Comparing Deductible, Co-Pay, and Co-insurance When Looking at Your Health Insurance Benefit Options

Are you a budding entrepreneur? Have a business idea but just don’t have the time or resources to get it off the ground? With all of the bailouts and stimulus packages floating around these days, one area that doesn’t get a lot of help is small business. Especially those who have just started, or are planning on starting a business.

Luckily, Ben over at Money Smart Life is holding a contest for entrepreneurs to help them kickstart their idea. 

Entrepreneurs can now apply for a grassroots small business stimulus package offered by finance website, MoneySmartLife.com.  The stimulus package offers a cash reward to one small business along with a business strategy plan to help them through the current economic downturn.

The prize includes:

• $250 Cash
• Business Action Plan
• Business Products & Services

Business owners can apply for the Small Business Stimulus package at at Money Smart Life.

Business owner applicants must be willing to discuss parts of their business in an open forum; the business strategy plan will be crafted partially on the website in collaboration with input from thousands of readers of TheMoneyWriters.com network.

The Small Business Stimulus package also offers businesses a chance to promote their services.  Any business interested in being featured as a Package Partner can do so simply by offering their services as one of the prizes for the giveaway.  Each Package Partner will receive a dedicated page which details their services.

Business owners can visit the website to either:

• Become Package Partners and promote their services
• Participate in the Contest

Apply at http://smb.moneysmartlife.com

I can’t believe we’re already beginning to close out 2008. With just about three weeks to go, the new year will be here before we know it. It seems like just a few months ago I was getting ready for spring, planting the garden, and doing some landscaping around the house. Now, it’s only a few more months until that starts all over again. It’s amazing how time flies.

So, as we slowly bring this year to a close, it’s a good time to make the most of what time is left. There is still time to save money, make money, and prepare for making the most of 2009. Here are some good articles from the past week that can help you.

Also, I’m trying to get into the habit of using social media a bit more, so if you want to connect with me, you can find me on Twitter and on the Generation X Finance blog page on Facebook.

Are You In Financial Trouble? Money Tips To Cope With Hard Times -A lot of people are in financial trouble these days. Unemployment continues to increase, the ability to obtain credit is difficult, and overall, people are having a hard time making ends meet. But, all is not lost. There are some things you can do to help you cope with hard times, and The Digerati Life has put together a great list.

Love Them or Hate Them, Make the Most of Gift Cards this Holiday Season - Whether you like them or not, chances are you may receive a gift card for Christmas this year. Not much you can do about it once you already receive one, but you can at least make the most of them.

Black Friday: Why Does It Exist? - We heard all about it for the past week, but what is Black Friday exactly? What does it mean, and how did it get started? Well, I don’t have all of the answers, but Lazy Man shares his experience and compares the perspective of both the consumers and the retailers.

Why You’ll be Richer Without Kids - A controversial topic, but the bottom line is true. Whether you like it or not, it costs money to have and raise children, so obviously, without children, you could have more money. But, since life isn’t all about money, is it really worth it? Brip Blap starts an interesting discussion.

Save Money at Restaurants - Tips for Spending Less When Eating Out -This is a busy time of year for many people, so that means spending more time eating out. We all know that eating out can be much more expensive than eating at home, so Ben has some tips to help you spend less when eating out this holiday season.

Reduce your Taxes by Claiming your Capital Loss -If there is any silver lining to the drop in the stock market, it’s that you can use realized losses to reduce your gains, or even taxable income. While this article comes with a Canadian perspective, similar rules apply here as well. If you have sold an investment for a loss in a taxable account, you may be entitled to some tax savings.

Roth IRA Q & A - The Roth IRA continues to be a popular investment choice, especially for younger people. The idea of withdrawals in the future without paying taxes is enticing. But, these vehicles can work for a number of other situations as well. Madison answers some common questions sent in by readers.

Fidelity to Reopen Contrafund and Low–Priced Stock Fund - Fidelity is reopening some good funds. I was always a fan of the low-priced stock fund, but it closed years ago. Luckily, the institutional version of the fund reopened in our 401(k) earlier this year, and it looks like the regular fund is doing the same. Come December 16th, you can take advantage of these funds as well.

Free FICO Credit Score Estimates -Who doesn’t like stuff that’s free? It’s even better when the free stuff is actually something useful. Jim highlights some free offers to help you get some free credit score estimates.

