Mary Anne Carter » Business

Running a cleaning business

Mary Anne — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 09:17:57 +0000

My sister used to clean houses in the past to make a little bit of extra money, and she was really good at that. She had quite a few customers. She hasn’t done that for several years now, but she is still getting phone calls from people asking her to come clean their house!
Where we live, more and more families are two-income families, which leaves them little time to clean house. The demand for cleaning services is on the increase, and I think that this would be a good opportunity for her to make some money running a business that she already is familiar with!

Relocating for a new job

Mary Anne — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 19:47:40 +0000

One of the things that I’ve been reading on Facebook a lot is a debate between folks who are supposedly friends regarding the unemployment situation. Some of the people maintain that there are plenty of jobs “out there” for people that really WANT to work. The rebuttal that I’ve been reading is often that the jobs that are available require relocation, and many families don’t want to relocate.

The entire discussion reminded me of a few years ago when my sister accepted a job out in Los Angeles, and had to find some Los Angeles movers to help her with her relocation process. She told me that she had hired a Los Angeles moving company to do everything that needed to be done – even the packing! I thought that was amazing, I had never heard of a company that will do the packing for you in addition to the transportation! I wonder if the LA movers are the only ones that do that, or if it is a service available around the US and I just live under a rock.

Reducing the costs

Mary Anne — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 17:58:36 +0000

When I keep hearing that the United States Post Office is struggling financially and is looking for ways to reduce the cost of running the organization, I immediately think about how much money they could save if the stopped individual home delivery six days a week and instead delivered to cluster mailboxes five days a week.

The reason that I think this would help them save money is because if they only delivered mail to a neighborhood centralized clustered mailbox then they would reduce the amount of time that the delivery person had to actually go to deliver the mail. In addition, if they used commercial cluster mailboxes that had a lock and key to them, the mail would be very secure.

And delivering the mail only five days a week instead of six days a week would reduce costs tremendously, don’t you agree? I know I wouldn’t mind not getting the mail delivered on a Saturday – sometimes I don’t even like to leave the house on a Saturday to go down to the mailbox and get the mail!

Changing cell phone companies

Mary Anne — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 11:40:03 +0000

I have not been particularly impressed with my cell phones since we got them when we moved here. Our contract with them is going to be expiring soon and I plan to change to a different company. I just haven’t quite decided which one! A lot of my co-workers have been telling me that I should check outAT&T but I’m not sure what kind of coverage they have in the area around my house. If it is at all possible, I’d like to get a plan that includes free phones for the entire family.

Great review site for gadgets

Mary Anne — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 12:05:07 +0000

The publishers of Stuff – a leading magazine dedicated to reviewing gadgets – have created a website that is also dedicated to reviewing gadgets. So now everyone that is interested in learning more about the existing, or upcoming gadgets out there in the world of commerce has a place to turn when they want to learn more about them. They cover just about everything you can imagine in the gadgetry world, leaning heavily on the electronics such as digital cameras, cell phones, televisions, and computers (just to name a few!)

The website has lots of different sections that you can go to. My two favorite links on the website are the Top Tens and the Reviews pages. In addition to those links, it has blogs, news, videos, and it has forums. It even has contests to win prizes; the only hitch is that you have to register as a user of the website. That’s shouldn’t be a problem, registration is free!

Drop boxes

Mary Anne — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 04:33:57 +0000

Recently I’ve noticed that quite a lot of people use mailboxes for other uses other than as a receptacle to hold incoming and outgoing mail. Mail boxes are being used by some places as drop boxes. The first time I saw a mailbox being used in that manner was by my mother-in-law. She had set up an arrangement with some clients of her book-keeping business to use padlocks on
residential mailboxes and use them as ways to deliver and safely store clients records.

The first time I noticed that type of arrangement was when I saw my mother-in-law was using a mailbox with a padlock on it as a drop box. She had a padlock on the box, and she explained that the office’s courier had a copy of the key so he could pick up and deliver correspondence independently of the US Postal service.

Making the best decision

Mary Anne — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 21:03:12 +0000

The article written by Alonso Kramer

I was trying to use thewww.texaselectricityproviders.com/ website to figure out what the best options were for my energy utilities. I really need something I can rely on. At my one of my old houses, we had some problems with the provider. My husband and I always felt like we were being overcharged and it seemed like the electricity would cut out randomly for what seemed like no reason. We both decided we really wanted to do our research for the next house and avoid the same problem. We are set to move into our new house next month. We are both really excited. It is a lot bigger and a lot nicer than our first house together. However, since it is so big, I am a bit concerned about the price of our utilities and if we can handle it. My husband told me that he really thinks we will be fine. I just get a bit concerned because electricity is essential. I do not want to be strained for money so making the decision for the most cost-efficient and reliable source would be ideal for me right now.

Credit reports/identity theft?

Mary Anne — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 15:19:18 +0000

A short while ago I filled up my gas tank at a Texaco station. I saw that they were running a special rebate promotion for new Texaco credit card holders, so when I got home I went online and applied for a new Texaco credit card for myself, and a separate one for my hubby.

I got my card a few days later, but I noticed in my email in-box was a rejection letter for my hubby’s card. It turns out that he was rejected because they don’t think he is him! They said that they rejected him based on information from a credit report company. So I printed it off and gave it to my hubby and told him to call the credit report company, which he has been trying to do all morning long. I am concerned that this may have something to do with an identity theft attempt!

