Crosby Finance

When considering a financing option for your staffing company, there are several options that may be available when dealing with a factoring or payroll funding source. Let’s explore 2 options: Factoring and Payroll Funding with Back Office Support.

Staffing company owners generally find out quickly when starting their company that it is a very CASH intensive business. The concept of staffing is simple: you market your services to potential clients, sign a contract to place your employees or contractors with those clients, identify suitable candidates for jobs, send your people for those jobs, then bill for your services. The only problem is that you hire the employees and pay their salaries generally on a weekly basis, yet your clients can take from 3 weeks to 3 months to pay your invoices. This creates a cash flow deficit almost immediately! The concept is simple, yet in reality, it takes positive cash flow to pick up the clients, pay your employees, and wait to get paid for your services.

One of the easiest and most effective solutions available to staffing companies is to locate a suitable funding source for your business. It is generally a pretty painless process to get approved for funding, and it will allow staffing owners to take on qualified new clients without the worry of paying for your employees before getting paid on your invoices. You submit your invoices to the factoring company, and are paid a discounted percentage (usually 80 - 90%) immediately for those invoices. Once the invoices are paid, the factor deducts a small percentage as a fee, and returns the rest to the staffing company. This program is referred to as factoring or invoice factoring, and the service is provided without back office services. In other words, invoicing, billing, payroll tax filing and payment, W2 submittals, etc. are created and maintained by the staffing company, and the factoring company only provides funding for invoices.

Some factoring companies go a step further and take the administrative responsibility off the staffing owner and provide back office services along with funding invoices. These services include funding 100% of payroll & payroll taxes, processing weekly payroll, processing weekly billings, creating original invoices and submitting those invoices to the staffing clients on their behalf, preparation and submittal of payroll taxes as required, creating payroll checks, payroll journals, check registers, invoice previews, accounts receivables agings, gross profit reports, and preparation of year-end W-2’s. The fees for this type of funding can be a bit higher than for factoring, however many staffing owners would like to relieve themselves of administrative duties to concentrate on revenue producing activities such as signing up new clients and sending out more temps to their clients.

Either program can be an effective solution for staffing owners, it really depends on your tolerance for administrative activities.

I feel a need to go back to the basics. After years of hearing the phrase high volume merchants, I still encounter some perfectly running businesses who have not acquired their own high volume merchant account. When I tell execs about the possibilities it offers, they say they will consider applying for one. It seems to me that these businesses have reached their equilibrium, and at this point wish nothing but to maintain it. I say otherwise. Equilibrium in business is death. Seek constant disequilibrium — that’s a way to survive. We all live in a cycle and once this cycle becomes static and reaches plateau, there’s nowhere else to go but down. Right, Tom Peters?

WHAT’S YOUR BEEF?
My friend is downright frank with me. He says it has nothing to do with equilibrium. It’s just that these businessmen haven’t caught up with the trend of accepting credit cards online. Sure they accept credit cards, apart from the usual checks and the occasional debit cards, but they only use a POS and other manual processing equipment. And even though they’ve heard of virtual processing, they are iffy about applying because of the high incidence of fraud associated with it.

HIGH VOLUME IS NOT HIGH RISK?
So maybe they have not educated themselves well enough about high volume merchant account. Or maybe they got it wrong. Let me just make it clear. Some of these execs may have even mistaken high volume for high risk. This is kinda funny. HIGH VOLUME identifies itself uniquely from all other high risk merchant accounts. How? By the mere fact that it doesn’t have to involve so-called illegal activities like gambling, pornography, etc. High volume simply means your business transacts from a minimum of $10,000 USD monthly to maybe $10 million USD and even exceeding that.

If your sales are considered high volume and you’re still not enrolled to a high volume merchant account provider’s services, where have you been hiding?

