Gas prices: Out of Control II

Is $106 the breaking point for oil? First, some traders insisted $100 oil was the line in the sand: go over it, and our rally would falter. But it didn't happen: after a brief, three-week flutter, the major indices are knocking on the door of their old highs.
It didn't happen at $105 either. But today, as oil passed $106 to the highest level since late 2008, retailers like JCPenney, Macys, Lowe's and Home Depot are down one to three percent.
There's other, inflation-related issues as well: two big companies (Wal-Mart and Hershey) made strong comments about the effect of inflation.  By Bob Pisani, CNBC Reporter

-to continue reading article go to http://www.csmonitor.com/Business/2011/0331/Oil-prices-Is-106-the-breaking-point 

-to read more about "oil prices" go to http://search.yahoo.com/search?cs=bz&p=oil+price&fr=fp-tts-701&fr2=ps

Auto Repair Insurance Scams

Definition of car repair insurance- 

Technically, car repair insurance is called extended warranty coverage. It serves to pay the cost of repairing problems that occur after the factory warranty expires – or in many cases it pays for repairs that the factory warranty doesn't cover.

Although you can buy car repair insurance, or extended warranties, many different places, be aware that many of these products are simply pre-paid service contracts and have serious limitations that limit their value. Typically the company selling the contract is not the company who actually pays claims. They are simply making a commission on the sale and don't much care if you get good service or not. (article by http://www.used-car-advisor.com/car-repair-insurance.htm)

Here is a list of just some of the many types of repairs and costs covered by this car repair insurance:

• Engine
• Transmission
• Electronic equipment
• Power equipment
• Air conditioning
• Steering
• Brakes
• Cooling system
• Suspension
• 4x4 systems
• Emissions system
• Turbo/Supercharger
• Towing fees
• Travel expenses
• Interior/Exterior Features
• Damages due to overheating
• Fuel System
• Much more .....

Choosing the wrong car repair insurance policy is asking for trouble because you will end up with nothing. You will certainly not be getting the coverage that you expected or desired. Phone sale car repair insurance policies are often scams because it’s so easy to make promises over the phone even if the company has no intention of delivering.
1. Telemarketer Car Repair Hidden Fees
Some of the most common types of telemarketer car repair insurance scams are because of hidden fees associated with your purchase. These may not seem like a big deal at the time however  they can make the insurance policy much more expensive. Some brokers will charge an arrangement fee for example, however this should never happen. The broker should get their fee from the insurance company themselves as the form of commission.
Some brokers will also charge an excess fee every time you make a claim. While these aren’t normally a problem it’s important to find out about these fees in advance. You should be very careful to avoid any hidden fees as you need to make sure you know exactly what you will need to pay.
2. Paying First and Reclaiming Later
Another very common auto repair insurance scam is the types of policy which request you to cover the upfront expenses of the car repairs and then claim the money back later. Read through the entire insurance document to find out whether or not this is the case. If you ever have to reclaim the money from the insurance company then the chances of ever getting it back are not very likely.
It’s much better to deal with an auto broker which will work with a certain number of garages directly. They will pay the garages straight away so that you don’t need to worry about getting your cash. It shouldn’t be your job to chase money from the insurance company, instead it should be the car dealerships problem.
3. Pressure Selling
Don’t get sucked in with a car warranty companies claims on the phone. There are a number of different promises that they can make which could end up being false. You must check the credibility of the company by taking your time to research them. Don’t settle for their pressure selling techniques.
If any business is trying to get you to sign the deal today then think again. A credible company will not tell you that a deal only exists today and try to pressure you into buying it. Instead they will give you plenty of time to think and decide whether or not the policy is the right one for you.
Get the company details if you are interested and tell them you will phone them back when you have more time. This will give you time to check out the credibility of the company and ensure that they are worth dealing with.

College Graduation: Time for Celebration or Time for Worry?

Your student loan documents probably do not explicitly state “let the buyer beware”–but maybe they should. A sobering report released this month by the Institute for Higher Education Policy, “Delinquency: The Untold Story of Student Loan Borrowing,” suggests that a majority of students struggle to repay their loans.

