The new rules that our government has put in place to protect consumers from Banks high fees are getting a wake up call.  Banks are now using other means to charge higher fees to consumers to make up for revenue lost from not being able to charge outlandish fees on overdrafts.  Customers may now see fees in services where they were normally free or higher fees on some current fees. 

Banks are looking to technology to squeeze out some additional fees.  Such as USAA and Chase have the ability to deposit check by taking pictures of the check from a smart phone.  All that you need to do is to take a picture of the front and back of the check and hit send.  Some customers would actually pay for such a service.  It would be a major convenience to deposit a check this way instead of having to stuff checks into an ATM. 

As bank fees rise, will be ever see the level of service years ago?  Maybe not, banking is eventually going more online every year.  More and more people are doing their banking electronically and the need to do any banking now at the teller is going down.  Banks such as Bank of America have accounts strictly for online use.  It is a trend of the times.

If you ever started a business or are thinking of starting a business you should be prepared for a lot of solicitors, many offering services you really don't need, but some services are legitimate and can be helpful to your business. We've gotten so many mail solicitations for credit card terminals, all promising so much for very little money. Credit card acceptance is important, you can't really succeed as a business online without accepting credit cards, but there are so many services out there that offer merchant accounts at a low cost and they're easy to sign up.

When you have a traditional brick and motor store, it's also important to accept credit cards, not accepting cards really hurts a business, especially since cash is becoming less and less important in today's market. Why many business owners do not accept credit cards is puzzling, maybe they do not want to deal with the hassle of learning how to use the terminal, or don't want to open a merchant account or they just like to keep things simple with cash.

The days of paper money are winding down, and now a company called SquareUp is bridging the gap between cash and traditional credit card terminals. The device, which is free, is attached to an iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad and allows anyone to accept credit cards instead of cash. This is great news not only for small businesses, but for outdoor vendors, event vendors as well as regular folks just selling stuff on eBay or CraigsList. Not only is the device free but the rates for such transactions are competitive with the rate services like Paypal would charge you, and it wouldn't require the user to sign up and sign in.

For more information visit SquareUp, and for more information about forming your own business or whether it be forming a Limited Liability Company, forming a Corporation or even applying for a DBA, please give us a call at 866-999-8200.

By now, it is widely known that Apple will introduce a new iPhone at next weeks Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC).  The new iPhone which is on AT&T is rumored to be heading to other cell phone carriers.  This is prompting AT&T to keep the users that it has.  It is widely believed that a lot of AT&T iPhone customers will be switching to other carriers because of the troubles that AT&T is causing. 

AT&T isn't helping to keep its customers when after it announced new pricing models for the data plans on the iPhone and iPad.  Currently, iPhone uses would pay $30 a month for their "unlimited" date plans which if you read the fine print cap at 5gb.  The plan is being replaced with a 2gb cap for $25 a month.  The plan is getting a lot of flack for it capping peoples ability to use the net.  Many people may not exceed the 2gb threshold but for people who use the iphone for its intended purposes such as streaming music and audio may be upset.  This cap is being introduced for fears of AT&T already swamped network will be even more swamped with the rumored new iPhone with its front facing camera.  Also, the AT&T network is also being hit with 2 million new iPad users.  This is an effort of AT&T to improve quality by limiting the amount that people can use.

AT&T is also introducing a tethering option with its new plans.  To use the tethering option, you must enroll in the $25 plan and pay an additional $20 for the option to tether to other devices such as a laptop or an iPad.  Apple is suffering some PR backlash because of AT&T's inability to improve service.  However, Apple is probably working to get the iPhone on other carriers as it stands to sell millions more iPhones to users who are reluctant to move away from Verizon.

AT&T is also trying to keep its customers by increasing the early termination fee to $325 from $175 in an attempt to keep its customers.  One analyst is expecting that AT&T could potentially lose up to 6 million of its 15 million iPhone customers.  If rumors are correct, Verizon and Sprint may be next to be an official carrier for the iPhone.  Verizon is also rumored to be testing iPads to run on its network as well. 

With so many people leaving At&T, it might artificially improve service from AT&T with millions of less users on its network.  Verizon on the other hand may see some performance hits as millions of heavy using internet users come their way once the AT&T exclusivity deal ends.

In the last few years Apple has been gaining momentum.  It all started back when Steve Jobs returned to Apple after being ousted from the company he first started.  Upon his return, Jobs introduced the iMac.  The iMac is the computer that is considered the computer that saved Apple from extinction.  Back then Apple was such a small player compared to Microsoft.  Today, it all changed.  Apple now has a bigger market capitalization than Microsoft.  Apple on the heals of the introduction of the iPod, iTunes, iPhone and now the iPad has seen its stock value skyrocket in the last year.  The stock has hit a share price of as high as $270 a share.  Apple has climbed this year as much as Microsoft has declined.

Apple has seen a lot of its products succeed.  People are seeing its ancillary products as trojan horses to make people buy into the computers.  This has definitely happened.  As people see how well they make the ipods, iphones and ipads they see that it makes sense to integrate them with computers and laptops.  As a result, Apple has been having record setting sales numbers which directly have been raising their stock.

The computer company recently dropped the "computer" from the company name officially and is now known as Apple Inc.  The company has grown its market share in computers significantly.  The company has been on the leading edge of innovation with many companies trying to copy the products with little success.  Nobody has been able to match the success of its ipod, iphone and ipad.