October 4, 2019

Keep Alaska Air Miles from Expiring with FandangoNOW purchase

If you are inactive with your Alaska Miles account for a 2 year period then you can lose your account and your airline miles.    If you don't use the airline frequently then you can pile up some miles only to have them wiped out due to this.     I actually lost some miles not long ago,.   In my case Alaska was nice enough to reinstate the account for me but I doubt that they'd do it again.   

One way to keep your miles in an infrequently  used mileage plan is to find other cheap or trivial methods to generate miles for free or low cost and use that just frequently enough to remain active and delay the expiration.    On Alaska airlines you can get miles with their 'Mileage Plan Shopping' by making purchases with a variety of retailers. 

FandangoNow is one of the retailers in the Alaska shopping portal.    They have items you can purchase instantly for a couple dollars.   

Go to : mileageplanshopping.com and log in with your Alaska account.
Then search their portal to find the FandangoNow and follow its link there clicking the green 'Shop Now' button and you will be redirected to the FandangoNow site

Buy anything there worth >$1 and you're done.
Now just wait.   It doesn't credit to Alaska miles instantly and you'll have to give it maybe a couple weeks.   So don't wait until the last minute.

FandangoNow has various movies you can rent but the good stuff is usually $5 or $6.    If you want to see one of those movies anyway and need the miles credit then maybe thats not a bad deal.    There are also single episodes of TV shows for $2-3.    Or if you don't have any need for a movie rental or show you can always just find a $1.99 item to buy just to get the 2 miles credit and keep your Alaska miles active.

The Mileage Plan Shopping site says:

"While most transactions will appear within 5 business days, some transactions may take up to 15 
days in order to appear in the list above."

I made a $2.99 purchase on Sept. 24th.   I got my miles on the Alaska site on October 4th.
On the Mileage Plan site it posted the item there on October 1st. I got an email from Mileage Plan Shopping on October 3rd saying that I'd earned 3 miles by shopping.   Then October 4th  on the Alaska site it showed up with the 3 miles credited in my Mileage Plan account.
Altogether it took 10 calendar days from the purchase until it showed in my Alaska activity.

I'd recommend putting an item on your calendar to remind you that the miles are expiring 3-4 weeks in advance so you've go some time to go make a purchase and get the miles credited.

--This article may contain referral links which pay this site a commission for purchases made at the sites.

June 21, 2019

How to Tell What Mobile Network Your Tracfone Phone Uses


I now have a cheap phone plan from Tracfone.     Tracfone has taken to using multiple mobile networks.   You could have Tracfone and be on AT&T, T-Mobile or Verizon depending on ... um, beats me, actually I don't know what or how they choose.     So anyway I don't know what phone network my was using and I wanted to check.   Took me a while of searching to get a good answer.

I found the answer I was looking for at HowardForums.com     Posted there by someone with username 'hpham'     I'm pasting their full answer here to save it for reference :



There are several ways to tell which network your Tracfone uses.

* Look at the SIM number. The first six numbers of the SIM ID determine the carrier: 

890126 = T-Mobile, 890141 = AT&T, 891480 = Verizon. 


* Use the phone model number. Model numbers ending with "C" or "VL" use Verizon. Numbers ending with "G" or "AL" use AT&T. Numbers ending with "BL" could be AT&T or T-mobile.


* Send a text message from your phone to your email address. Look at the sending address of the email. The carrier name is in it.


My phone has 891480... at the start of the SIM and if I text to my email from my phone it comes through with an address @vtext.com which is Verizons address.    My phone is on the Verizon network.

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May 17, 2019

Should You Delay College and Work To Save up Money Instead of Taking Loans?


The Simple Dollar today discusses the question Is a Gap Year Better Financially Than Going Straight to College?

Setting the other reasons for gap years aside, lets look at the finances.    Does it make sense to work a job before college in order to save up the money to pay for tuition so you can avoid taking out student loans?

