Unemployment benefits have been extended a few times in an effort to help those who are unable to find work. If you lose our job, unemployment benefits can help you through the tough times, but you do need to be aware of the requirements that might be placed upon you to qualify.

Are You Eligible to File for Unemployment Benefits?

Your first step is to figure out whether or not the way you left your job qualifies you for unemployment benefits. In order to qualify, you have to meet wage and time period requirements. Most states have an unemployment office, or you can get information from your state’s Department of Labor. In either case, find out what qualifications you have to meet in order to receive unemployment benefits.

Realize, too, that the way you leave your job matters. For the most part, you need to be laid off in order qualify to receive unemployment benefits. Generally, you are not entitled to unemployment benefits if you quit your job. Quitting for school, marriage, self-employment, or even illness are not considered good enough reasons for quitting and collecting unemployment benefits. Additionally, if you are fired for misconduct, or if you are involved in some other dispute, you probably won’t qualify for unemployment benefits.

There are exceptions to this rule, though, if you can prove that you quit for a “good cause.” This usually includes situations of a hostile work environment, or for some other reason. Your state’s unemployment office will decide what constitutes a good cause, and you can usually plead your case.

How Do You Maintain Unemployment Benefits?

Once you begin receiving unemployment benefits, you generally don’t continue to just receive them by virtue of the fact that you are out of work. Indeed, most states require that you meet certain qualifications to receive continued benefits. Generally, you need to be reading, willing, available, and able to work. You are expected to be ready to accept a job, and be physically able to perform work.

Many states also require that you check in with a case worker periodically to ensure that you are actively looking for a job. You may be required to update your resume, and submit it to various jobs. You may be asked to account for which job openings you applied for, as well as other actions you are taking in order to look for a job. Some states even set certain standards for work, and require that you accept jobs that meet those qualifications. If you balk at trying to find a job, or if your contact doesn’t think you are doing enough to find a new job, you might not be able to receive your unemployment benefits, or the amount you receive might be cut.

As you receive unemployment benefits, it’s also important to remember that you are taxed on them. You will need to figure that into your plans; in many cases, it’s important to get off the unemployment rolls as quickly as possible.

(Photo: Sean MacEntee)

Do You Qualify for Unemployment Benefits? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Qualified dividends also enjoy favorable tax rates, with the income taxed at long term capital gains, which make them especially appealing to those on fixed income, such as retirees. As long as the dividend is considered a qualified dividend, you can enjoy the lower rates.

So what are the capital gains tax rates for 2012?

Capital Gains Tax Rates

The capital gains rate you pay will depend on your ordinary income tax rate.

Unless something changes, capital gains rates are set to increase, along with ordinary income tax rates, after this year. Long term capital gains rates would increase to 10% for those in the 15% bracket and 20% for those taxpayers in higher brackets.

Primary Home Exclusion

There is one huge exception to the capital gains rule and it’s for your primary residence. If you sell your primary residence, defined as a place you lived in for two of the last five years, then you can exclude $250,000 of capital gains from your tax return. You simply don’t report it on your return and so you pay no tax. If you are married, the exclusion increases to $500,000 ($250k a piece). This can be a huge tax break depending on how much you gained on the sale of your home and makes owning a home so favorable (not including the mortgage interest rate tax deduction) compared to similar investments.

If you want to pay lower tax rates, then you need more capital gains. Easier said than done, huh?

(Photo: epicharmus)

How Capital Gains Taxes Work from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

How do you plan to pay for your child’s college education? Maybe a large portion of their tuition is covered by academic or athletic scholarships but for the average family, that isn’t the case. Needs based grants will only pay for a portion of the tuition making student loans a reality for many. A recent study by the Associated Press found that one out of every two college graduates either can’t find a job or they’re underemployed working in a field unrelated to their college major. This makes graduating with as little debt as possible a priority.

The 529 plan is the best answer to this problem. Although many plans used to allow for the purchase of years of college at today’s prices, most plans now work like a 401(k) where you invest money in to the plan and choose the mutual funds that fit your objectives. If you start contributing early, the tax advantages allow you to build up enough money to keep applying for student loans and many allow family and friends to contribute to the fund too.

