To Cancel, Or Not To Cancel.

@ssilva8960 Oh, I’ll do it! Don’t push me!

@Stallion I saw the Mehrathon yesterday day, said “meh” and had no interest in trying for an IRK.

The last couple, the only thing that was actually something I’d use was the IRK bags and I’ve got plenty of bags at this point. Fuko, Fuko, BOC, IRK…

Losing interest.

@CyberneticAngel Bed Bath & Beyond its no wonder eye haven’t really liked anything eye bought after realizing what eye did buy arrived weeks later. Saying that eye stumbled upon this here site late into it and originally posted that this stuff is junk. Immediately eye was shited on. Members stating there is stuff to buy occasionally; shifting through all the junk can be time consuming. Eye did buy a few Libratones, earphones, and Regret Kits. Which once arrived yes I basically regreted them. Currently Im pondering why am eye paying for another shipping membership especially when it doesn’t even seem to pay for itself.

@CyberneticAngel @whomeyesu I hate everything about this post and your username. Why would you do that? Like nails on a chalkboard.

@CyberneticAngel @KNmeh7 Why would you hate something that is totally true. You boosting your 36 orders to boot since 2016; obviously states that you buy 1 item a month to retain VMP membership. For what eye realize you are pondering that very same question. Unless you are very much using that membership to donate to charity. Which in fact likely is just adding to the worlds trash; since the charity will have a hard time selling said bought stuff. Eventually it all will end up at a landfill; even worse ocean or ozone.

@whomeyesu I’m just curious, is English your native tongue? My opinion of your writing hinges on the answer lol.

@CyberneticAngel Maybe or possibly internet translate works woders.

@kornblatt word.

@kornblatt If you didn’t drop the mic you should have.

@kornblatt Clearance section? Clothing? Animal food?

Exactly which site are you talking about?

@kornblatt Eye already know the response to this here main remarks. Once, provided batch under the entered inventory scu sells out and a new batch scu is generated creating a new item price margin. With all willing less a new potential customer price we all believe that this is bull shit yet from the acounting end it is true yet is still fucked up. It wont change its just the way its entered into on hand inventory is done through some mer profitable business margin. That constantly fluctuates upon the deemed vendor of such goods to be had wants to charge the marketing department for such goods. While we patiently see the price margins fluctuate and when a deal is brought back to life. They clearance sites in general live off threads and the more they see which search engine is working or not working determines the parting ways of contract agreements abundantly ending. As us customers call bull on such practices its just the way the buyers enters the threshold of course likely positive amounts made unless its been taking up space for far to long. Which is when the deal people determine if its worth holding or folding finally for a loss. Which again from a business perspective is a mere tax right off so yes never actually a loss. Its a very common business practice in general and only those that don’t tend to follow suit won’t make it.

@MarkML but without the sketchy combination pregnancy/drug test comob that always makes me snicker

@cengland0 if your 401K fees are too high, it might be time to harass your employer. Or if from a prior employer, move it to an IRA.

@RedOak The fees are $150/year for the Rollover 401K’s. After my layoff in 2017, I decided to retire and didn’t want to deal with my former employer whenever I wanted to make 401K changes. I cannot transfer that money to a regular IRA without a tax penalty of 10% and that would exceed the $150 I pay each year. Once I reach 59.5 years, then I can transfer money with just paying the regular income tax and no penalty but I already know that the income tax on that will also exceed the $150 I pay to service that account. I’m not in desperate need of those funds at this time so I plan on keeping it there until I have to take a mandatory disbursement at age 72 – I have about 17 years to go if I live that long.

But that rollover fee is just one example. I pay Google $60/year for my Nest doorbell to show me video snippets of motion events instead of still images. I pay $65.40/year for Ooma VOIP just so I can fax things and I never need to fax anything myself but have a neighbor that uses it about twice a year (Averaging a cost of $32 per fax). I pay supernews $144/year to view newsgroups on the Internet and I go there probably once every other month. When I look at these other services that I pay for and get very little use out of, the $60 I pay meh each year is trivial just like the others.

@cengland0 @RedOak lol I get your point and I’m paying ooma more cause I cant be arsed to deal with calling them to switch to basic… And it was a home/work number that is never used but is just out there and forwards to my cell…

I assume by your 401K comment you have some in a roth… You could roll that portion into a roth IRA without a penalty. But… Your money.

@cengland0

I cannot transfer that money to a regular IRA without a tax penalty of 10%

Why not? Sounds like some bad consultant advice.

@cengland0 @unksol

Aha, Ooma. I suppose we hang onto it for a bit of nostalgia regarding our 30 year old landline number.

But also do use it for the occasional fax needs. The good online fax services we’ve tried cost money as well.

Without the Premier option, the cost would be an out $60 for the taxes that the state and federal govt insist on collecting, even for a “free” service.

We like the ability to screen incoming calls that Premier offers and use the second phone number it includes for our LLC.