As the cost of a higher education has exponentially increased over the last couple of decades, common sense and anecdotal evidence has suggested this is the case. Unfortunately, policymakers have relied solely on default rates as a measurement tool. Default rates alone paint an incomplete picture, because they exclude borrowers who have difficulty repaying their loans but avoid default.  

The new report primarily focuses on the nearly 1.8 million borrowers who entered into repayment on loans obtained through the (now defunct) Federal Family Education Loan Program in 2005 during their first five years of repayment. It details the rates at which borrowers entered not only into default, but also into deferment (a temporary suspension of loan payments for specific situations such as re-enrollment in school, unemployment, or economic hardship); forbearance (temporary suspensions of a borrower’s payments because of financial difficulty made at the discretion of the lender); and delinquency (late payment on a loan).

Falling behind on federal student or parent loan payments can be terrifying. Your credit scores drop, which can cut off opportunities to buy homes, go back to school, or  get credit cards. Bankruptcy judges generally won't clear the debt, and the government can take part of your paychecks and even Social Security checks. But those having trouble making payments on federal education loans do have a growing number of attractive options to temporarily reduce or pause their monthly bills, or even get some of their debt forgiven.

 Here are some steps to get at least temporary financial relief while preserving good credit ratings:

 1. Document. Gather and keep good records of all phone calls and save copies of all paperwork and E-mails.

 2. Determine your loan type. Look at your documents and, if necessary, call your lender to figure out what kind of educational loans you are having trouble with. This can be harder than it sounds. Through July 1, 2010, private lenders such as Sallie Mae and Citibank can make both federal and private student loans. (After that, students and parents will apply through their college directly to the federal government for federal student loans. Private companies will only make private student loans.) The confusion over the different kinds of loans offered by private companies could have caused some borrowers to mistakenly takeout private loans instead of federal loans. Unfortunately, private loans offer those in financial trouble fewer options for relief. (However, Congress is debating a proposal to allow debtors to use bankruptcy to escape at least some private educational loans.) The following instructions apply only to the five major kinds of federal education loans: Parent Plus, Grad Plus, unsubsidized Stafford, subsidized Stafford, and Perkins.

 [Read about other advantages of federal student loans.]

 3. Determine who to call. You can get the name and contact information for your loan servicer by checking with the federal government or calling 1-800-4-FED-AID. Don't just call the company or school that gave you your loan. Most lenders sell their loans to investors, and hire companies called "servicers" to handle billing. If you've missed several payments, the servicer may turn your account over to a collections agency. In addition, those who have missed some payments often get calls from insurance companies, called guarantors, that backs many student loans. Borrowers generally need only deal with their servicer or collection agency.

4. Check the timing. People who haven't yet missed any payments have the easiest time of decreasing their monthly payments or getting permission to skip some payments, as costs and hassles rise the longer borrowers avoid paying. Lenders can add late fees of up to 6 percent of each monthly bill for every missed payment. It's still comparatively easy to get relief if you start negotiations before you've missed your ninth payment (or are less than 270 days late). After that, however, you're considered in default which means your credit rating plunges and you cannot receive any additional federal financial aid for college. Collection agencies can confiscate tax refunds or other government payments owed to defaulters, and they can garnish up to 15 percent of defaulters' wages. Lenders can add collection fees of up to 25 percent on most federal education debts starting 60 days after default. Those who default on Perkins loans can see their debts jump by collection fees of up to 40 percent.

Ultimately, there are a variety of other ways to manage your loans.  This article was meant to shed light and provide some assistance and ideas.  Perhaps others will be willing to share their stories and ways they have coped. 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/usnews/20110330/ts_usnews/avoidloandelinquencyanddefault

Health Insurance: Blue Shield Rate Hikes

The Los Angeles Times is reporting  that Blue Shield's premium hikes are hitting some policyholders with as much as an 86% premium increase.  Click HERE for LA Times article.  Higher insurance premiums sought by Blue Shield of California in recent months would drive total increases as high as 86.5% for thousands of individual policyholders, new documents show.  Blue Shield said the three rate increases reflect the soaring costs of medical care and the greater use of expensive healthcare services by policyholders, along with new state and federal mandates.

In explaining the need for the increases, company spokesman Tom Epstein also said that Blue Shield had underpriced some of its individual health plans, leaving the company without enough revenue to cover the cost of medical care for members. As a result, the insurer has had to raise premiums substantially on its money-losing products.