The Best 529 Plans

529 plans are state sponsored but you don’t have to live in that state to enroll in their program. Some states offer tax advantages to residents who enroll in their state’s program. If that’s true of your state, take in to account your tax advantages when evaluating fees and investment return. The general rule is that states with no state tax will not offer a tax break and most states that do, provide deductions or credits for contributions.

To find the best 529 plans, start by going to savingforcollege.com and researching the plan in your state. Evaluate a 529 plan just as you would a 401(k). Keep the fees as low as possible and stick with low cost index funds unless there’s a reason to pay the extra fees for an actively managed fund.

Next, many of the major financial media outlets publish yearly articles where they compile a list of the best 529 plans. States like Nevada, Alaska, Utah, Ohio, and Virginia make the list each year because of low fees and great return. CBS, as well as Kiplinger and MSN publish lists to get you started.

Bottom Line

If you have a young child, you’re in the best position to start a college savings account now and some of the best 529 plans are the best tools for assuring that your child doesn’t have to graduate with debt.

Best 529 Plans from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

In some cases, this might include encouraging children to get summer jobs and help contribute to the family finances. Indeed, there are some families that ask kids to contribute to family finances in some way.

Putting Kids to Work on the Family Business

One way to do this is to put kids to work with the family business. Instead of paying employees, kids might help clean up, serve customers, or even just do some of the filing. This can be a way to cut expenses on a family business, while giving kids good work experience. While many parents would like to pay their kids for this kind of work, when money becomes tight, it might be that it isn’t an option.

Cut the Allowance

Whether you normally pay your kids for chores or not, if you might need that money for groceries, instead of to be used by your kids to buy a new video game. If you are in financial straits, paying an allowance, or paying for chores, might no longer be an option if you want to maintain some level of financial responsibility.

Appropriating Money from Outside Jobs

Still other families make the difficult decision to appropriate money from outside jobs. If your teenager has an after school job, the money made can be a valuable addition to the family. When that is the case, you might feel justified asking for a portion of the babysitting money, or the lawn care money. In many cases, kids are amendable to this idea — as long as it is clear that the money is needed for the good of the family.

Helping Your Child Understand Your Decision

If you do decide that your children need to help contribute to the family’s financial stability, it’s important that you be honest and up front about the situation. Explain that you are going through a difficult time, and that you would appreciate it if the child could help by taking a “pay cut” in allowance, by working at the family business for an extra few hours a week, or contributing after school earnings to the food budget.

Realize, though, that you can’t ask your child to make such sacrifices and then make none yourself. Show your child that you are sacrificing by forgoing some of your favorite activities, or by selling some of your stuff. If you are still having “date nights” while your kids are stuck at home, and having some of their money appropriated, they will become resentful.

You should also make it a point to talk about how everyone is helping, and thank your child for being an important part of the effort. When kids feel like they are making a real difference, they are more likely to want to help.

What do you thin? Should kids have to help maintain financial stability in a family?

(Photo: lantzilla)

Should Your Kids Contribute to Your Family’s Financial Stability? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

I have nothing against Zecco because I’ve never used them but their history of changing their fee structure has been a little disconcerting. In the beginning, they offered free trades, which seemed unbelievable and made me wonder if Zecco was a scam (it wasn’t). Then they made it so that you needed a $25,000 balance in your account to get 10 free trades. Then… they stopped their free trade program entirely. They were moving further away from free trades and closer to a fee structure like TradeKing, but without TradeKing’s customer service record. Their weaker customer service marks are understandable, you can’t expect to get free trades and top notch service. You get what you pay for and with TradeKing you get great customer service at only $4.95 a trade.

I’m interested to see how the merger works out. Hopefully Zecco is merged into TradeKing and nothing changes about TradeKing.