My reply to that is below :

For the financial decision, it almost always makes more sense to finance college vs working to save up money.
Why? Because going to college gets you a good paying job and by delaying college you're just trading good job wages post college for low wages before college. If you're not banking on making good money after college then I'd ask why you're doing it at all considering that paying for it isn't trivial.
Look at the 5 years in question and the choice really boils down to :
Gap year : 1 gap year working unskilled job and 4 years in college 
vs 
no gap year : 4 years in college and 1 year working after college with a degree and some student loan debt
So you're really trading a year before college working unskilled wages versus a year after college with a degree and the debt.
The average new college graduate makes $50k /yr. Lets take Trents assumption that working pre college is making $20/yr. Really you're trading $50k of income for $20k of income. After tax and minimal expenses you ought to be taking home probably $30k vs $12k. If your first year after college nets you $30k you could pay off the $12k in loans your gap year might avoid and have $18k extra cash.
Now the choice is :
Gap year : work 1 year and net $12k then go to college for 4 years
no gap : go to college and take out $12k extra in loans then work a year and net $30k and pay off that $12k pocket $18k more
Of course the particular numbers will matter. Depends on how much money you can make in the gap year vs your planned post college career.
Gap years can make sense for other reasons. If you're really not ready for college, doubt it will work for you, don't know what you want to do with your life, etc, then those are potentially better reasons to do a gap year.


--This article may contain referral links which pay this site a commission for purchases made at the sites.

May 6, 2019

15% back at Ebates (now Rakuten) on 400+ Stores

Ebates  is celebrating its 20th anniversary with 15% back at 400+ stores right now.   

Also note that Ebates  has now apparently changed its name to Rakuten so don't be surprised if the page redirects to that new site.

Smal sample of some major name stores with the deal :

Macy's
JCPenney
Walgreens
Shoes.com
Ann Taylor
Pier1
Shutterfly
Dell
Lenovo
Advance Auto Parts
Dicks Sporting Goods
Columbia Sportswear



Some may also give 20% back, I'm showing "exclusive" 20% rates on several stores.   I guess thats a YMMV deal but I'm not sure how it works.





Standard Ebates blurb: To get cash back from Ebates you need to be signed up with Ebates.  Then simply go to Ebates to get the referral to the store before you do your shopping.  I also get a referral bonus if you use my links to sign up with Ebates.  


-- This article may contain referral links which pay this site a commission for purchases made at the sites.

March 27, 2019

FREE - One Month Trials of Showtime, Starz and Epix at Roku Channel


The Roku Channel is offering a one month free trial for Showtime, Starz and Epix.


Link to the deal 


Its a free trial and auto subscribes at full price after the month expires.   
This free month offer ends on Sunday 3/31.   


--This article may contain referral links which pay this site a commission for purchases made at the sites.

March 18, 2019

Computer RAM Memory Prices 2007-2018

The prices for memory used in desktop computers has been relatively high for the past couple years and is now starting to come down.   I was curious what the longer term trend has been. 

I made a chart showing the prices of computer memory over the period 2007 to 2018.   Prices are in $ / MB.

Chart :



Note that the specific memory technology and speed has changed over time so the memory is also faster.    e.g. back in 2007 you might be buying DDR2-800 and today it is probably DDR4-2666

Data source : https://jcmit.net/memoryprice.htm 
'copyright 2001, 2017, 2018 John C. McCallum 
You can use the material here. Please acknowledge the source.'


--This article may contain referral links which pay this site a commission for purchases made at the sites.

February 7, 2019

Don't Move to Indiana To Become a Prosthodontist

I really shouldn't have to tell both of the Prosthodontists in the nation who are currently looking for a job but you probably won't find a job if you drop everything and move to Indiana.   Also I don't know what a Prosthodontist is so let me pause and go look that up.    Turns out that a prosthodontist is a specialization in dentistry that handles restoration of teeth or dentures.

Why am I talking about prosthodontists in Indiana?   