Now, let me list down the benefits of having a high volume merchant account:

1. VIRTUAL TERMINAL
Once the merchant account is up and you are ready to accept credit cards, it’s likely that your provider will let you process checks and other forms of payment using a virtual terminal. If you do the math, not only will you preserve the old-age functions of your business, you will also likely quadruple your sales as soon as you acquire your virtual terminal.

2. SAVINGS AND REDUCED RATES
High volume merchants profess that the new account has helped them save thousands of dollars per year, with discounts and promotions. Moreover, if your business is considered high risk and you’re enrolled in an offshore bank, you get the privilege of reduced tax and non-governmental interference.

3. STATEMENT/ACCOUNT HISTORY REPORTING
Keeping count of your transactions whether it’s daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly is extremely valuable to your business. Account providers ease your burden plus give you quick access to your account statements if you wish to view it online.

4. PROTECTION FROM FRAUD
It’s mere common sense to apply only for a high volume merchant account that offers protection from fraud. This is the number one reason why some merchants don’t want to take the first step towards application. A sophisticated system like SSL or 128-bit database encryption will ensure no identity theft will happen. This results in less chargebacks.

5. SHOPPING CART
How you do your business remains the same except that your customers will find more ease in buying your products and services. For a discussion of online shopping cart, see “Streetsmart Tips in Choosing Your Online Shopping Cart”.

Bottom line: It simplifies your business process. Of course, if you can’t help but be dubious, you always have an alternative: Buy your own payment gateway system. In the end, the real underlying benefit of acquiring a high volume merchant account is that pretty much all the investment that you put returns to you and in the long run, will reduce your costs while exponentially helping your sales increase.

Credit reports and credit scores are very important for people all over the United States. There are three major credit bureaus that operate for consumers in the United States and they are the ones who are responsible for the credit scores and credit reports that you can request about yourself. But do these credit reports and scores really matter? Furthermore, what consequences can a bad credit score or report have on your future? Likewise, are there any benefits to having a better credit score to your name?

Obtaining your Credit Report and Credit Score

The three major credit bureaus in the United States are Experian, TransUnion, and Equifax. All of these credit bureaus obtain information about consumers all over the United States, and if you have a credit card in your name then you automatically are eligible for a credit report and credit score. It must also be noted that these credit bureaus calculate each of their scores slightly differently, although there’s talk of standardizing the way credit scores are calculated.

In any case, however, the United States has mandated that consumers are eligible to obtain one credit report about themselves each year absolutely free. In order to do this one of the places you can go to obtain it is AnnualCreditReport.com. By visiting that website you can easily obtain your credit report online. However, in order to see your credit score there may be a small fee involved.

Why Credit Scores and Reports Matter

If you are undecided about whether or not you should obtain your credit score and credit report then you might as well obtain your credit report for free. There are many reasons why, but the best reason of all is so that you can keep track of your credit reports and what’s listed. There are also many reasons why your credit report and scores do matter. In order to obtain automobile loans, mortgages, personal loans, as well as any other type of loan product the bank or other company will more than likely find out your credit score. If your credit score is too low then they may automatically deny you access to different privileges and loan products.

However, if you do have a low score but have extenuating circumstances that are listed on your credit report then the lenders that you choose to work with will be able to see all of that. Furthermore, smaller loan companies may even work with you if you explain why you do have such a low credit score.

Benefits of Good Credit Scores

On the other hand, if you have a high credit score that’s over 700 and a clean credit report then those two things will work in your favor also. For example, one can obtain mortgages with lower interest rates, as well as a whole host of other benefits that go along with loan packages from banks and credit unions. When you consider the benefits of having a high credit score and positive credit report then one should realize that it definitely does pay off!

All things considered, doing your best to keep your credit report as clean as possible is of utmost importance when obtaining loan products from banks and other lenders. In other words, it truly pays off to work towards the goal of financial independence by having a positive credit report and score to your name!

Banks and other financial institutions are rushing to enter partnerships with mobile operators (wireless carriers) to offer a new breed of integrated financial products, all controlled from the convenience of your mobile phone (cell phone).