TradeKing & Zecco Merging from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

If it’s anything like the Bank of American settlement, it’ll take several months before the settlement is approved and even longer to figure out how much each person gets. At this point, the only thing to do is wait (and decide if you want to opt out). In the case of Bank of America, payments and account credits were automatically issued from the settlement fund after Court-approved disbursements were remove, for laywers and the like. Citizens is a much smaller bank but the settlement fund is smaller too, $137.5 million for Citizens versus $410 million in the BoA fund.

Citizens Bank Overdraft Fee Settlement from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Then there’s this article that spoke of a study where actors were hired to pose as average customers with one of four different types of portfolios. They visited 300 Boston area advisers and the large majority of advisers changed their portfolios to more fee laden options. Seriously?

My Other Pet Peeve

Along with the issues above, my other pet peeve is that the average American has no access to quality, non-biased financial advisers. The 99% can find one of those advisers in the Boston survey above because they’ll be quick to sell you a fee-heavy mutual fund, annuity, or life insurance policy but what about the advisers that don’t receive commissions? These fee only advisers can’t make a living on small accounts so often they won’t even talk to you over the phone unless you have a $100,000 or more to invest.

The average working American needs help with their investments. Just this past weekend I spent some time with family members and some of their friends. After I told them what I did and offered to look at one person’s 401(k), that turned in to looking at and adjusting 7 people’s retirement accounts.

They were in fee heavy actively managed funds when they should have been predominantly in low fee index funds. Their 401(k) was bleeding money away in fees not because they chose to do it that way but because it was one of the prebuilt options that their employer recommended. That, I believe, is a crime.

I see this every day and it bothers me. Average Americans need help and there should be advisers working with those people. That’s what I do with my practice and I’m looking to expand that offering. I believe that if advisers provide an affordable option to middle class Americans, they would gladly accept the help and that’s what I’m out to prove.

The Numbers

I’m currently conducting a survey to see if my theory is correct and here’s what I’ve found so far. As of the time of this writing, 81% of Americans are worried that they won’t have enough money for retirement, 78% of middle class Americans don’t have a financial adviser, 88% report little or no investment knowledge, and 82% claim that they have little or no confidence in their ability to pick the right mutual funds for their 401(k). If that doesn’t sound like a whole lot of people who desperately need the help of stand-up, ethical financial advisers, I don’t know what does.

And here’s the second part of the survey, 63% said that having an unbiased professional help them with their 401(k) would be extremely or highly beneficial and another 23% said it would be moderately beneficial. We have to do something about this problem. One out of every four people is postponing retirement because they don’t have enough savings. We as advisers can’t let this happen. People work hard and sacrifice time with their family throughout their working life. They should be able to make up for that time once they retire.

The financial advising community has failed and we have to change that. Sure, Americans have to take responsibility by saving more but financial advisers have to stop worrying about fees and start seeing themselves as financial physicians who have an obligation to help everybody.

Will You Help?

I’m putting my money where my mouth is. I want to make more of a commitment to middle class Americans who need help but I’m not yet sure how to do it. Would you click here to take a 5 minute, anonymous survey that would help me develop this business model? Not only do I plan to use the results of this survey for my own practice but I hope to continue writing about it to raise awareness. Your help would be greatly appreciated.

Am I wrong? What’s your take on this topic? How is the advising community failing the middle class and what do you need from the financial advising community. There’s no shame in not knowing enough about your 401(k). I probably don’t know enough about what you do for a living. Let me know how financial advisers can help people of all income levels.

Are Financial Advisers Failing the 99%? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

But what is prepaid debit? And is it really a good idea?

The Basics of Prepaid Debit

A prepaid debit card is one that you can load up with funds and use as a credit or debit card. These cards usually come emblazoned with the logo of a payment processor, like Visa, MasterCard, or AmericanExpress, and can be used wherever the logo is accepted. A prepaid debit card doesn’t need to be attached to a bank account. Many prepaid debit cards also allow for direct deposit, so your paycheck can be deposited onto the card automatically.