According to this article "The fastest-growing job in each U.S. state" from Yahoo Finance, the fastest growing job in Indiana is prosthodontist.     You can follow that link to see their nice pretty graphic showing the (alleged) fastest growing job per state.    Reading that raised a red alert in my BS radar.      I figured if I've never even heard of an occupation its probably unlikely that its a new boom job.    In fact  all I had to do was click on the source cited " projections from the government-backed Projections Managing Partnership (PMP)" to see that there are currently 0 prosthodontists in Indiana and the projection is for there to be 10.      I do see that going from nothing to 10 is pretty good growth but 10 jobs is nothing.        I don't know how the Yahoo finance articles authors decided that this +10 job growth ranked as the fastest growing job for the state.    There are numerous jobs for Indiana projected to have higher net job increases and high % increases.   The % increase for prosthodontists is actually listed as 0.    The job numbers go from 0 to 10 so theres no valid way to express % increase.   Yet for some reason the Yahoo folks decided this change from 0 to 10 was the biggest increase. 

Two ways of looking at the fastest growing jobs are to look at the % increase or the net increase.   A job that goes from 50 to 75 has a 50% increase and a 25 net increase.     

Pulling the data from the Projections Management website for the 2017 to 2019 projections for Indiana we get :

High % growth jobs for Indiana :

OccupationName Base Proj Change PercentChange
Artists and Related Workers, All Other 50 60 10 20
Helpers--Painters, Paperhangers, Plasterers, and Stucco Masons 50 60 10 20
Cartographers and Photogrammetrists 100 110 10 10
Set and Exhibit Designers 100 110 10 10
Archivists 120 130 10 8.3
Elevator Installers and Repairers 120 130 10 8.3

Jobs with high net job increases for Indiana: 

OccupationName Base Proj Change PercentChange
Combined Food Preparation and Serving Workers, Including Fast Food 83720 85620 1900 2.3
Registered Nurses 65480 67330 1850 2.8
Team Assemblers 82420 83850 1430 1.7
Personal Care Aides 29230 30530 1300 4.4
Waiters and Waitresses 51740 53030 1290 2.5

Clearly there are a LOT lot more jobs in food prep, nursing, personal care, than there are in the "boom" 20% growth jobs such as painters helpers.   But if you only look at the % increase then you're likely to chase a job with very few actual openings. 

Oh, also don't move to Idaho to be an 'exhibit designer'.   The Yahoo finance analysis did the exact same thing for that job in that state and decided that going from 0 exhibit designer jobs to 10 jobs is the fastest growing occupation for Idaho.

--

This article may contain referral links which pay this site a commission for purchases made at the sites.

January 11, 2019

40% off Showtime, Starz for 3 Months via Amazon

Amazon is running a promotion for 40% off of select channels right now.

You can get 40% off for 3 months on :
Starz, Showtime, PBS Masterpiece, Lifetime Movie Club

Its a limited time offer through January 17th.   Also looks like its only for new subscribers via Amazon.


--
This article may contain referral links which pay this site a commission for purchases made at the sites.

January 7, 2019

Amex Offers for $15 back on fubutv, $5 back Hulu & 30% back CBS Online, Showtime & Sling TV (YMMV)


American Express has a number of offers currently for cash back on several online steaming services.


The deals I've got from them are :

30% back up to $15 on  Sirius XM Radio Inc. (including both internet-based and satellite-based), Pandora, Spotify, Sling TV, CBS All Access and Showtime. (expires 3/6/19)

Spend $5 or more get $5 back on Hulu up to 4x (expires 3/28/19)

Spend $35 and get $15 back on fubutv up to 3x  (expires 7/1/19)

Amex deals are YMMV so check your offers to see if you've go them or not.



Also Ebates currently offers $5 cash back on Hulu (new users)


Standard Ebates blurb: To get cash back from Ebates you need to be signed up with Ebates.  Then simply go to Ebates to get the referral to the store before you do your shopping.  I also get a referral bonus if you use my links to sign up with Ebates.  



--This article may contain referral links which pay this site a commission for purchases made at the sites.

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