These new products integrate a traditional bank account with a mobile tariff package (rate or minute plan) and innovatively give you secure control over your finances from this mobile phone.

Competition amongst financial institutions for consumer’s current account business is intense, and differentiation by any means other than price is very desirable; hence the attraction of an integrated proposition to financial institutions. Mobile operators, keen to reduce churn (where consumers move between networks to gain a new handset or lower tariffs), see financial institutions as having developed longer lasting relationships with their customers.

When considering constructing an integrated banking and telecommunications proposition a financial institution (for example Barclays, HSBC, Natwest or Lloyds) needs to decide the depth of relationship that they require with the mobile operator. Will a simple co-marketing arrangement suffice? This is easy to construct but brings no long term customer loyalty benefits. Or, do you require a much deeper relationship such as a Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) agreement. This allows the financial institution to provide a customised customer experience and enhanced end to end security.

If the financial institution opts for a Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) agreement then the importance of ensuring one has competitive terms and conditions from the host mobile operator can not be over stressed. Piran Partners (www.piranpartners.com) advises the creation of a detailed model to stress check the targeted consumer’s behaviour, calling patterns and your wholesale costs.

In many respects, financial institutions are ideally positioned to become successful and profitable providers of mobile telecommunication services; boosting their revenues by circa £400 per customer. Perhaps this is why so many financial institutions are considering this option? International copyright Piran Partners LLP, 2007.

(c) Piran Partners LLP, 2007.

Subjects that this report on mortgage credit will examine are PPI, credit history and improving it, debt consolidation, APR rates and why this can lead you off track plus much more.

Nowadays the mortgage and finance industry is very competitive, the aim of this page is to give you enough knowledge to take advantage of the increase in bargain deals. Although we don’t promise earth shattering savings, by following the simple steps a substantial saving could be made on your monthly mortgage payment. With remortgages for people with bad credit getting lots of rejections can be daunting and most lenders will not accept bad credit, therefore our aim here is to reduce rejections and increase cheap accepted applications.

Tip I : Make sure you can afford the payments ! Ensure you can afford the payments even if interest rates rise in the future. If possible fix the remortgages for people with bad credit is better for you.

Tip II : Compare deals from varies lenders or let an independent mortgage adviser do it for you. We suggest you compare rates using the internet before accepting any offer. Use online mortgage league tables to see what kind of interest rate are being offer for customers with CCJs.

Tip III - What payment protection cover should I take ? You may have seen several programs on TV recently saying that PPI is a rip off. This may be the case it depends on your risk profile. If you have a large amount of easily accessible savings then you may not need cover. If you have no savings then cover may be of benefit to you. If you are considering taking PPI on your remortgages for people with bad credit then rather than comparing APRs compare the TARs or (Total Amounts Repayable). Because one lender may charge a cheaper APR but a bigger amount for the protection you could be better paying a higher APR and getting the cheaper cover throughout the term.

Tip IV : Use a remortgages for people with bad credit specialist broker or independent mortgage adviser. These experts normally have access to nearly every mortgage product on the market and thus can source you the best possible deal. Unlike banks these brokers have access to many financial products.

Where do I go from here?

Please make sure you have carried out the appropriate steps listed above. For remortgages for people with bad credit a website that can help can be found here Bad Debt Remortgages

It is the summer of 2007 and there are many brand new homes on the market. Herein lies a potential problem for you if you are looking for a brand new home in a new subdivision. If you have been paying attention to the marketplace, you might know that some builders are offering fantastic incentives to attract buyers. At this time in many areas, buyers are staying away in droves.

Imagine this scenario for a moment. You are driving around on a pleasant Sunday afternoon and you see a subdivision with all new houses and a new golf course. You love the model house you tour and you decide to buy. It is your lucky day because the builder happens to have that exact model as part of their unsold inventory.