When you use a prepaid debit card for a transaction, it works like any other plastic method of payment. However, the money comes from the funds associated with the card. You can’t spend more than you have. Prepaid debit offers the convenience of a credit card without the debt, and without the need for a bank account.

The Drawback to Prepaid Debit: Cost

Prepaid debit is being touted as a way to teach kids the ways of plastic, and as a way to conveniently manage finances without debt, and without the need for a bank. However, the costs of prepaid debit cards can be quite high. Many prepaid debit cards include the following fees:

• Account opening fee
• Fee to load the card
• ATM fees (including to check your balance)
• Inactivity fee if you don’t use the card
• Monthly fee just for having the card
• Fee when you buy a prepaid debit card at a retailer

These fees start to add up quickly. The good news, though, is that there are some prepaid debit cards with relatively low fees. The WalMart MoneyCard Prepaid Card, the American Express Prepaid Card, the UPside Visa all feature no monthly/annual fees, or very low monthly fees if you load a certain minimum each month. If you shop around, it’s possible to find good deals in prepaid debit cards, and these cards can work well if you can avoid fees.

Prepaid Cards: Ideal for the “Unbanked”

Prepaid cards are being marketed as an alternative to opening an account with the big banks and their big account fees. However, many prepaid debit cards end up costing more each month than an account fee at a bank. Plus, there are still plenty of banks out there that offer free checking and other fee-free banking services.

In reality, prepaid debit cards are most ideal for those who are “unbanked.” This is a segment of the population that can’t qualify for a bank account, whether it’s because of a certain financial situation, or because a ChexSystems report or some other consumer report disqualifies them. If you can’t get a bank account, compare the cost of prepaid debit to what you are paying to use checking cashing places for your paychecks. You might find that you can save money with prepaid debit.

For most consumers with the ability to use a bank account, prepaid debit probably isn’t the way to go. Some of the low cost or free options might be attractive for those who want additional flexibility and convenience in family finances, but, for the most part, prepaid debit is a poor substitute for fee-free banking.

(Photo: beaugiles)

Is Prepaid Debit a Good Idea? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Today, we’re going to take a look at the serial numbers and how they work.

First, we need to separate “new” style bills from old ones. New bills are the ones introduced within the last few years. They feature enormous faces that aren’t on those familiar black backgrounds. Here’s an example of a new bill:

Here’s an old one:

How Serial Numbers Work

On the new bills, the serial number starts with a letter that corresponds with the “series” of the bill. New series are issued when there is a change to something on the bill, like a new signature for the Secretary of the Treasury or the Treasurer of the United States. Old style bills do not have this letter corresponding to the series.

The next letter, or the first on older bills, corresponds to the Federal Reserve Bank that issued the bill. You might recall on old bills there used to be a large letter on a bill. In redesigns, that letter was removed. You can still see that on $1 bills, the large “L”, since they haven’t been redesigned. I include a list of the letters and corresponding Federal Reserve districts below.

The number (and last letter) itself is just an increasing counter of bills issued by each bank and are unique to each bill issued a bank. The New York Fed and the San Francisco Fed will both issue a bill with the serial number 12345678X, but the NY Fed won’t issue two bills numbered 12345678X (with one exception, which I’ll explain shortly).

If instead of a letter at the end you see a star, it means it’s a replacement note. The original was never released because of a printing error. The serial number series for replacement notes is completely different so you can have a duplicate serial number, one with a star and one without.

Federal Reserve District Letters

As mentioned above, the letters correspond to the districts of the Federal Reserve Banking system, here are the letters and the corresponding district:

• A: Boston, MA
• B: New York, NY
• C: Philadelphia, PA
• D: Cleveland, OH
• E: Richmond, VA
• F: Atlanta, GA
• G: Chicago, IL
• H: St. Louis, MO
• I: Minneapolis, MN
• J: Kansas City, MO
• K: Dallas, TX
• L: San Francisco, CA

The various districts don’t print the currency, that’s handled by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, which is part of the United States Treasury. Logistically, the BEP prints the money and sells it to the Federal Reserve Banks at manufacturing cost (the Bureau of the Mint sells coins at face value) and then the FRBs distribute the money to various financial institutions using a variety of mechanisms.

