Yesterday the IRS announced that they will no longer be mailing tax forms in the mail to individuals and forms can be downloaded and printed from their website at http://www.irs.gov/, which has comprehensive information and has made great strides in the last several years. Earlier there was also an announcement of mandatory EFTPS deposits by those who make payroll deposits for employees, also an easy to use site.
Both of these announcements exemplify the ease, speed, and productive use of the web for financial transactions this day and age. If you are like most, you have a long list of websites and passwords for your personal and business use, as checks go the way of the buggy whips this information will gain in importance and become more valuable to others.
Here are a few tips for protecting this information and ideas that you may consider for your personal and business organization:
- Our favorite way of saving passwords, websites, and account information is using, an Excel or Word file that has a strong (letters and symbol) password.
- Save the file somewhere deep in your system, not on your desktop or in the root directory of your “My Documents” folder.
- Do not name the file “Passwords” as my fellow workers noted to me, it is easy to identify.
- Let someone (spouse or co-worker) know of the location and master password for your electronic file.
- Occasionally print a copy of this information, especially if it is not backed up offsite or on a separate device, and put it with your Will and Estate documents, just in case you and your co-knowledged person are incapacitated at the same time.
- My favorite Iphone application for this service is Keeper , although I have not used the computer linked version and only save personal email passwords, airline and hotel frequency use program numbers on my phone.
- Change your passwords frequently, at minimum a few times per year.
Bonnie and Clyde used guns and violence for their hold ups, today financial hold ups are much different and less intrusive to us as a person, yet very much end in the same result if successful. Take a few moments to organize your important information, it may save a lot of time in the future, not only to you, but other important people in your life.
Have a Great Day!
JK