The price you and the builder have settled on is for $200K. You move in, play a few rounds of golf, and all is well. Three weeks after you move in, you are driving home and you notice a new sign in front of that builders model. You are stunned because the new sign is for $175K. What happened to your $25,000.00?

Can it happen? You bet it can happen and in a market like we are currently in, I expect it will happen. You as a buyer need to be vigilant and do as much homework as you possibly can. Do you want to be one of the first buyers in a new subdivision or at the end of the build out?

In the housing business, it is the values of houses similar to yours, in close proximity to yours, that determine the value of your house. I hope you don’t have to move in a year and the builder has sold three more houses on the street, all for $175,000.00.

As mentioned in an early article, there are two types of credit cards: secured and unsecured. This article will explore some of the issues of secured credit cards.

What is a secured credit card?

A secured card is a credit card that requires you to deposit a certain amount of money into a savings account, money market account, or certificate of deposit. The minimum amount usually ranges between $200 and $500 but this will vary from one company to another. Your deposit is considered your security and some card issuers will even allow the deposit to earn interest.

The amount that you deposit into the account is your credit limit. You should understand that sometimes the limit will be for the full amount that you put into the account but with some companies your limit may be a percentage of the total amount that you deposited.

A secured credit card is not a debit card. This is important to understand because if full payments are not made each month, interest will be charged on the outstanding balance.

Who should consider using secured credit cards?

If you have no credit history at all, using a secured credit card can be a good way to begin establishing your credit. Many young people who are just starting out may choose this as an option.

If you have bad credit, you may wish to use a secured credit card to help you improve your credit score. In addition, a secured credit card may be the only source you will have for obtaining a credit card. There are some transactions that require the use of a credit card. This might include car rentals or hotel reservations. If you need to make those types of transactions and cannot get an unsecured credit card, this might be the only way you can get a true credit card.

What to look for in a secured credit card:

Interest Rate: Do not be fooled into thinking that because you have no credit history or a bad credit report that you have to settle for exorbitant interest rates. Make it a point to shop around for the lowest rates that you qualify for before you apply for a secured credit card.

Fees: Pay close attention to any fees that will be charged to you or to your account once it is opened. There are some companies that will charge ridiculously high fees that will reduce your initial deposit before you even use the card. Stay away from those companies. Look for companies that have no fees whatsoever or for those companies that charge a small one-time fee to set up the account. Annual fees for attractive secured cards typically range from $20-$35.

Scams: It is sad to say that there are companies out there who are in the business of ripping people off. They prey on the vulnerability of those who may be in a credit crunch. Some of the things they do include promises of getting you “quick credit” for a price. Another popular scam is to ask you to call a 900 phone number for “secrets” to getting a credit card or credit repair. Your phone company will charge you a high rate for using a 900 number and you never get the information that was offered.

The best advice to avoid secured credit card scams is that if it sounds too good to be true it is. Use your common sense and do not be taken by these crooks.

Credit Improvement Issues: Even with a very good payment history on your secured card it can takes many months before you begin to see improvement in your credit record. You have to be patient when repairing bad credit. You also have to be smart. Make sure that the company that issues the secured credit card to you will report your good payment history to the three big credit reporting agencies. Not all companies report and if they do not report you are simply wasting your time.

Keep in mind that they will also report your bad payment history if you do not pay on time. Be careful and make your payments on time each and every month.

The first time you are getting a loan, it can be confusing what all is needed and how to start. This outlines the steps to getting a loan from picking a lender to closing.

1) Picking a Lender.
Comparing lenders can be daunting. All the components of a loan including the interest rate, origination fee, points, and other miscellaneous fees are hard to sort through. Fortunately, you can get the Annual Percentage Rate (APR) from each lender for each of their programs. The APR is basically an interest rate calculated with the base interest rate plus all the closing costs, so basically, if you have zero closing costs, then the interest rate and the APR will be equal.