The U.S. Justice Department is widening a probe into whether Blue Cross Blue Shield health-insurance plans are artificially raising premiums in several states by striking agreements with hospitals that stifle competition from rival insurers.

Federal investigators and some state attorneys general have sent civil subpoenas to "Blue" health plans in Missouri, Ohio, Kansas, West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and the District of Columbia, according to people familiar with the matter. The investigation is examining whether dominant health plans around the country are forcing hospitals to sign anti-competitive contracts that unlawfully inhibit them from doing business with their rivals.

Assembly Bill 52 (Feuer) is up for hearings this Spring.  The bill simply gives California's elected insurance commissioner the power to stop excessive premium hikes before they take effect.  Right now, Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones is powerless to stop Blue Shield or any other health insurance company.

Gas prices: Out of Control

Gas prices approaching $4 dollars per gallon in California.  So not only are we paying more to the oil companies and the speculators, refineries will be taking more of our hide as well. Of course, California is already brushing the $4.00 mark and could hit $5.00.  Big oil companies and greedy speculators. The speculative market may have driven crude oil prices up, but that's not the price oil companies pay for the crude oil that goes into our gasoline. America's big oil companies use crude oil that they have harvested from the ground or bought much cheaper through long term contracts to refine into gasoline. You'll see the results in next quarter's profit statements: big profits from both crude oil sales and refineries that make gasoline, what's called "upstream' and "downstream" operations in profit reports.

Rather than compete with each other to provide more cheaper gasoline, oil companies cheat together to withhold needed gasoline supply from the market. Consistently, the companies artificially pull back refinery production of gasoline in order to reduce supply coming in during periods of peak demand so they can increase prices. It’s legal so long as there is no smoky back room where they talk about it, but they don’t need to since industry data about supply flows freely on corporate computer screens. This behavior has been documented by government agencies like the Federal Trade Commission.

Fear and greed, expertly manipulated by billionaire speculators in oil markets, are much more to blame. Here are five ways to curb the speculators and oil companies. Nothing easy, like a gas station boycott. But more effective if the public voice can cut through the financial and oil lobbies. Obama campaigned against oil company greed on the campaign trail but now he seems to have lost his voice on the subject.

Policy actions

1.  President Obama, stop the speculators. The president is the boss of the should-be regulators at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), who are supposed to be setting rules that would slow down the purely financial speculation that is driving energy prices. Surely Obama knows that ordinary Americans can’t stand much more of unaffordable gasoline, heating oil and food.  Yet it’s U.S. workers who are paying for energy speculators’ yachts and vacation homes. President Obama should be cracking heads at the CFTC, replacing some members if necessary to get the votes for regulation that is written but not approved by the CFTC.

We want the CFTC to make energy trades public, not secret, and establish strong “position limits,” in commodity markets, which would stop huge trades that drive the market up in a single day.  We also want speculators–including oil companies–to put up at least 50% of the cost before they place a futures market bet, just like stock purchasers already do. Today, commodity speculators only put up cents on the dollar before they gamble. Just try that in Vegas. Making all these things happen could drop the price of oil by up to half.

Want to take personal action? Call the White House (202-456-1111). Someone at the other end does listen to and log the White House messages.

2. Release oil from the U.S. strategic reserve. This is another one that’s up to President Obama. Admittedly, there’s a 38-billion-gallon surplus of privately owned oil in storage tanks in Oklahoma pipeline country alone.  But releasing oil from the public’s reserve would be a signal that Obama serious about pulling back oil prices that threaten economic recovery. The U.S. Treasury would also benefit from selling high.

Caution: This only works if he also gets serious about curbing speculation. All the more reason to call the White House yourself.

3. Get one single regulation past the CFTC. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission has done little but drag its feet on regulating financial markets, but it is finally  taking comments on proposed position limits that would help curb speculators. But there are only two certain votes for it on the five-member committee.  Even CFTCchairman Gary Gensler, an Obama appointee, hasn’t declared himself in favor. Big financial companies like Goldman Sachs, which profit from huge amounts of trading, hate it. They are flooding the CFTC with lobbyists and comments predicting disaster.  OilWatchdog’s friends at the Commodity Markets Oversight Coalition