Credit card holders must check out the terms and conditions of the credit card they hold, as ignorance of terms and conditions and laws, is not an excuse and they may land up in a financial mess if they misinterpret or ignore the terms and conditions. If the credit card is lost or stolen, the cardholder must immediately inform the issuing bank and keep the reference details of the complaint of loss or stolen card. The card holder is liable for any transaction even after the card is stolen or lost, in case he fails to inform the issuing bank, but if he informs the bank, he is not liable for any transaction made on the card if the loss has been reported to the bank. Should the cardholder find the recovered card, the recovered credit card must not be used; instead it should be destroyed by cutting in to several pieces through the magnetic strip. You may check out the joining  [...]

Banking has become the need of the hour and one cannot survive without having the basic knowledge about the same. Let us know about the various types of bank accounts and the services they offer to their customers. One opens a bank account to save his money in trusted hands.  Banks offer different types of accounts which one can open as per the requirement.  The most common basic types are the savings accounts and the current accounts.  Savings accounts can be opened by individuals, for example, Mr. John Andrews, or Ms. Catherine Diaz, in their own name and operated by themselves only.  On the other hand, current accounts are those which are in the name of organizations or any type of business entities, for example, a trader, a retailer.  The facilities available on both these types of accounts are a little different.  Both savings account and current accounts have their own advantages  [...]

  A unique financial portfolio should provide an instant cash flow, security, appreciation, instant liquidity, tax saving, low risk and framed within the legal parameters. We often have a tendency and a un satiated greed to multiply our investments in shortest time period and tend to get swayed by investing in one particular asset which is supposedly giving high return at that point of time. It has been proved time and again that it is very risky to put all eggs in one basket, and in the due process we fail understand the long term implications and repercussions of our investments. It is advisable to spread out your investments and make a deep study and introspection whether your asset is actually growing wealth over above the inflation like debt funds though they provide reasonable returns and stabilise our portfolio but are unable to beat the inflation factor in due course of  [...]

The government has taken strong measures to increase the revenues  by making a new provision in the law , that the act of evading duty or even an attempt made to evade duties due to the government, has now been made as an non bailable offence and the government has the powers to put the evaders behind the bars . Also, in the same way non disclosure of import or export shipments above one crore rupees and fraudulently claiming exemptions and incentives come under the same law and are non bailable offences. The news reveals that the government wants to tighten the taxation laws and has made new provision of arrest for non payment of service tax, and in cases of excise duty evasion extend jail terms up to seven years with fine if the leviable duty is over 30 lacs, however if the duty liability crosses fifty lacs of amount, the government plans to make the offence cognizable and non- bailable In  [...]

Credit cards are no doubt effective tools for making transactions easy and convenient ,but at the same time the frauds in the credit cards has hit the banks and credit holders hard as there is a huge rise in the credit card frauds and hence it is imperative to use your card wisely without revealing or disclosing any pass words, pin codes or personal account details to anyone .However even if you are precautious, there is a possibility of your data being stolen ,and a method of card skimming is used by fraudsters to misuse your card and commit frauds. Card skimming is a method adopted all over the world by the fraudsters whereby a skimming device –a pocket size scanner – is attached to the card reader. Whenever you swipe the card to make a payment, the skimming device secretly records and stores all your card details and relevant information. Fraudsters later retrieve the device and  [...]

Banking has been getting simpler with advancing technologies like phone banking, Net banking, and mobile banking.  Now, one need not go all the way to the bank for small tasks like balance inquiry, transaction inquiry.  These small things can be done from home via phone banking, Net banking, or mobile banking also.  Almost all leading banks have a call center line available, some 24 x 7, some at least 12-14 hours a day.  Each customer has a unique account number or a debit card number and is issued a phone banking code (called T-pin) also by the bank.  You can dial the bank call center number or the bank itself.  You will be directed to a self-operated menu system where you will be asked to enter your unique ID and code.  This code is a 4-6 digit number (different banks have different number of digits).  On verification of this information, you will be directed to a further menu through  [...]

Money should not control us, we should control our money. To keep a check on our finance and make our future secured, we must plan our finances by making strong budgets save money, set our priorities right, invest at the right place at the right time, and plan for a relaxed retirement. You may follow some of these tips to keep your finances healthy and sound- 1. Always determine your cash flow every month, and then plan your expenses. 2. Make a realistic budget and do your best to implement the same. 3. Make a list of fixed expenses, committed expenses, discretionary- expenses and then make your payments. 4. Shop and look for the best offers in terms of credit cards and savings accounts and choose the best interest rates and benefits. 5. Read books, magazines, and websites, to brush up your financial skills and try to work out your financial goals. 6. Spend less than you earn,  [...]

The work load on banks in India, handling cash deposits and cash withdrawals has increased and the only way to reduce the work load and handle the transactions is by the use of technology. Bankers are planning to install close to 2000 ATMs to help their customers for withdrawal and deposits of cash transactions. It has been observed that while the branches can handle only 50 to 60 cash transactions per day, ATM machines can handle 400 customers per day. The finance ministry has also proposed to the banks to outsource the deployment of ATMs to service providers, as this will help the banks to reduce their costs of operating their ATMs. Till date 26 public sector banks in India have selected nine service providers for 16 clusters and are all set to resume operations of banking via ATMs. The total number of ATMs in India is likely to go up from current 1 lakh to 1.75 lakh by the year 2016. The  [...]

The generation next has too many options in life, and this holds true for investments too. Investments can be in fixed deposits, or real estate or shares or debentures or for that matter in life insurance. However, when you are flooded with schemes of investments in various formats you tend to get confused and sometimes make wrong choices and bad investments. It is imperative that your investments must suit your future requirements, should have a liquidity value at any point of time, should grow at a decent rate and should be secured at all times. Any investment you make should have a purpose or a goal, and all your investments should have divisibility, else they could turn in to risky proposition in the long run. Your investments should be in a pattern that you can en cash your investments according to your financial requirements. For instance you cannot sell your investments in  [...]