We recommend the use of a password manager to improve the security of your access to online resources and generally recommend LastPass for this use. Some of you may have received a notice of a recent security incident from LastPass, or have seen or heard about it in the news. Summary: if your LastPass master password is both strong and unique, you do not need to take any specific action in response to this […]
This morning I woke up and discovered that there’s a live tool to change your bank account with the IRS if you changed bank info since 2018 but haven’t yet filed for 2019. I had someone in that situation, so I called up and got permission to do this, and this is how it went. 1.) It’s an Intuit product, basically using the front end that TurboTax uses. You have to create a login with […]
There is an enormous difference between working on individual retail accounts and working with the tools a professional custodian gives me. Benefits to you include: Better access to institutional-class funds. Because of my fiduciary business model and professional credentials, I’m authorized to use DFA funds (Dimensional Fund Advisors). I can only access them through my professional custodian, though. These are generally acknowledged to be as good as (or better) than Vanguard funds. No-load access to otherwise-loaded mutual […]
Over the week-end I’ve been reading up on how to handle the credit agency breach. Identity theft overall is becoming more and more of a problem, so I don’t mean to diminish this breach as an issue, but I think this is a bit over-hyped. My experience with fraudulently filed tax returns – a form of identity theft – suggests that quite a lot of us – if not all of us – have already […]
As you get your finances organized you’re going to wish you had a secure place to keep all your online passwords to websites. There are several on the market, but I personally use a Chrome Extension on my web-browser to an app called “LastPass”. It’s free if you just use it on desktops, and a small subscription cost if you want to use it across mobile devices. https://lastpass.com/ Once you have a strong master password […]