I have yet to see, in person, a bill with a star.

How Serial Numbers on US Money Work from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

About seven months ago, I started running. I never ran when I was younger. I sucked (and probably still do) at running. I thought of myself as “not a runner” and seven months ago I thought I’d change that. I see all sorts of people running, why can’t I? Running is tough. It’s tough on your ankles, your knees, your hips, your leg muscles, and your chest. I decided to put aside pride and start slow, especially since it was freezing out, and build my way up. I’m not going to blow away times but I’ve been able to consistently increase my distances and decrease my times to the point where I can run several miles at speeds that make me happy.

What does this have to do with personal finance? It’s no different than learning something new, whether it’s golf or running or whatever. It’s going to be slow at first until you build up momentum, get your systems all set up, and finally hit your stride. Don’t get frustrated early on when the gains aren’t there, if you endure, you will succeed.

Here are this week’s finds:

• SavvySugar at Wisebread shares a nine thrifty, meaningful gifts for Mom in case you were a procrastinator and hadn’t gotten your Mom something yet. These ideas are light on the wallet but make up for it in time.
• Joan Otto, Man Vs. Debt’s community manager, shares how she hustled to earn a few extra bucks to help pay down nearly $90,000 in credit card debt. Credit card debt is easy to accumulate and extremely hard to eliminate.
• One of our writers, Miranda, shares five of the biggest lies freelance clients could be telling you on her site. I think the people who do this are shady (that tell the lies), there’s no reason to do this if you plan on building a legitimate business for the long haul. With successful businesses, everyone wins together.
• Want to land your dream job? J Money shares his 6 tips to landing your dream job. These tips work for anyone trying to land any job.

Have a great weekend!

(Photo: jdhancock)

Roundup: So… I’ve Been Running from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

I haven’t gotten a tax refund in a while because when you run a business, you typically make quarterly estimated tax payments which, if you do the math right, net out to zero. Any overpayment or underpayment you apply to estimated payments. It makes for some boring tax day celebrations! That said, when I did get tax returns, I always tried to minimize them by adjusting my withholding and then doing something fun when my math was off.

What did you do with yours? (if you had one!)

Your Take: What Are You Doing With Your Tax Refund? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Luckily, there are plenty of activities that are free, low cost or there are ways to make a high priced activity much more affordable. Today I thought I would look at some of the more traditional activities and how you might be able to cut the price down to reasonable levels.

Baseball!

I live in Florida where it seems like every city, large or small, have a baseball stadium used for Spring training by the professional teams. Once spring training is over, those stadiums are home to minor league baseball. I find those games even more fun than professional games because there isn’t a bad seat anywhere.

What’s even better is that seats aren’t expensive and you can often find tickets on Craigslist for less than $20 per ticket. If you don’t live in Florida or another spring training town, there is likely a minor league team close by.

Sure, this isn’t a no cost activity but remember, you can always check out community baseball games for free or find an empty diamond, call some friends, and have a game of your own.

Museums

Check out this interesting article about places kids should see before they become adults. Hardly a trip for budget conscious families but one thing sticks out in this article: Museums. Even if you have to pay to get in to a museum, the admission price is often reasonable but forget about that. Your local library may have fee passes to a children’s museum and where I live, I’m constantly seeing coupons for free admission for the family if one person pays.

Movies

Of course you could stay home and rent a movie but the kids are only going to find the fun in that so many times. My favorite way to make a great night out at the movies is to go to the park. In the summer, many parks set up a big screen and show children’s movies for free. Bring a blanket, some snacks, and maybe a chair or two. Some outdoor malls do this as well.

The Zoo

You’re probably not far away from a city zoo and there’s no doubt that making the day of it is fun for all ages. The problem is that the zoo can be expensive. Like museums, you can usually find coupons to slash the price but that still might not bring the price down enough. Do you have a nature preserve or arboretum? These are often free. If you live near a body of water that is fit for swimming, buy a few cheap snorkels and check out the marine life. The great thing about nature is that you can always find it for free.

