Canadian Personal Finance Blog

Archive for the ‘Cash’ Category

Yes folks, here I got again, extolling the virtues of Lent and how you can use it to your advantage for your Personal Finances.

Easter is the time for new beginnings or restarting something you need to start doing again, and most people view Lent as a time to “find something to give up”, but that is dull and shows little flare, so another way is to look for something to Enrich your life for the 40 days of Lent (leading up to Good Friday and Easter).

Think about your spiritual journey, yes please do, however, also take advantage of this journey to work on your home finances as well!

Your Financial Lenten Journey

What areas of your personal finances could use either Enrichment or Better still a sacrifice that might help your financial well being? There are some very simple ones that I think about every year (and have done a few of them):

• The Latte withdrawal penance. Cut out buying coffee for the 40 days of Lent and put that money aside, to either save, give to charity or pay down your debt. Keep track of this and see how much money you might be saving here, it’s worthwhile finding out where this discretionary money is going.
• Read 4 Personal Finance books over the 40 days to enrich your understanding of your personal finances or your investing adventures. Building up your expertise over Lent is a good thing.
• Brown bag it for 40 days, give up buying lunch at work, and bring your lunch instead. Another way to find out where your discretionary spending is going.
• Take the bus to work for Lent, leave the car at home, buy a bus pass and take the Bus to work. Yes gas is cheaper right now, but not driving might have other benefits for you (less stress, more exercise, etc.,).
• Read financial blogs every day: another way to build up your understanding of finance is reading and learning.
• Open a TFSA and put found money there: OK, not really a Lent thing per say, but still somewhere to put your new found moneys.
• Live on cash for 40 days and get rid of your credit cards. Freeze them in your freezer, lock them in your safety deposit box, or cut them up, but live on CASH only (no debit either) and see if you can do it, does it change your spending habits? This one is one heck of a heavy one, and anyone who does try it keep me posted and I will encourage you as best I can!

Think about these or suggest others, I am open to suggestions myself. Shrove Tuesday is coming and then Ash Wednesday means Lent begins and your journey begins that day.

I’m giving you a weeks head start to start thinking about this stuff folks!

In recent memory the major get rich scheme that helped sculpt the Canadian frontier was the Klondike Gold Rush, and the National Film Board again comes through with an excellent movie outlining this event, called the City of Gold.

For my American readers this is similar to the California gold rush, however it is in the North of Canada in Dawson City, and this film outlines the problems endured to try to “Get Rich Quick!”.

In today’s Get Rich Quick schemes, at least you don’t have to trek through snow and fight Grizzly bears, but are they as likely to make us money?

The animated short that I found on the weekend from the National Film Board (Banks and Humor) got me thinking about how banking has changed so drastically in one generation (effectively 25 years).

When I was growing up, the bank was open from 10:00 AM to 3:00 PM Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, reopened Thursday from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM and then was open Friday until 4:00 PM (I seem to recollect I may not have that correct), and that was the only access you had to your money, other than being able to write cheques on your bank account.

I remember my Mother and Father did their banking on Thursday night, and it was a “tradition”, as it were, to go out Thursday night, get the grocery order for the week and go to the bank to do the banking as well. That was it, you could not do much else, because that was the only time you could “bank”.

ATM Brings a New Age

When I went off to University I was lucky that I lived on campus and the University had a branch of the CIBC on campus, so banking for me was relatively simple. That first year I even got a Credit Card (mostly just to buy text books with). 

Late in my first year or early second year, the Campus bank got the first ATMs I had ever seen and the world changed drastically again. Money was then available most of the time, you just went to the machine and you got your money (at the time withdrawals were about all you could do with the ATM).

A year later I moved off campus and then found the Canada Trust, which was open 9:00 AM – 6:00 PM every day and was even open on Saturdays, and I moved my banking there, and they had ATMs that were called Johnny Cash machines (I kid you not), and thus my access to banking was even easier.

