If you were recently in the hospital, and you have some bills piling up, you may want to know a little about your credit score, and how these bills can affect it, before you think you can just skip over them, and not worrying about them.

In America today, the main reason that many people are in debt is solely because they can’t or don’t pay their medical bills.  With those without insurance, you’re going to find out that it’s hard to pay a $20,000 surgery bill.  This is why I highly recommend you at least get a higher deductible health insurance plan.  These can run you around $40-$100, and are actually quite good for the money.  Find yours at eHealthInsurance, where you can compare top leading health insurance companies.

How does it affect my score?

Like any unpaid bill in life, a health bill is going to be no different.  If you don’t pay after 30 days, you’ll most likely get a notice in the mail.  Keep in mind that if you can’t pay it off, you want to contact someone immediately so that you can get some help.  Most of the times, the hospital may put you on some sort of payment plan, where you can pay off your bill in small amounts.

Now, after about 90 days, you’re going to find that the hospital, or doctor’s office is most likely going to sell off your debts to a third party.  This is where the harassing starts.  If you continue to not pick up, or ignore the bills, you will most likely find out that they will either try to garnish your wages or take your to court.

How can I stop this?

The easiest way to solve these problems is simply by paying your bills, or contacting the company.  This is usually the best way to go, when it comes down to getting your medical bills solved.

Sadly, if you don’t pay off your credit cards, you may soon find out that the credit card companies are going to come around, and most likely sue you.  Should they be able to do this?  Of course, you’re borrowing their money, and they want it back.  If you gave someone $1,000, and never got it back, how would you take it.  You have to treat the credit card companies the same way.

Now, if the credit card companies are coming at you to sue, here are a few tactics that you can take in order to save yourself from a future court date.

Always respond to your summons

If you receive a summons in the mail, or however you receive this, you’re going to want to respond.  The worst thing that you can do is ignore it, or not show up.  If you don’t show up,  they can start to garnish your wages, and you’ll have no idea what’s going on.  If you do show up, or contact them, you can work out a way to solve the problem.  Trust me, hiding is not going to help you on this one!

Try to work outside of the court room

If you say owe $10,000, and you can’t pay the bill, call up the debt collectors and try to work something out.   Since you’re both human beings, explain to them in a nice way on what’s going on.  If you’re just being a deadbeat, pay up!  If you truly are trying to pay, but you lost a job, tell them that you have a family to feed, and you’re trying your best to send a few dollars.  See what they can work out for you, and maybe they will cancel out the potential to sue you.

The best way to work this out in the end is to contact the debt collectors, and let them know what’s going on.  If you can do this, you’re going to find that they will do everything in their own power to help you out.  As long as you’re honest, and you’re nice, you shouldn’t have a problem figuring something out.

We all would like to make some extra money.  Whether it’s a lot, or if it’s just a little  bit, it could still help get some of the monthly bills out of the way.  So, if you’re looking to find some ways to make a few extra bucks each month, you may want to consider a few of these jobs below.  These jobs allow you to work from home, and can bring in some great money for either your first job, or your second!

Make Money Online With These Jobs:

Transcription – First of all, you could always find a place that is willing to hire you full-time or part-time.  If you know transcription well, you can get a job doing this from home.  It could bring in extra money, and be a job that offers a lot of convenience.

eBay – Do you know how to work eBay well?  If so, you may want to consider selling items for other people.  You could do this from home, it would be an easy job, and you can take off a percentage of their sale as commission.

Freelance – Are you a good writer?  If so, you may want to consider writing for blogs and/or websites.  People hire others to write content for their websites.  This could also be an easy stay at home job.

Surveys – Yes, it’s that simple.  You can take surveys online, and give big companies your opinion and make money online.  A great website you may want to consider is findmysurvey.com.

Tutoring – Do you have the brains to tutor someone else?  If so, you may want to consider it.  If you like working with children, teens or others on information that you know well, you can get paid for it!  This could be a hobby, a great job, and you can get paid for your knowledge!

Websites -  Are you good with working on the Internet?  If so, perhaps you’re good at designing websites, marketing, etc.  If you have any skills what so ever you can easily find a job that will pay you money.

Working online can be a great thing.  It can bring in extra money, allow you a very convenient schedule, and there is no need to leave the house if you don’t want to.  So, if you’re looking for a full-time or part-time job, you know which jobs to consider!

We are always looking to make more and more money.  You can never have enough it seems like.  Although, why work your life away trying to make money, when you can make your money make money for you.  A huge percentage of people have just ordinary savings accounts making hardly any interest.  Instead, those people could place their money in a money market and make a good interest on their money!

It is okay to have a savings account with little money in it for easy access, but you should always place the majority of your money in a money market.  What are the benefits you ask?  Continue reading below to find out!

• You can guarantee yourself that you’re going to make money off of money that is just sitting there.
• A money market is not risky like stocks and mutual funds can be.
• You can withdraw from a money market at any time, but you’re usually limited a certain amount of times you can touch it each month.
• Most money markets are always FDIC insured.
• A lot of money markets don’t even require a minimum balance.  Therefore if you really want you could put only $10 in it!
• Money markets are very easy to use.  You can also find your money market account online if you sign-in.  This allows you to keep track of how much you’re making, and to always see what your balance is without having to make a phone call or meet with someone.

There are several benefits of having a money market.  A money market will work much harder for you so you don’t have to, unlike an ordinary savings account. Money market rates are always fluctuating, but you can get around 6% on your money for just sitting there.  So, regardless of what the rates are, and how the economy is, let your money work for you.  Anything is better than nothing, and a money market is always better than a savings!

Amazon is one of the world’s biggest online marketplace.  You name it, Amazon is most likely going to have it.  Whether you want a particular book, or you want to buy a new lawnmower, yes, they have everything.  The thing I love about Amazon is that their prices are extremely hard to beat!

So, what if you’re looking for promotional or coupon codes?  Where do you look?  How do you find them?  Let me show you some great tips you can take in order to find what you’re looking for.

A quick search can be your friend

I know it sounds easy, but this is how I find a lot of my promotional codes.  I will simply Google “Amazon promotional codes”.  Now, the trick here is that you should put in the month and date, since their codes tend to only last 30 days.  For example, if it’s August of 2009, you’ll want to search for “Amazon coupon codes august 2009″, and see what comes up.

Keep your eyes peeled on coupon sites

I’m a huge fan of RetailMeNot, and sites like Buxr.  Both of these sites have a great amount of deals that are updated by the hour.  Bookmark these sites, and keep coming back.  You may hit the jackpot with particular deals.  You’ll have to keep in mind that many Amazon coupons are for particular items, and not just your order.

Look for the daily deal

Every day, Amazon holds a ton of daily deals.  For example, check out the widget that I placed at the end of this post.  This will show you Amazon’s daily deal, and if you’re interested you can grab it for a low, low price.  Keep in mind that these tend to go very fast.

Here’s the widget…