How Should You Manage Your Student Savings Account?

As a student, you would also have various requirements, such as applying for a credit card, taking out a car loan, or even buy your own house. These financial needs might occur while going through college education or immediately thereafter, when you take up an active career. It would be better to plan for all these in advance and manage the finances properly during student days, so that you have a very good credit rating with a high credit score when you complete your education and start your life in full earnest. The following tips should help you in better finance management with your student savings account.

Keeping Money Safe Online

The Internet is a very safe place to manage your money and make necessary purchases but you should take certain precautions. Online banking is a convenient and easy method to manage your money, since most banks use latest technologies and take several precautions to protect your personal information. However, you should also ensure that you keep all your financial information and transactions safe and secure.

• You should never reveal your account number and password to anyone, however close that person might be to you. You should also avoid passwords that anyone could easily guess, such as your first name or last name, your phone number, etc.
• When you have completed the online transactions, you should log out of your account, especially if you are using publically shared computers, where others would also have access to the computer that you have been using. Even though most U.S. bank log you out automatically if your account is inactive for 15 minutes, it is better to log out yourself.
• You should always have an idea of the balance in your account and create alerts for deposits and withdrawals.
• You should double-check all your financial transactions frequently, such as credit card transactions, deposits, recurring payments, and your own ATM withdrawals. If you come across any transaction that appears doubtful to you, you should contact your bank immediately to resolve that issue forthwith.
• You should ensure that you spend only what you have in your account. If you issue a check and it gets returned for lack of funds, the bank would charge you a fee for insufficient funds. The person to whom you issued the check could also demand a fee for the returned check, making the entire process costly. Further, if these types of transactions occur regularly, your credit rating would be severely affected.
• You should also familiarize yourself with good credit rating and credit scores. The credit rating depends on several factors, such as your past payments history, amounts that you owe or your total outstanding debts, new credit amounts, credit history length, and the types of credit. The credit score would vary between 300 and 850. If your credit score is 700 or more, your credit rating would be considered as very good. Hence, you should take steps continuously to keep a good credit score.

If you follow the above tips, your money management as a student would be an excellent one and would help you a lot when you proceed for a career and a future life.