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PayPal Bookkeeping System Update

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This is an update of the practice of using a PayPal Bookkeeping System as your core record keeping system.  If you want to read my original idea on the concept, please read my previous article titled “Using PayPal As A Simplified Bookkeeping System”

PayPal

PayPal Bookkeeping System Experience Update

Okay, I’ve made my first credit card payment from my PayPal Account to my PayPal Extras Credit Card.  While that simple payment transaction was fine (although it does take up to 24 hrs to show up), I tried to download the credit card transactions for the accounting system I blogged about earlier.  While Paypal captures the payment to the credit card, the actual credit card transaction aren’t downloadable to an excel format (it will do PDF though).  This is a huge disappointment for me because I was hoping to export the entire year and merge it with the basic Paypal transactions.  This would have been much easier than it sounds, so much for simplicity.  I don’t have many outbound expenses though, so the PayPal Bookkeeping System that I wrote about still might be of benefit.

 

The PayPal VRS (Voice Response System aka voice-mail) Was A Monstrous Disappointment

A huge disappointment for me was the PayPal VRS (Voice Response System or phone-mail) system.  I had to punch in the same information into the phone over and over again, what a joke.  If you have a question that’s predictable then the system is fine, but if you have a question like I had (downloadable transaction) you fall through the system in bitter disappointment.  I have experience with such systems, and I have to say that this system is one of the worst systems that I’ve ever encountered for questions that don’t fit within their canned response.  My question somehow lead me to a connections with no feedback.  So no elevator music, not reoccurring “An Agent will be with you shortly” message that’s in a repeating loop that occurs every 2 minutes.  Nothing!  Just a connection the system with no option.

So knowing that somehow I found a bug in PayPal’s VRS system, I did what any sensible person would do… I hung up!  But unfortunately, only after waiting on the phone system way too long (what was it 15 or 10 minutes I wait in the PayPal twilight zone?).

Change in PayPal Bookkeeping Strategy

So what a frugal guy to do, that sees the beauty of simplifying his bookkeeping system as much as possible?

  1. Make my credit card transactions atomic.  Atomic means that I’ll pay a credit card transaction as soon as I see it in the credit card transactions listing. Once is that I could PayPal any transaction I use the credit card for each time I use the Credit card.  This gives me instance accountability.  So for example, if I buy something Jan 13, as soon as it shows up on my PayPal credit card, I could instantly pay it.  Then for the next credit card transaction, wait until that previously paid one clears.  A pain, but it would work, and work well for me since I don’t have many expense transactions.  This would make all my transactions so that they are represented one to one in PayPal, so the transactions would each be record in my PayPal system.  Then I would just save and print the PDF credit card statement that my PayPal Extras Credit Card provides.
  2. Create an Excel Macro that could strip out noise transactions.  This would further simplify the manipulation of the spreadsheet after the import is completed.  The Macro would categorize reoccurring expenses, and delete statements that have no value for the bookkeeping system.  Such macro purges would be PayPal statements that are in a “pending” state.  Of course I’d make a copy of the original exportation of the PayPal transaction in a separate sheet in the same excel workbook.
  3. Create a future project to automate this process.  I could code something if I have time.  Not sure if I will or not, but if I do, I’ll make it available to everybody.  At this point I doubt that I will try this, but maybe…
  4. Moving income from my Connected Bank To PayPal and then back out again.  Much like step 1, this might seem like a pain, but it’s actually quite easy and fast.  Mostly by moving money from my bank to my PayPal then back to my bank, will enable me to acknowledge income sources such as Google Adsense.  Might look crazy, but it’s actually quite simple to do.

After next year concludes (or even after a few months of solid activity), I should have a better grasp of the strengths and areas that can be improved upon.

I view my PayPal Bookkeeping System as an experiment in how much I can simplify or partially automate this process.  If I stick to just PayPal and PayPal Transactions for my business transactions, there is no reason that I shouldn’t be able to dramatically reduce the bookkeeping process.

Happy Holidays,

Don

How Money Can Improve Your Life and Make You Happier

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There are some studies out there that claim that earning more than $75,000 a year can’t make you more happy in your day-to-day life.  If you want to read an article that claims such a reality, check out this article at Businessweek: After $75,000, Money Can’t Buy Day-to-Day Happiness.  The article is based on of a Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, which surveyed 450,000 Americans in 2008 and 2009 about their household income, and emotional state during the prior day and overall feelings about their life and well-being.

So it got me thinking, how could making over $100,000 improve my day-to-day life and potentially introduce more happiness in my life.  let’s say that I made $150,000 in discretionary income per year (this amount is after all taxes have been taken out).

Having Money

Here is how such an income increase could improve my happiness levels

Each year use the $150,000 to establish a dividend stream for money to use to increase my lifestyle.  Ideally, I would purchase various dividend stocks that would provide around a 5% return.  This “dividend stream” money would be the basis for making the improvements in my life and in the process making me happier.

So after $100,000 invested for one year, the following next year I would have around $5,000 to increase my lifestyle spending or make me happier.  Then the following years I would continue to increase my money amount to use for life improvements and my happiness by $5,000 each year.  So after 5 years, I would have $20,000, after 10 years I would have $45,000* to spend to make my life better.

After saving for two (and maybe three) years I would have the finances to have at least one incredible overseas vacation annually.  While this doesn’t directly improve my happiness level, just thinking about having such an option makes me happy right now!