10 Essential Steps to Take BEFORE You’re Laid Off - Be prepared. The best offense is a good defense. Ok, boy scout motto and cliches aside, the best thing you can do is prepare for a job loss before it happens.

Recession-Proof Careers -Speaking of losing jobs, here are a few careers that tend to hold up even during a recession. Unfortunately, I don’t see my line of work in there, and working in finance is probably one of the worst places to be right now. But, maybe you’re career choice is on this list.

Expenses play an important role for almost all investors. If you invest in mutual funds, index funds, or ETFs, you’re paying a fee to the investment company. These fees are built into the overall return, so they aren’t always readily apparent, but they do affect your return. The higher the fee, the greater the drag on your return, and the less money you’ll make over time.

So, with many experts suggesting mutual fund expenses will soon be on the rise, it can be a cause for concern for investors. For the past few years, the general trend was a steady decrease in fund expenses. Expense ratios peaked in 2003 and have steadily declined since then. Unfortunately, the past five years of reduced costs may be coming to an end.

Why Funds May Increase Expenses

Every fund costs money to operate. You have fixed company costs, managers to pay, call centers to staff, and websites to maintain. In order to pay for everything involved with running an investment company, you need to generate income. So, funds charge a fee based on a percentage. Some funds charge only a fraction of a percent, while others may charge well over 1% per year.

As money flows into these funds, ,the amount of revenue increases, and since many expenses are fixed costs that don’t necessarily increase with assets under management, the fund company can trim their expense ratios and still generate enough income. Since 2003, that is exactly what has happened. Money has flooded into investments, particularly stock funds, so investment companies were able to continue cutting expenses. Unfortunately, this year has been different. With most stock funds losing 40% or more, and even more people fleeing stock funds for safer investments, these companies are now faced with the possibility of coming up short in income generated from the fees.

When companies struggle to generate enough income, they may have no other choice but to begin increasing their expense ratios. It will likely first affect smaller companies with fewer assets that don’t have the flexibility to weather these difficult economic times, but many experts believe it will begin to affect even the largest firms.

How Much of an Increase Can You Expect?

Estimates differ, but for most stock funds, you’re probably looking at anywhere between a 0.05 and 0.2% increase. Bond funds may also see an increase, but more than likely, they will be negligible. A 0.1% increase doesn’t sound like a lot, and it is a pretty small number. But when you consider the fact that this economic downturn probably won’t quickly turn around, these small increases may occur on a regular basis for the next few years, which could add up to a relatively large increase.

What Should an Investor Do?

In the grand scheme of things, there isn’t much you can do, but you do need to pay attention to what’s going on with your investments. If a fund is going to increase fees, whether you like it or not, it’s probably going to happen. This doesn’t mean that if one of your funds is announcing an increase that you should immediately go somewhere else, but you do want to make sure you’re minimizing fees everywhere you can. This is why it’s important to start off by investing in low-fee funds right from the start, so that fee increases like this won’t have as much of an impact on your bottom line.

One area that this may impact is in retirement plans such as 401(k)s. As plan administrators review their plan’s investment options, changes in fees from one firm to another may lead to a fund lineup change in your plan. Or even worse, your plan administrator may be oblivious to fees completely, and your offerings may get hit harder by these increases. In cases like this, you’d want to bring it to their attention in an attempt to obtain better fund choices within your plan.

If you have credit or debit cards, you may want to examine your recent activity. Numerous reports are popping up across the web with reports of very small purchases being made by Adele Services. Most of the reports are showing $0.10-$0.25 transactions occurring anywhere from mid-November through the last few days.

On your bank account or credit card statement, you will likely see this by the transaction: ADELE SERVICES 800-764-8104 NY or GFDL 800-764-0847 TX

If you encounter any of these transactions, you should alert your bank or card issuer right away. It’s still unclear as to how these card numbers have been obtained. It is possible that a retailer database has been hacked. Some are suggesting that these small transactions are just tests to find valid accounts where much larger fraudulent purchases will be made in the future. Others say it could be a scheme to try and funnel small, and hopefully unnoticeable amounts from a large number of people. Whatever the reason, if you’ve been affected, you want to get that card canceled and a new one issued immediately to prevent further damage.

Here are a few discussions that alerted me to this scam:

Amazon Discussion

800 Notes Discussion

If you have been affected by this, or have any additional information, feel free to provide more details such as how much was charged, and on what date. Since there isn’t a lot of information concerning this scam yet, the quicker people become aware of it and take action to remedy it, the less damage will be done.