Are we silly to consider replacing our perfectly good Ooma box with the new one they’re currently offering at half price, $50? For the ability to attach their inexpensive security and water sensors. And to get a backup box in case our over 7 year old box dies. (BTW, they confirmed you can deactivate the old box and reactivate it later, so the old box becomes the backup.)

@unksol No, I don’t have a roth account. I already have so many accounts that I use a program called Spensa to keep track of them. Just counted and I have 24 accounts spread amongst multiple financial institutions and none of them are roth accounts. With a maximum of $7,000 annual contributions each year, it doesn’t seem worth it for the effort. It doesn’t make any difference if I move 401K money over to a roth or other post-tax money into a roth because you need to pay the tax upfront in the year you do the rollover if it’s sourced from a 401K. To limit my savings contributions to $7,000 (I’m over 50) is the deal breaker. Don’t want to give too much financial info away but just accept that roth accounts aren’t for everyone.

@unksol regarding keeping Ooma, I actually called them to cancel because my internet connection sucks so bad and they offered me free upgraded hardware to try to fix the internet issues. I asked them how in the world a new Ooma box would work better when my internet goes out and he was very persistent. I knew it was all BS but figured I would get the new hardware and then cancel a few months later. That was over a year ago and I still haven’t canceled. Maybe this is more evidence of me being lazy.

@RedOak

I cannot transfer that money to a regular IRA without a tax penalty of 10%

Why not? Sounds like some bad consultant advice.

Maybe I called my “regular IRA” incorrectly as it’s an investment account used for retirement savings, not a traditional IRA that was funded with pretax dollars. It was funded with post-tax funds. With this definition change, do you still think I can take money out of a pre-tax “qualified” 401K rollover account into a post-tax “nonqualified” investment account without paying a 10% penalty at the age of 55?

@RedOak I have a google voice number that I give everyone. When someone calls that number, it gets forwarded to both my Ooma phone and my cellphone at the same time.

I used to answer on the Ooma landline when my internet was stable but now only answer it on my cellphone. That’s what makes the Ooma virtually worthless for me now. But it’s just a little over $65.40/year for the taxes for their basic service. I don’t need any of their premier services because Google Voice provides all those features for free and that’s the primary phone number I give out. At those prices, it’s almost worth keeping for some emergency use and the couple faxes I send for people.

@cengland0 Really, you should talk to a qualified financial advisor.

But note, you can roll a traditional (pre-tax) 401K from a prior employer into a traditional (pre-tax) IRA without penalty or tax impact at the time of rollover as long as the rollover is direct.

Typical reasons to do that are high 401K fees and the desire to have more investment options than offered by the prior employer.

(Post-tax) Roth 401K conversions are trickier, especially if you anticipate withdrawing money within 5 years.

As to the high number of accounts you have, a financial advisor can help there as well - the problem with so many accounts isn’t simply the chaos and potential confusion… that also makes it far more difficult to assure you have properly balanced investments matching your risk tolerance.

@cengland0 @RedOak a post tax IRA is a roth IRA. If you wanted to roll a pretax 401K into a roth IRA you would have to pay the taxes on it. Although there shouldn’t be a penalty on top of the taxes because you are not withdrawing the money, just moving it.

You should also be able to roll a pretax 401K into a pretax IRA without paying any taxes. You can have both a regular (pre tax) and a Roth(post tax) IRA, it’s just the yearly contribution limits are across both. But that doesn’t impact a rollover that’s just an account transfer. So you should be able to open a regular IRA and roll your 401K in there while continuing to contribute to your existing IRA. or which ever is best for you. If you want to do that.

My 401K is half regular/half roth with an old company… I’d need to open a pretax IRA and split it between that and my existing roth IRA to not have to pay taxes on the regular part till retirement.

@RedOak I hired a financial advisor and they get paid a percentage of my balance – not a percentage of the investment gain. He was losing me between $7,000 and $13,000 per month for a whole year and still getting paid his percentage so I fired him and decided to manage my money myself.

His plea for me to keep him was if you went to a doctor to remove cancer and he missed a cell and the cancer came back, you would still have to pay the doctor for that service. Thought it was funny he compared himself to cancer coming back. My better analogy is if I hire someone to mow my lawn and he instead sprayed roundup on the lawn and killed it, not only would I refuse to pay, I would sue him for the lawn to be resodded.

Now that I’ve been managing my money myself, so far I have not lost any principle and have actually gained a little even through this pandemic. It’s only costing me $150/year to keep that securities account open. That securities type of account allows me to purchase things you usually cannot get from a traditional bank like corporate and municipal bonds and higher rate CD’s that are only offered to brokers. You can also sell CD’s on the secondary market. Obviously if you know that your bank offers those, it’s probably through their brokerage organization which is a different part of the company.

