| Tips on improving your credit score
Your credit score influences many areas of your life. A prospective employer will check your credit when considering you for employment. Your insurance agent may check your credit when deciding to insure your car or home. Your lender, whether for a home loan or other consumer debt, will check your credit score when making a determination. Your credit report shows the history of your borrowing activities as they have been reported to the credit reporting bureaus (TransUnion, Experian and Equifax) by lenders, court records and others at a point in time. The credit score helps credit grantors to evaluate this information quickly because it gives a snapshot of your payment history. Thousands of credit grantors send updates to the bureaus -- usually once a month. These updates include balances, monthly payment amounts and whether there have been late payments.
Scam Jam 2007 held
By Karen WilliamsonKARENW@CULLMANTIMES.COMExperts agree shredding mail, paying bills and viewing bank statements online, picking up new check orders at the bank and mailing bills at the post office are ways to stop identity theft.If people take those steps, they will have reduced their risk for identity theft considerably, according to Federal Trade Commission attorney Paul Davis from Atlanta who was one of the experts at the 2007 Scam Jam Wednesday at City Hall."That right there will eliminate a certain percentage of identity theft," he said.Paying bills online requires the use of anti-virus software and firewalls on personal computers, and both have to be updated regularly, he said.Davis recommends contacting one of the three consumer reporting agencies — Equifax, Experian and TransUnion — every four months to request a free credit report."Federal law allows you to get free copies of each one every year," he said.That way people will know quickly if there is a problem.
Child Protective Services: Problems, Reforms and More Problems
Rafael Sierra smiles as he watches the face of his girlfriend, Maria Martinez, with their newborn son. It's a July afternoon and sunlight pours into their hospital room at Bayshore Medical Center in Pasadena. It's the couple's second son in as many years. Rafael hasn't slept in almost two days, too anxious from the delivery. He sits by a window to fall asleep. Maria rests in the hospital bed, holding her baby. She's glad the big day is over and her son was born without complications. During the last couple months, Maria had checked in at Bayshore several times for intense stomach pains. She had been a little worried. But now, Maria can relax. Rafael had left the couple's first son at his mother and stepfather's house, though he would rather have his boy with him. The relationship between Rafael and his mother has deteriorated in recent years, especially since he started dating Maria, who, at 26, was almost eight years younger than Rafael.
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