Jan 02
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An excess payment is a fixed amount you must pay every time your insurer pays for repairs to your car. Usually, this is paid directly to the garage at the time you collect your car. However, if your car had to be written off, the excess amount that was agreed on the policy will be deducted from the settlement payment made to you.
If the other driver was at-fault, you can get your excess payment back from their insurance company. However, even though it is legally required for a driver to be insured, it is possible that you could get into an accident with an uninsured driver.
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Jan 02
This is the third and concluding article in a series that covers the perverse government bailout of AIG. The first piece covered how the insurance industry operates and where problems can arise, the second dove into the moral hazard of the AIG bailout, and this third piece will address not only the risks, but the history of over-the-counter [OTC] trading and what should be done to resolve its weaknesses. I do not believe that OTC trading should go away entirely. OTC trading has served a purpose for specialized transactions or when specific financial instruments are first traded.
When discussing over-the-counter instruments we are not talking about stocks trading via pink sheets or OTC because their price has dropped below exchange listing criteria.
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Jan 01
It’s 2010 already! We wish you all a happy new year. As of this date, The Smarter Wallet is just a little over a year old and continues to find its place in the wild world of the financial blogosphere. 2009 was a year of both personal and business growth for us, but it also was a year of financial challenge for so many people we know. So all in all, the year was a thoroughly mixed bag.
Image by the Huffington Post
We’d like to end the year and start the new one with a review of what went on in this blog. We
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Jan 01
This is just a reminder that as of 1/1/10, Sprint is changing their contracts to add a “Regulatory Charge” of 20 cents per month. Despite the name, this is nothing but an increase in your monthly plan cost, as it is not a consumer tax nor is it required by law. Because of this voluntary fee hike, you can now cancel your Sprint contract without an early termination fee (ETF). You must do this within 30 days of notification (check your billing statement).
After some early pushback, it appears that most Sprint reps are now aware of this legitimate out. Com
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