as their only means to find out the morning news.

Why Social Media May Be Ruining Your Career

While there is a growing explosion of the use of social media and its addictive properties, there is a danger to its overuse as well. American workers and companies are feeling the wrath of overuse and unhealthy social media use during company time. It can be detrimental to your career as well which has the potential to impact your wallet.

40% of Generation Y worker would rather have social media access at work instead of a higher salary!Click To Tweet

You Are Not Working

Believe it or not, but your employer hired you to work. They didn’t hire you to update your Facebook status. While you are playing around on the internet and on different social media websites either on your work computer or your smart phone, you are not working or earning a profit for your employer’s business.

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