After establishing this “Happiness Increasing” dividend stream, I would do the following:

  • Hire a housekeeping service to clean our house a few times a month (perhaps weekly).
  • Join some athletic club or at least get a gym membership.
  • Joining or creating a community improving group to help with city concerns and improve the lives of all the citizens.
  • Become a “Life Changer“.  By this I mean identify either a family or individual that is incredible in every aspect except with money.  Then help without them realizing it.  This would be accomplished by creating a business and hiring them or something similar that would help them out in a small way.  Granted, it wouldn’t be much help financially, but any help helps (lol).  And who knows, perhaps the business that you’ve created for the individuals could help by being profitable.  Eventually, after 5 or 10 years, switch control the individual and become a minor partner or something similar where you wouldn’t be as involved.  Then you could focus your energies on someone else that needs help.
  • Become creative, if not in the traditional drawing, sculpting ways, then perhaps using technology.
  • Go out-to-lunch more and become a regular at such places.  Warren Buffett does this in his hometown and he seems to enjoy doing so.

I’m just scratching the surface, here, but the basic idea is that if you can’t increase your happiness level with more money, you are not trying to do so.  Money is a tool, and as such, it can help you build happiness if you use it intelligently.

What ways can you think of to create happiness with money, please comment below any ideas that you can think of?

Cheers,

MR

*the first year is considered the seed year, so it doesn’t count in my dividend stream, so because of the seed year, after 5 years I only have $20,000 but after 10 years I have $45,000 instead of $40,000 (the 5 year amount doubled).

Starting A New Lifestyle By Taking a Month To Prepare

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In the past I use to make resolutions, then after the first week when I didn’t hop into those new resolutions instantly, I would give up on them thinking that I already violated those goals so why even try.  Obviously, this wasn’t the best way to accomplish such goals.

white egg

This year, I’ve learned my lesson!  From this point on, January of each new year will be my transition month into the new year.  So instead of jumping into a new lifestyle head first, I’m going to the shallow end of the pool and easing myself into my new mindset and lifestyle.  No more “cold turkey” dumping the old and jumping to the new for me.

Some of you can jump right in with the new year.  You planned your strategy in December and jump in head first on day 1 of January.  If that works for you, then great!  I just find that December is too busy for me to adequately plan my strategy.

So you might be wondering how I’m going to start my preparation for my lifestyle change…  Well tonight I’m going to hard boil eggs!  Not very exciting huh…  Then the next day I’m going to eat two eggs for breakfast as part of my weight loss program.  After eating my eggs in the morning, I’m going to start developing the dietary path for my weight loss portion of my New Year resolutions, and let the strategies for those resolutions develop from that point.

Oftentimes, the hardest part of change is the first step, so for me the first step is boiling eggs.  Not sexy, but a start!

So I start my lifestyle change be using a simple task to ignite the process.  I would like to say that this is the first time I’ve used such techniques, but it’s not.  I use similar tasks and tricks to help me write the assembler and operating system software back during my college days.  So in a way, instead of waiting for perfect inspiration or betting everything on day 1 of the New Year, instead I’m going to trick myself and do whatever it takes to change my lifestyle.

And now I’m off to boil eggs…

MR

 

Rich in the Past or Middle Class in the Present – I Choose the Middle Class

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Recently, I went to the Edison and Ford’s summer homes when I was in Florida during vacation.  After touring their homes and getting a feel for how they lived their lives, I started wondering if I would rather live like I do today or live a life similar to one of these great men of the past.

Surprisingly, I choose the present, and here is why:

  • The world is at my disposal because of cheap transportation via the airplanes and airline infrastructure!  It’s relatively cheap to fly today versus in the past.  The trick in the past would be to even finding a flight to even a small fraction of the places airplanes can take us today!
  • I like air conditioning, especially during hot summers like we just recently had!  I can imagine that the folks back then were often pretty sweaty during their summers!
  • I like central heating!  It’s nice have an even flow of heat throughout the house!
  • I like the heater in my car!  Can you imaging driving to work in the winter (especially if live in the North) without a heater?
  • It’s nice to have great inflatable rubber tires!  If I lived in the past, I might get stuck in the ruts in the roads that they had back then, especially when it was snowy.  which brings me to my next point:
  • I like our roads and the fact that they are plowed when it snows!
  • Credit and credit cards (like the Chase Freedom credit cards)!  Now we too have access to credit like the rich of yesteryear had.  While some complain about available credit, at one time the middle class didn’t have such opportunities.  Credit is just a tool,  what you do with that tool is up to you.
  • Modern medicine is huge!  The rich back in the days of yesteryear didn’t have it nearly as good as we do with respect to medical treatments!
  • Technology, yes as much as I state that we are losing jobs to technology, I still love it!  It’s amazing what we can do today versus yesterday.  Shoot, I’m not even sure if I can write a paper letter more than a page long anymore.  Think about when was the last time you wrote a real multi-page letter to someone where the letter was more than an invitation to an party?  Do I even have to mention cell phones, let alone a smart cell phone?
  • I love indoor plumbing.  Oh they has some systems back then (think  outhouses), but still, we have it better.
  • And then there are all of the recreational activities!  boating (not the slow boring type of the past either), jetskiing, snowmobiling, affordable snow skiing, parasailing, and the list goes on and on!
  • And finally, the Internet!  Yes this is a part of technology, but it’s so much more than that!  Currently, we surf the web, email each other, play games, blog, watch movies, listen to music, educate ourselves, fix things via information googled on the internet, socialize, etc…  The internet  just continues to snowball into bigger and more incredible things.

Actually the Internet really tips the scale!  I would bet that we of the here-and-now have been exposed (via the internet) to twice as much as the people in the middle classes of Edison and Ford’s era!

As much as the media complains about how bad the middle class has it today, I wouldn’t switch places with someone that was rich just 40 years ago, let alone over 100 years ago!

Sometimes we need to sit down, look around, and realize how incredible we really have it!

I say enjoy the here-and-now before it has come-and-gone!

So here is to a great weekend, now it’s time to enjoy it!

MR