Zero closing costs would be great, but it is typical to have an origination fee of about 1%, credit application fees, document preparation fees, and the appraisal fee. When comparing rates, the lower the interest rate, the less interest you will pay over the life of the loan. When comparing the APRs, you are comparing the interest rate plus the closing costs. This is helpful because some quoted interest rates may seem low until you realize that the lender is charging you a point (1% of sales price) for that better rate. If you are comparing APRs as well as interest rates, the APR will show as being much higher than anything without points.

There are of course other reasons to weigh in when choosing a lender. Local lenders tend to know the local real estate market better and are familiar with the state laws for lending. Having a responsive and reliable lender is always invaluable because you are going to count on your lender to get you through the underwriting process in a timely manner.

2) Deciding which type of loan is best for you.
To figure out what loan program fits your needs, a lender is a helpful guide. You can speak with one to get a grip on what programs might work and then call around for rates for that program from other lenders. In general, the different type of loans are: 30 year fixed, 15 year fixed, and ARMs (adjustable rate mortgages).

The fixed rate loan programs have the monthly payments fixed. The ARMs are typically fixed for a certain amount of time and then adjusts along with the prime. For example, a 5 year ARM has a fixed interest rate (and hence monthly payments) for 5 years and adjusts for the remainder of the loan life. Most of the ARMs are amortized over 30 years, which means the monthly payments are calculated as if you are paying the loan off in 30 years. So, in the 5-year ARM case, the interest rate will adjust for 25 years. Most people refinance or sell the property before the 5 years are up so that they do not have to deal with the adjusting interest rate.

3) Submitting your mortgage application.
Once you have picked your lender, you will submit your loan application. This is usually personal information including your social security number, salary, recurring debt, and savings. They pull your credit score and figure out your debt-to-income ratio. With these two pieces of information, they can find which loan programs you qualify for and which might work best for you.

4) Getting a Pre-Approval Letter
Once you have submitted your mortgage application, you can get pre-approved. This will provide you with a letter from your lender that basically says your debt-to-income ratio and credit score qualify you for the loan program. This letter is helpful to have when you put in offers to show that you are a strong, qualified buyer. Many listing agents will advise their sellers to not even accept an offer unless it is accompanied by a letter, especially in good markets, where as a seller, you do not want to tie up a property with an unqualified buyer.

5) Processing Your Application
At this point, the application has been just the buyer’s word, and now the lender will need to proof of all the income and debts you had provided, so they will ask for documentation like bank statements and w2s. These statements are verified.

6) Underwriting the Loan and Final Approval
At this point, you have found a home and want to get the loan. The lender will need to send the house contract and your documentation to underwriting to basically give final approval. As well, the lender will have an appraisal on the property to assess its value. This ensures to them that if for some reason the property goes into foreclosure and they end up owning the property, that the value will still cover the amount owed on the loan. The lender will also need to approve the survey. This is to ensure there are no major encroachments on the property. And in addition, they sometimes require flood certificates or wood-destroying insect certificates, depending on where you are located in the country. These again ensure the property is not a disaster waiting to happen. These are all precautions the lender takes before allowing funding on a property because they want to not get stuck with a worthless asset, but it is also another assurance for the buyer that the property is decent.

7) Funding and Closing
Once the sellers and buyers have gone to closing and signed all the papers, including the Settlement Statement showing all the fees and loan amounts, this paperwork is submitted back to the lender. The lender will then double check everything was signed and give a final funding number. This number allows the funds from the lender to be released and the property is funded! The process is complete and you can now enjoy your home, just remember to make your monthly mortgage payments.

There are two basic credit card types: secured and unsecured. This article explores some of the issues associated with unsecured credit cards.

First, what is an unsecured credit card? An unsecured credit card is a card (and credit line) that does not require any security deposit from you. These unsecured credit cards are generally intended for those people with a fairly good credit history.

