Mary Anne Carter
Mary Anne has her own blog now
Category Archives: Business
Mar 21 2012

Cost containment

by Mary Anne

One of the most useful ways that software and technology can be used by a nursing home to help keep a lid on overtime expenses is with nursing home scheduling software. Over the past several years I’ve been asked by clients and family and friends to help them with transactions related to nursing homes. One client had me keep tabs on the nursing home bills for his elderly mother. I had to sort through them, send some of them to various insurance companies, authorize payment of others through a trust checking account, and weed out the duplicate copies that were mailed out. It was amazing how many duplicate copies of charges were being sent out by the nursing home. I don’t know if they had a problem with their invoicing system or if they were trying to fleece my client, but I had to pour over a lot of paperwork and challenge a lot of duplicate charges!

One of the things that really shocked me was the charge on the bills for a simple beauty salon visit by his mother – the charge was $300 for a beauty salon visit! And the woman went to the beauty salon twice a month! I remember bringing that charge to the attention of my client, and he said he was aware of it and the charge was right. I just cannot even imagine having enough money to pay $300 twice a month to have my hair done! All I can say is that it must be nice to be able to afford such an expensive nursing home!

If and when I find myself in the position of having to help my own mother find a nursing home, I’m sorry to say that we will not be able to afford such a nice place that we can give her a beauty salon appointment twice a month for $300. We will have to find one that takes good care of the patients, but keeps costs as reasonable as possible. One way that technology can help with that is with the use of nurse staffing software to ensure that there are enough nurses on duty all of the time. I don’t want to send her to a place that neglects their patients because they are understaffed.

Categories: Business, Computers and/or Internet, Family and friends, Life | Comments Off

Mar 18 2012

Looking for bargains

by Mary Anne

When I was a teenager, freshly graduated from high school, my first full time job was with a Hotel Bathroom Supplies & Restaurant Supply Company about a half-hour’s drive from my house. My official job title was “Girl Friday” which meant that if it involved any of the office work, I did it. One of the things that I found very interesting about the company was that I learned a lot about bookkeeping and marking up prices that I had not learned in school. Of course I was fresh out of high school back then and really was totally unprepared for work in the real business world. Which is why, I’m sure, that particular Hotel Product Supplies & Catering Supplies company only saw fit to pay me two whole dollars per hour! Which, from what I understand, was more than minimum wage at that particular time!

When I have the need to take a look at my resume to update and edit it, I find myself thinking back to that first full-time job. That was where I learned that if I wanted to take a break I had to be smoking a cigarette. And that if I were so brave as to correct my boss’s terrible spelling and grammar on a letter that he wanted me to type up that he would get really angry and threaten to fire me even though I was right and he was wrong. I learned a lot of real-life lessons back then about how unfair life is and that biting my lip and holding my tongue was a very hard, but very important thing to do if I wanted to keep my job.

From time to time I find myself thinking back to that job, and remembering that even though the people there were difficult to work with, that the place really did have good prices, good quality, and a good selection of things that are not normally available to the retail customer going to a mainstream department store. So when I decide that I want to buy something for my house that just might be available from a place like that I will go online and see if I can buy it from a website like the PeachSuite Wholesale Hotel Supply & Restaurant Equipment Company website. You can find some really cool items on there, like a seven-piece pie cutter for under ten dollars. I think that is a great little gadget to have!

Categories: Around the House, Business, Cooking, Life, Memories, Shopping | Comments Off

Mar 15 2012

Storage wars

by Mary Anne

One of the television shows that my husband and I enjoy watching together is called “Storage Wars.” The first time I sat down to watch the show with my hubby it was a matter of me just wanting to sit down and rest for a bit and he was already watching the show. At first I thought that the basis of the show was lame, but after a while I got into the personality dynamics of the show. The basis of the show is that there are a lot of competitive business people that buy abandoned storage units from an auction and then they hope to sell the contents of the unit to make a profit. When we turn on the television, we never know where the group is going to be showing up as it seems as if they travel all around the country going to these kinds of auctions. Apparently they have done a lot of research into the demographics of the neighborhoods so that they can take educated guesses as to what type of items might be in the units.

For example, the contents of Denver self storage units might be related to the skiing industry, so if the business person is not interested in dealing with trying to sell items that would appeal to customers that enjoy skiing, they might actually skip that auction. Similarly, the show at a Miami storage unit might have a lot of items in storage related to surfing or boating, so there might be a different base of bidders there. And a show done at a Phoenix storage unit might have some valuable archeological items that could be of interest to museums.

There does seem to be a base core of participants that travel around for the show, and when I watch the show I always wonder how much the stars of the show are getting paid to do the show, and I wonder who came up with the idea to do a reality show like this. I just can’t even imagine how a concept of a show like this got approved to be broadcast in the first place.

Categories: Business, Life, Opinion, Television and movies | Comments Off

Mar 11 2012

My Own Coffee Blend

by Mary Anne

A few years ago I caught myself drinking a lot of coffee during the day – especially at work. For one thing, the coffee at work is free. And for another, I do not smoke and never take smoke breaks like so many others do. But sometimes you need to get up from your desk, walk around and clear out the cobwebs. So I would find myself walking to the break room and getting a cup of coffee every few hours. Before I knew it, I was drinking 6-8 large mugs of coffee every day and the caffeine was starting to keep me awake at night.

I decided to cut back on the coffee and switch to water or a flavored water while at work. If I was going to cut back to just one cup of coffee, it was going to have to be GOOD coffee. So I bought a bag of ground Columbian beans from Starbucks.

But that is too strong for my taste. I finally figured out how to make my own personal blend of coffee to make from home. I take a small canister and fill it halfway with Starbucks Columbian coffee, and then fill the canister the rest of the way with Folgers brand Columbian coffee. When I mix them together, the coffee is not too strong and it retains the special taste of Columbian beans.

Categories: Business, Cooking, Life, Shopping | Comments Off

Mar 1 2012

Medical malpractice insurance

by Mary Anne

One of the important things that kids need to think about, when it comes to career planning is if they are going to go into medicine, is how much they will need to pay for medical malpractice insurance. I remember about thirty years ago when I was friends with a guy who was thinking about becoming a pediatrician that he was telling me that when he got the medical malpractice insurance quote for going into a private practice by himself that he decided to join a group of doctors because the cost of the insurance was lower if he was associated with a group. Going out on his own was more than he could afford. I think it’s really sad that so many good medical practitioners have to charge really high prices to their patients because of the cost of insurance!

Categories: At the Office, Business, Family and friends, Finances, Life, Opinion | Comments Off

«Older Entries
Newer Entries »
 
Scrappy Theme by Caroline Moore | Copyright 2012 Mary Anne Carter | Powered by WordPress