Anyway, I already know I can transfer money from a 401K to a qualified pretax IRA without a penalty and I’ve done that for all my former employers so I can sever my relationship with them and manage my money myself. I had to rollover the money within a year of termination or it would be locked in my former employer’s account forever. Now the only reason I need to contact any of my former employers is to begin receiving my pensions when I reach the age of 59.5.

the problem with so many accounts isn’t simply the chaos and potential confusion… that also makes it far more difficult to assure you have properly balanced investments matching your risk tolerance.

Not a problem. I cannot put all my money in one spot due to FDIC and NCUA protection limitations and for other safety reasons. I’ve even gone the route of adding POD/TOD names to the accounts to make them technically different. Believe me, I really know what I’m doing in this area because I’ve been working in the banking industry for 27 years prior to being laid off in 2017. I just thought a financial advisor would be able to invest my money in a way that could earn me more money than if I did it myself. That proved to be a bad assumption and I doubt I will ever hire another one in the future.

@unksol

You should also be able to roll a pretax 401K into a pretax IRA without paying any taxes.

Yes and I did that. I no longer have a 401K with any company because all of them have been rolled over into a qualified pretax IRA where I can manage the money independently of my former employer.

@cengland0

Key phrase for the financial advisor - “qualified”. Bad financial advisors give bad advice.

I no longer have a 401K with any company because all of them have been rolled over into a qualified pretax IRA

Huh? Why are we having this discussion?

From your original comment at the top:

losses I’m realizing in fees on my 401K.

@RedOak

Huh? Why are we having this discussion?

I understand your concern. I called my account a 401k for simplicity because it could confuse some readers if I called it a qualified 401K rollover pre-tax IRA instead. This discussion went on a tangent which caused me to provide more specific details.

@cengland0 @RedOak Boy, do I wish I were in a position to throw away that much money. There are days I consider canceling Netflix to save money…

@cengland0 @PooltoyWolf

Boy, do I wish I were in a position to throw away that much money. There are days I consider canceling Netflix to save money…

Haha, I might be able to out-cheap you in that category.

1. We haven’t had cable TV for 30 years since I was single.
2. We’ve never paid for Netflix or any other streaming service other than Amazon Prime and the driver for that one was the “free” shipping and 5% back reward on the Prime card. The streaming video is cream.

@PooltoyWolf

Boy, do I wish I were in a position to throw away that much money. There are days I consider canceling Netflix to save money

It’s only $60/year for VMP so it’s not really that much money. It’s probably equivalent to having one Starbucks coffee each month (not really sure because I don’t go there) but definitely less than if you bought two.

@cengland0 @RedOak glad you have it handeled. Non fiduciary financial advisors and shitty fees… Shudder.

Tangents are fun lol. Didn’t mean to sound like a smartass, you’ve probably got me beat… People should be careful with their retirement accounts.

@cengland0 @RedOak

Averaging a cost of $32 per fax

I lold.

When I look at these other services that I pay for and get very little use out of, the $60 I pay meh each year is trivial just like the others.

I shocked. You realize if you don’t put an upper bound on how many times you can use this logic at once you’re heading for the poorhouse, right?

/giphy shock and displeasure

@cengland0 TL;DR

@cengland0 @RedOak Okay eye only read the first few sentences in your fee response. Why pay a fee for video doirbell. There is no monthly fee doorbells to be bought. Well actually eye don’t know whom sells them or what brands yet eye do know they exist. $120-$150 one time pays for itself in 2-3 years if you live that long.

@whomeyesu The basic video doorbell service is free. Someone rings the bell, you can see on your phone who it is and respond that way if you wish. You can connect at anytime and view the video from the camera. Throughout the day, if it detects motion, it will send you a motion alert and snap an image.

What you don’t get with basic service and get with a Nest Aware subscription is 30 day event triggered video recording, more intelligent alerts such as “sound detected,” “person detected,” “package left,” and “package picked up”, activity zones, and the ability to share clips with your friends. If those additional features aren’t needed for you, pay nothing more than the doorbell price itself.

@cengland0 Hi, with the doorbell that eye use. Eye get video access back for as long as it is stored. Depending on storage space or what it is thats been recorded will determine what is done to the actual video. What eye don’t get is the support community. Being able to report suspicious activity to other doorbell owners. Eye tried many before finding my current doorbell that charges no monthly fee for its full video service. Eye am glad eye did finally find one that does not support a monthly fee.

@RedOak I got a very nice Cuisinart pot & pan set in an IRK a couple of months ago. That got me not only a free pass for future IRKs from SWMBO, but outright encouragement to try and nab them.

In case it wasn’t clear, this new/old feature would be permanent for those legacy VMP folks.

@Stallion they could even eliminate the incremental shipping by including those items with orders they’re already sending us.

Would be an easy way for them to transfer otherwise dumpster-grade stuff from their dumpster ours.

@RedOak I like that idea of dumpster transfers from Meh to us! Combining products with existing orders and shipping makes a lot of sense.

I HOPE YOU ARE LISTENING MEH!

@RedOak Yes this! I would love to open something I ordered and find some random thing in there too. Not every time, but once in a while would rock. It would also maybe encourage more spending!