Location Severe Storm Risk/Debit v. Credit Cards/Help Get Clean Water Everywhere

WEATHER
Jet stream is hanging over the northern US border with some minor dips west and east. This means most of the continental US will enjoy mild weather today (Friday). There is a threat of severe weather over southeastern New Mexico and west Texas and from Arkansas to New York City. Highs nationwide will be mainly in the 60s to the 80s. There will be some 90s in the southeast, Texas and the southeast.

Houston will be warm and muggy for the foreseeable future. There will be a few showers and thunderstorms around over the weekend. But it will be hit and miss. Highs will be primarily in the middle to upper 80s.

SPANISH WORD OF THE DAY
Let's do debit card or tarjeta de débito, pronounced tar-HEY-tah DAY DAY-bee-toe. Find out why you might want to avoid using your tarjeta de débito, or at least be more careful about checking your bank transactions when using it. See the AND MORE section.

Learning language and math and science skills are linked. Research shows that children who learn more than one language score higher on standardized math and science tests and have improved scientific hypothesizing than children who are monolingual. Help them begin that language learning process--order my award winning DVDs, Let's Learn Spanish with Frank & Paco. They are on the shelf (in the education section) at Barnes & Noble stores or you can order them from http://www.frankandpaco.com, http://www.amazon.com, http://www.bn.com, http://www.bestbuy.com, or http://www.ebay.com/. Our ESL (English as a Second Language) version can be found at http://www.frankypaco.com.

AND MORE
My sister (the world traveler for her work getting radiation sources out of countries where terrorists could get their hands on them) was visiting recently and believe me, she has seen a lot going to Africa and Georgia (old Russia). She said the thing most people don't realize is the extreme lack of clean drinking water in developing/3rd world countries. She said on one trip to Georgia, she was so thirsty, she was dreaming about water. When a hotel manager asked about her visit, she said it was great except she was just so thirsty. He laughed and said ahhhhh and opened a cabinet behind the desk. In it were rows and rows of Evian water. He said he keeps it for visitors from countries like the United States. She was so relieved.

My sister also added that in many countries she has visited, what ends up happening is that people just drink the water anyway. They end up chronically ill with various intestinal maladies. Some cause death.

So truly, this is such a serious problem. As I mentioned in previous posts, my dear Aunt Awanda passed away. She was a huge advocate for mission work and one of her big passions was getting clean water to people in poor countries. So, when I went to make a donation in her memory, I found out that she was a huge advocate for a waterlines, a non-profit, completely volunteer based organization which helps make clean water available around the world. They don't have a "donate now" button. But you can mail a donation to:
302 East Coronado Road, Santa Fe, NM 87505 USA

To learn more, here is the link:
http://www.waterlines.org/

A friend of mine recently said he will not use debit cards because of the lack of protection. I personally only use mine at ATM machines. Plus, I had heard other stories including one where a friend of mine went through a driveup at a fast food restaurant using her debit card to buy a $1 item and how an employee got her information and ran up huge deductions from her account before she realized it.

So, I started checking around and here is what I learned. The big difference between debit and credit cards is that with debit cards, any purchases take the money out of your account immediately. With credit cards, you have until the statement arrives to pay and even then you can choose to pay only part of it and pay interest on the remainder. From an AARP article, I learned that with a debit card, if you report a loss or misuse within 2 days, your maximum out of pocket is $50. If you report within 60 days, your maximum loss is $500. (Note: some states have a $50 limit). If you wait longer than that, you are likely out of luck. Also, if your account becomes overdrawn, you may have to absorb all fees for being overdrawn. Here is the link to that article:

http://www.aarp.org/money/credit_debt/a2002-08-14-ManagingMoneyDebitCards.html

And from Credit Card Forum, with credit cards, you can reverse charges if you receive damaged goods...not usually the case with debit cards. There is much more detail in their article at the following link.

http://creditcardforum.com/credit-card-fraud/23-why-your-debit-card-isnt-safe-any-purchase.html

Now, for both credit and debit cards, who hasn't heard about stories about crafty employees using "skimmers" to copy the scan information off the card? There is more on that in the following snope article:

http://www.snopes.com/crime/warnings/clear.asp

Bottom line, unless you are vigilant about checking purchases on your debit card account, then it is a race against the clock to minimize the amount of unrecoverable withdrawals from your account, if someone steals your debit card or your debit card information.

So, be careful everyone!

Have a great weekend!
Cecilia Sinclair
Wonder Weather Woman