Nearly all unsecured credit cards will come with a credit limit. This is the total amount of credit that you can charge to the card. If you go over that limit, you may be penalized. The actual amount of the credit limit is determined by the card issuer and it does not have to be same for every person. In other words, one person may have a limit of $500 while another may have a limit of $5000.

There are some important issues associated with an unsecured credit card that consumers should understand. A few of those issues include:

The Grace Period: You should read and understand the grace period that applies to each of your credit cards. The grace period is the amount of time that you have to pay your balance before the card issuer begins charging you interest on the balance. If you pay your balance in full before the grace period ends you will not be charged interest. Each company has its own amount of time for grace payments so be sure you read each company’s policy.

Annual Fee: Before you apply for an unsecured credit card see if the company charges an annual fee. This is a yearly fee that is charged to your account or may have to be paid in advance. Annual fees are more often associated with secured credit cards but you may see them with unsecured as well.

Balance Transfer: Your unsecured credit card may offer what is known as a balance transfer. A balance transfer is when you have an existing balance with another company and you transfer that balance over to the new card.

Why would you do this? If the new card has a substantially lower interest rate you can save money.

Annual Percentage Rate: Of particular interest to anyone who plans to apply for or use an unsecured credit card is the APR that is associated with the card. This is the amount of interest that the company will charge you if you do not pay off the full balance within the grace period allowed. As you might imagine, the lower the ARP, the less you will have to pay in interest charges.

Finance Charge: Your unsecured credit card may include finance charges that are above and beyond the APR. Finance charges are most often triggered when you take out a cash advance. Again, make sure you understand these charges before you use the card for purposes that trigger added finance charges.

Gold or Platinum Cards: These cards usually carry a higher credit limit and may come with some extra benefits or reward programs. These are nice to have but make sure you are not paying extra for something that you will not use.

A mortgage is a method of using property (real or personal) as security for the payment of a debt. Mortgage fees have been rising of late as providers reduce their headline annual percentage rates to attract new business. In most jurisdictions mortgages are strongly associated with loans secured on real estate rather than other property (such as ships) and in some cases only land may be mortgaged. In many countries it is normal for home purchases to be funded by a mortgage.

Part of a successful home purchase includes finding the best possible home loan. On a home purchase, the process of transferring ownership from the seller to the buyer, the disbursement of funds from the buyer and the lender to the seller, and the execution of all the documents associated with the sale and the loan. The federal government has a number of programs available to help prospective buyers purchase homes. Even with good credit, most borrowers will have a hard time borrowing 100 percent of the purchase price today. Make sure you fully understand the mortgage process by checking out what to Know When Shopping for a Mortgage to Purchase a Home.

Typically, creditors are banks, insurers or other financial institutions that make loans available for the purpose of real estate purchase. In some jurisdictions, mortgage loans are non-recourse loans: if the funds recouped from sale of the mortgaged property are insufficient to cover the outstanding debt, the lender may not have recourse to the borrower after foreclosure. If the loan is sold, the originator replenishes its funds and can make more loans to other homebuyers. There is a network of sub-prime lenders, mortgage brokers, warehouse lenders and investment bankers who make possible the delivery of loans to sub-prime borrowers. With most loans you pay off the interest on the loan before you pay off the principal (or the actual amount you borrowed).

It is common for home mortgage transactions to include an escrow agreement where the borrower adds a specified amount for taxes and hazard insurance to the regular monthly mortgage payment. The money goes into an escrow account out of which the lender pays the taxes and insurance when they come due. You can also get insurance to protect your income or just your mortgage payments if you become ill or disabled, or lose your job.

Get familiar with the language and fundamental terminology you’ll encounter when getting a mortgage loan. You can get free independent advice about mortgage difficulties from several organizations. And if you’re a first time home buyer, you need to know the mortgage basics and what to expect with your first home loan. With today’s real estate market, it’s important to find a mortgage loan that’s ideal for you, your finances, and your future home.