More than 5,000 people are expected to attend when the Microsoft Store opens Thursday at Garden State Plaza. Macklemore and Ryan Lewis will perform at 7 p.m. at the mall to help celebrate the opening. Gates open for the concert at 5 p.m. Customers who show up to the 11 a.m. grand opening ceremony have a chance to win giveaways including free tickets to the concert. The Garden State Plaza location is the third Microsoft store in New Jersey. The 3,744 square-foot store will sell Microsoft devices like the Surface and Windows Phone as well as computers running the Windows operating system from brands like Samsung and Dell. Workers can provide technical support for any products running Microsoft software, even Apple products. “If you’re running Office on Mac, we’ll train you,” Peter Harrington, northeast marketing manager for Microsoft, said. “We don’t care where you bought it, we don’t care when you bought it, we don’t care who made it,” added Jonathan Adashek, a spokesman for the company. The store will employ 53 workers, from store leader Mike Mercandino to the part-time product advisors on the sales floor. Customers will be able to pre-order the newly announced Surface Pro 3. As part of the grand opening, Microsoft is giving $1 million to local organizations Children’s Aid and Family Services, the Arc of Bergen and Passaic Counties and Bergen Family Center. A credit card can be an asset to your lifestyle, but if not handled carefully it can become a liability, especially if you find it so convenient and easy to use that you lose control of your spending. This short guide will help you understand how you can use your credit card so it works to your advantage, not against you. Advantages A credit card can: 1. Offer free use of funds, provided you always pay your balance in full, on time. 2. Be more convenient to carry than cash. 3. Help you establish a good credit history. 4. Provide a convenient payment method for purchases made on the Internet and over the telephone. 5. Give you incentives, such as reward points, that you can redeem. Disadvantages On the other hand, credit cards can: 1. Cost much more than other forms of credit, such as a line of credit or a personal loan, if you don't pay on time. 2. Damage your credit rating if your payments are late; 3. Allow you to build up more debt than you can handle; 4. Have complicated terms and conditions; What is a credit card? A credit card is more then a simple piece of plastic, it is first and foremost a flexible payment tool accepted at 30 million locations worldwide, and if the card balance is paid off every month, then no interest is charged on purchases made so, essentially, short-term credit is granted without the consumer paying any interest. Among its many features it provides: 1. Access to unsecured credit (no collateral required against amounts charged) 2. Interest-free payment from time of purchase to the end of the billing period 3. Instant payment of purchases, allowing for instant receipt of goods and services 4. 24/7 access 5. Fraud protection However before you decide to use your credit card, carefully consider all of the factors and weigh them against your personal needs and values. What about credit card control? Handling money and credit cards wisely is a talent few of us are born with. But it is a skill that can easily be learned. The place to start is with budgeting. What is a Budget? It's simply an organized way of managing your finances, basically, it gives you an overall picture of where your money is coming from, when it's coming in and how it's being spent. A budget should be flexible, changing according to your circumstances. Why Budget? Budgeting helps us achieve short-term goals like paying the monthly bills on time; it's also for longer-termfinancial goals like buying a home, a car, paying for an education, a wedding or a holiday. When you take control of your financial affairs, you're more confident about the future. A budget is key to financial control. It gives you a "Polaroid picture" of where you stand financially and where you're heading. Credit card control tips Use a low or no-fee credit card and save on the annual fee that some companies charge. Only charge to your credit cards what you can pay off in full when the bill comes. You might not use your credit card as much if you start believing that you have to pay off your entire balance at the end of each month. A good way to help to reduce what you pay on your credit card is to search for a card with a lower interest rate. Many financial institutions now offer at least one of these types of cards. Remember that when you take a cash advance on your credit card, the interest starts accumulating immediately and not on the due date of your credit card bill. Also keep in mind that if you make only the minimum monthly repayment you may never get out of debt. Conclusion The main advantage of having a credit card is convenience but if you're not good at budgeting and managing your finances, the over-use of credit cards can leave you with a debt that's very difficult to pay back. |
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