Interac and On Line Banking caused a Paradigm Shift

With the advent of Interac suddenly the need to carry large amounts of cash, or have a cheque cashing card with your grocer disappeared (over night it felt like), after a short period of time, you could buy pretty much anything with no cash in your pocket (I still remember my mother being very nervous walking around with $100 to pay for the weekly grocery order), cash was now not needed, if you had a debit card.

On Line banking in the late 80’s meant you no longer needed to ever go into a bank, except for specific issues or to access a safety deposit box.

I rarely if ever go into my bank, I think the few times a year are to:

1. Access my safety deposit box (once or twice a year)
2. Complain and/or attempt to get my banking fees eliminated (once a year)
3. Open a new account or investing account (once every year or two)
4. Deposit a large cheque (once or twice a year)

Given I used to go to the bank at least once a week 30 years ago, it seems things really have changed a great deal in a very short period of time.

Is this a good thing, is my only question? If you were forced to only be able to “bank” at specific times, might you think more about what you were doing? I am curious to hear any opinions on this topic.

I have said many times that Cash is King, but I may need to rethink this idea given the odd situation my wife ran into a week or so ago.

The Cash Tale

Our son’s Nursery School was running a Scholastic book fund raising book service, so my wife found a couple of books she figured my son would like, and she filled in the form and gave it in with the exact cash needed to pay for the order.

My wife has decided to see if she uses cash instead of cheques and direct withdrawal, if it will give her the “tactile feedback” she needs for budgeting (I applaud this idea). My wife’s plan is simple once the cash is gone, there is no more spending, but that is a side note to this interesting story.

Mrs. C8j dropped off the order and thought no more about it, until she was cornered by the mother who has volunteered to run the book order. The volunteer told my wife that Scholastic did not accept cash and that my wife needed to write a cheque instead. My wife then asked the woman, why didn’t the volunteer write a cheque on her own account and take the cash as a cash advance and the problem would be solved. The volunteer said she couldn’t do that, and told my wife that she must submit the order with a cheque or the order would be refused. My wife ended up writing a cheque to get the books.

Cash is not Money?

This incident leaves me scratching my head, asking the question, when did Cash stop being currency? I realize there are situations where cash shouldn’t be used (sending cash in the mail is a bad thing), but it seems more and more, society is frowning on the use of cash, or is making it very difficult to use cash.

This made me wonder what would happen if I did the following experiment: Buy a car and walk into the dealership with the entire payment for the car in cash, would the dealership take the money? I am curious to hear if anyone has actually done this.

With counterfeiting of Canadian $100 bills, most establishments do not accept bills over $50, and they don’t really like taking those bills much either (try to pay for a $11.00  charge with a $50 bill and see the reaction of the cashier). How long will it be, before cash and bills in specific stop being accepted as currency?

Good question after the past couple of weeks, asking that question might not be the question to ask, the question might be, “How bad is it going to be this week?”, especially on the financial markets. I have no advice or wisdom for you right now, I simply watch and ask questions and simply react to what happens. Maybe it’s best to follow the Lawyer’s credo, “Never ask any question you don’t know the answer to before hand”.

Cash is Still King

On the personal finance side (micro) we (Mrs. C8j and I) continue to live with the credo “cash is king” and continue to keep our credit cards out of our wallets. How long we can keep this up, I don’t know, but for now, it is important not to allow any credit “build up” to occur thus causing financial haemorrhaging, as we have seen in the past.

More cash is appearing from transferring work related savings vehicles into our own RRSP and savings vehicles, so again, we have decisions to make about WHAT to invest in and WHEN to do that investing. For now, I am in a “wait and see” mode, since I still have little confidence in the current economic apocalypse.

Top 100 Employers in Canada?

Given I am still looking for a job, folks send me interesting information, and one I received from my mother. Evidently there is a company that rates the Top 100 Employers In Canada, with details about every company and why they are such good companies to work for. The information is interesting and is mostly on the “macro” level (i.e. benefits and such), and not much about the work environment itself, but still very useful information to have when searching for a job. Strangely my former employer is not mentioned, curious.

I am not that picky right now, I’ll take work, and not worry as much about whether there is subsidized maternity leave (given it doesn’t really matter to me either).