Finally

Don’t count out the traditional activities because they’re too expensive. Often times they don’t qualify as low cost activities but with a little creativity and a watchful eye for coupons, you might be able to bring them down to something that doesn’t leave you feeling guilty on Monday.

How to Make Costly Weekend Activities More Affordable from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

The service is called CheckMate and there are two ways to deposit your check remotely. The first way is to download their ING Direct app, take a photo, and upload it. The second involves taking a picture of the check, logging into the website, and uploading it.

I used the ING Direct app and the process was painless. There is a limit of $3,000 maximum per check and after you take a photo of the front and back, you’re asked to enter the amount of the check (it won’t read it off the image, or they use it as verification). Then, you’re told the deposit will be available May 17th. Once ING receives the image, they email you. Once the deposit is confirmed, they email you again (and you can destroy the check).

Seems pretty pretty easy to me, hopefully the deposit goes through!

Update: Deposit was confirmed within a couple hours of submission.

ING Direct Offers Remote Check Depositing from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

The basic premise is that you have a Daily Disposable Income (DDI) that you can spend each time, similar to the points system of Weight Watchers. Through journals and active tracking, you can make sure that you don’t spend more than your DDI each day. There are other principals that build on it, like the Power of 365 (seeing the impact of one daily purchasing decision over a year), but the core idea is still about the DDI.

The second half of the book is basically a journal, which is valuable but I thought it wasn’t as useful to print out a small journal for half the book. Overall, I think the idea of a daily amount you can spend, both arriving to that number and then figuring out the impact of your decisions, can be very powerful if you find budgeting extremely difficult to maintain.

Review: Wealth Watchers by Alice Wood from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

If you’re the hands off kind of investor, keeping these 401(k) accounts as they are, scattered with different investment institutions is allowable but probably a bad idea for a few reasons. First, they’re hard to manage. Just keeping track of a checking and a savings account is hard enough for some people who are constantly on the run. Second, since you’re limited to only a small offering of mutual funds, you can open up the amount of products available to you by consolidating these 401(k)s in to one IRA account. Here’s how.

Step 1- Collect Your Data

You’re going to need all of the contact information for the investment institutions holding your 401(k) accounts. This includes user names and passwords for each. This may involve contact the HR department of your old employer if you haven’t held on to any statements.

Step 2- Open an IRA

If you need the help of a financial adviser to manage this account, speak to them before opening an account. If you plan to do it yourself, look for companies that offer no cost IRAs. Scottrade, as well as others, offer a no cost IRA and some even give you money when you open the account. Often you can set up these accounts online in about 10 minutes.

Step 3- Do the Conversion

Contact each holder of your 401(k) accounts and complete the appropriate transfer forms. Understand that there may be transfer fees involved with the transfer. If the fees are due to only having the IRA for a short period of time, transfer the accounts that you’ve had the longest and let the newer accounts stay where they are until enough years pass to significantly lower or eliminate the fees.

Step 4- Get Help

If you’re not as financially literate as you would like to be, get help from a fee only financial adviser. They can help you put together a proper asset allocation with the lowest possible fees. Because of the large amount of investment products available in an IRA versus a 401(k), putting together a low fee portfolio is much easier in an IRA.

Alternatively

If you don’t want to have to manage the money in an IRA, often you can transfer the funds from other 401(k) accounts in to the 401(k) plan you have with your current employer. It’s rarely a good idea, financially or logistically, to have multiple accounts so even if you leave this employer at a later date, it will be a lot easier to transfer one account instead of two or more. Also remember that IRA accounts, just like 401(k)s, aren’t tied to an employer so if you change jobs, the IRA account will remain in tact.

Bottom Line

IRA accounts hold many distinct advantages of a 401(k) but make sure you contribute the maximum amount that your current employer will match in to your current 401(k). Never turn down free money.

How to Consolidate Your 401(k)s in to an IRA from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.