How much longer can it last?

Mary Anne — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 03:59:08 +0000

When I listen to the news about how the U.S. Postal service is struggling to stay afloat, I think about all of the competition that it faces – the UPS and Fed Ex are the largest competitors for packages, and for letters and documents the competitors are fax machines and the World Wide Web. People nowadays have a lot of options to choose from when it comes to delivery services. Sometimes I start to wonder if actually putting mail in our residential mailboxes might become a thing of the past.

I wouldn’t be terribly surprised if home delivery of the mail was cut down to only a couple of days a week, or even eliminated completely in favor of people having to pick up their mail in a central location like cluster mailboxes at the intersections of their roads, or like commercial mailboxes in a post office or a general store, like in the old days when the post office was just delivering mail by pony express. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that we would revert back to ponies, just that the mail delivery would end at the posts office and people would have to come get it from there.

A touch of class

Mary Anne — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 02:17:05 +0000

One of my favorite things to do is watch Home and Garden Television shows about making your house better looking. One of my favorite shows is called “Curb Appeal.” The show is designed to take a hum-drum boring looking house and make it look outstanding. I enjoy learning about different ways to make a house look nicer. One of the ways a homeowner can improve their curb appeal is by putting one of the many good looking Gaines Mailboxes curbside. There are a large variety of Classic Mailboxes and Keystone Mailboxes available for sale on the Internet. All are USPS approved, and some websites offer free shipping.

The website I was looking at today that sells these mailboxes and offers free shipping is gainesmailboxesdirect.com. I was looking for a rural mailbox that might offer some theft protection features and saw that this website sells locking inserts for the mailboxes that they sell. I have never seen anything like that before; I think that is a good idea! There have been a few times when I have worried that just putting our mail in the mailbox was not protecting us from unscrupulous characters that might get into some of the mail and attempt some identify theft schemes. Having our incoming mail go into a locking insert would make it just a little bit harder for some unauthorized person to snatch and grab the mail quickly.

Setting up my home office

Mary Anne — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 14:24:33 +0000

For years I have been “making do” with hand-me-down office furniture in my home office. Nothing is ergonomic, nothing looks nice. In fact, it looks horrible! I have a very old student desk that I was given when I was in 3rd grade that I put an old wooden desk top on top of that I use to put my computer on. My printer is on a plastic shelving unit beside that desk. My chair is an old bar stool with casters on it. Nothing about it is comfortable at all!

I would like to buy new office furniture to set up my home office, I’m sure that I would be a lot more productive if I was comfortable!

Good to know

Mary Anne — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 17:28:14 +0000

One of the things that seems to be effecting everyone I know is how this challenging economy is ruining their credit ratings. Many people are defaulting on loans and credit cards because they have lost their jobs, or had to take pay cuts. Fortunately there is a plethora of useful information online about how to rebuild your credit fast to minimize the consequences of bad credit. In addition to the free information about how to rebuild credit fast there are a lot of businesses available who provide credit repair services available to the consumer.

Figuring out which is the best credit repair service can be problematic, however. I think that if I felt the need to get professional help with that situation I would probably go to my local bank and talk with my friend Katie to ask her where to start. She’s been my personal banker for the past two years and I have confidence that she would steer me in the right direction.

Drowning in paper

Mary Anne — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 19:43:43 +0000

For years I have resisted going paperless. I’ve wanted paper credit card statements in my hand to make it easier to reconcile the statements, and I did not want to have to use my own printer ink and paper to print them off. But I’ve noticed that my home office is drowning in paper, and I’m seriously considering checking out some paperless office software. Sometimes I feel a little bit old-fashioned in my desire for permanent hard copies of everything, but since I’ve been working with computers since the very first personal computer came out on the market I’m a little bit gun shy over the losses that can happen when something crashes. For example just yesterday when I downloaded photos from my digital camera and then was trying to modify and save the changes. The program crashed and during the crashing it deleted the entire photo. Gone, forever, never to be recovered or seen anywhere again. So I’m a little bit gun-shy, do you know what I mean?

The new marketing strategies

Mary Anne — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 21:57:32 +0000

One of the things that I like about the advancement of the Information Age is how it allows more people to be able to work from home instead of having to commute several hours a day. Sadly many people don’t have the skills they need to be able to do that, and still others live in an area where the Information Age is still trying to reach them. I find it surprising whenever I meet a neighbor that tells me that they cannot get fast Internet where they live!

One of the companies that employs people who have access to the Internet, and copy writing skills is the triangle direct company. This company assists businesses to market their businesses on the Internet, and one of the ways it does that is by hiring people who can write for them without even leaving their houses! Can you imagine being able to make your living by staying home and typing on the computer without even having to change out of your pajamas? Sounds great to me!

My sister came for a visit this weekend.

Mary Anne — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 19:14:13 +0000

My younger sister came over this past Saturday afternoon and spent the night. It was nice to see her and to catch up on what’s going on in her life! We were talking about the bad economy, and how hard it is to keep up with the ever increasing cost of living. She is interested in starting her own business, and we were talking about the opportunities to make good money doing something like that. I suggested that she sign up for a couple of college courses in starting a business because I think that it is a lot harder to do than it sounds.