Hello February!

On my end, it’s been a rather . . . intense start to this new year. I’m looking forward to calmer days in the weeks to come. That being said, I want to encourage you all to continue taking steps to improve or protect your financial health, even when life is hectic. This month, I wanted to focus on a few things that can be done quickly and that don’t take a lot of time. Taking care of your finances doesn’t require a ton of time-consuming projects.

Here are three things you can do to stay on top of your finances in February:

• Pull your free annual credit reports. Annual credit reports are a right. This website will allow you to get free copies of your credit reports from the three reporting bureaus (Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion) for free. Just because you pull the reports doesn’t mean that you have to analyze them today: put them aside until you have the time to review them. If it helps, schedule the time needed to review them, so this task doesn’t fall through the cracks. Also, Equifax is currently allowing up to SIX free reports per year for anyone within the United States (these extra annual reports will be available until 2026). So after you make corrections to your report, you can allow a month or two, then pull the Equifax report to see if the changes are displaying.
• File Form 1096 for information returns. If you or your business made payments that should be reported on 1099s, 1098s, W-2s, and a number of other information returns, then you have to file this form. Depending on the number of forms that need to be filed, this may not necessarily be a quick task. But it’s the beginning of the month: if you do paper mailed information returns, it’s still early enough to order this form from IRS (you can’t use the online version for submission). Form 1096 is the cover sheet for hard-copy information returns: you simply have to count how many of each information return you’re sending into IRS, then jot it down on the form. If you don’t have to file information returns, then of course you can skip this tip.
• Move your savings to an account with a better interest rate. Bankrate has a listing of the current rates of both physical and digital banks offering high yield savings accounts. Do your research then move your coins.

That’s it for February: short and sweet, because your time is precious. Talk to you all soon!