Aite Group reveals that at least 14% of bank customers would be better off using prepaid debit cards than checking accounts.

A good use of a nominee?

Submitted Link #1: http://www.aitegroup.com/reports/200902111.php...

I know of several others who use it as well. My brother-in-law has a fairly new site that is growing fast. Another acquaintance has a more mature site that makes a modest amount of money. Of course there are the people highlighted on the SiteSell site itself as well...

Your success with this or any other small business will be directly related to how much work you put into it (provided you have a sound business model). If you do it casually you will only ever reap casual results. Only when you put your heart into -- and lots of hard work -- will you reap full rewards.

Submitted Link #1: http://www.disaster-emergency-preparedness-kits.co...

2) Medical billing and coding or medical transcription? In "folklore" as a medical transcriptionist (for 18 of the past 22 years), I have heard tales of "blind" transcriptionists who have some sort of accessibility software on their computers to enable them to do this. I'm really sorry, but I never delved deep enough into that "folklore" to discover the specific methods used to accomplish that, as I'm not personally blind. My guess is that it is either text magnification or text-to-speech for proofreading purposes.

(3) Telemarketing from home?

As you may have noticed, all these ideas are based on verbal skills alone or in combination with written or typing skills. Most of the time, these ideas would end up with the person being an "employee" as opposed to a "contractor".

In my own meanderings as an "employee" who works from home, I am still working out the kinks in ghost addressing in my rural location. The solution I found for allowing my company to deliver packages to me without them knowing my actual home address would lead to complications with state and local taxation if I take the final step and label the CMRA as my "home address." The CMRA is located in a different county, and that other county doesn't have a county income tax, so I'm hesitant to list the CMRA as my "home address." Looking for suggestions on that one as there are no CMRAs in my native county.... Like "Jim" in other posts, friends and relatives are OUT as prospects for that issue! Thanks! (and sorry for covering multiple topics in one post!)

Well, of course. I have such friends too, but that's not what Jim's contemplating. He's contemplating using some homeless indigent he met on a street corner, who I wouldn't trust to hold my beer, much less my money.

The nominee plan has its merits, but it also has some downsides that people ought to at least be aware of so they can make a reasoned decision.

My use of a nominee would be somewhat different. I'd have a trusted nominee set up a bank account in the name of a NM LLC, and have her sign the signature card and the checks and give them to me. Then I'd have her sign a notarized certificate of completed participation that would stand as legal notice that she is no longer authorized to access the account that can be produced as evidence should she decide to abscond with the money for some reason, not that I'd expect to need it. The signed blank checks can be used as per Jack's instructions, and if the account is set up with a bank that permits on-line banking and wire transfers, the LLC account can be used as a cut-out to transfer money to another personal or LLC account as necessary without having to use the checks. I would also have her obtaining a debit card in my pseudonym from the bank, telling them that I'm an employee authorized to use the card, and that she'll sign the signature card in my stead because I'm located out of town and she needs to FedEx the card to me so I can pay for business expenses on the road. She explains the sub-account as an accounting matter that allows her to track my expenses easily, and also allows her to only deposit the authorized amount that I can have access to, so I can't access the main account.

This debit card will be in its own sub-account, to which money can be deposited only at need, and the card is used only for internet and phone transactions where there is no chance an ID will be asked for. It can be used for other purchases, in cases where just the PIN is required, not an ID.

This keeps my real name off of the net and out of store records while still allowing for the convenience of on-line shopping, and because only the amount of money required for a specific purchase is transferred to the sub-account just before the purchase, even if the card is compromised, the loss will be minimal. The card can also be dumped and abandoned at need, should there be a potential for questions from the police.

This also works if you wish to set up automatic payment for some recurring bill without having your name attached to it. You set the billing up either under the name of the LLC, if the fact that it's a business doesn't cause problems, or under the pseudonym if it needs to be personal, then you set up the automatic billing to be deducted from the pseudonym sub account, not from the main LLC account.

That's what I'm doing with my DSL and ISP service. I tried to get private residential service, but Qwest absolutely would NOT give me residential service without an SSN. When I told them I'd be setting it up under an LLC, they transferred me to the business side, which set me up with the account, under the NM LLC I got from Kitty without a single hitch. They did ask for an EIN, but I told them I didn't have one because it was a new holding company and I didn't have one yet, and they didn't say a word. I used my pseudonym as the point of contact, with the bill going to my P.O. box addressed to the LLC. I'll be able to set up automatic billing once the first bill arrives using my debit card account I set up previously. All I have to do then is transfer money into that account as required. I'll probably do it quarterly for simplicity's sake. I pay only slightly more for the business DSL account than I would for a residential account, but I also didn't have to buy a phone line along with the DSL service. It's also quite fast, 7mbps down and 864 up, for $61/month. The original ISP I selected, which I'd used for years and trust, can't provide service in my new area code, so Qwest set me up with an ISP located in Wyoming, that doesn't even serve Colorado according to their website. I had no idea they did this, but I think it may add a level of security because they use dynamic IP addressing so even if someone tracks my IP, the traceroute ends at an IP address more than 300 miles away from my actual location. Next on the agenda is a VPN cut-out...

2) Seth's concerns are valid when approaching an anonymous nominee off the street, but a friend or relative might be more or less trustworthy than an impaired or desperate stranger, depending on the character of the friend or relative.

3) Given that Jim, by his own report, has no friends or relatives capable of trustworthiness as a nominee, perhaps the street-urchin idea is still quite workable.

4) Personal note to Jim: Yes, I think you do have a bit to learn about street people. As a "side assignment" you might consider volunteering in a shelter or soup kitchen for a few days in order to get a handle on the issues that your targets may be dealing with. It will also give you other ideas than cash for payment, (phone cards, McDonald's gift cards, errand-running, etc.) in order to avoid facilitating their addictions and actually be of benefit to them in their own struggles. I think you have the ability to be genuinely helpful to people and at the same time obtain anonymity for yourself in your banking dealings! Good luck!

My understanding of Jack's plan is to create a nominee account WITHOUT there being any paper trail that leads to you as a distinct individual. In the book, he describes having the nominee actually open the account herself (elderly lady), sign a large supply of blank checks in return for a fixed fee, and then disappear from the equation entirely, leaving you with a stack of negotiable instruments (blank checks) attached to an account that the nominee "owns" but has no access to. But this "lack of access" is not very secure in reality.

That's how you get anonymity, by never having your name attached in any way to the account. Your plan attaches your name to the account through the power of attorney, which will be recorded, and it may also put you in the position of being a technical "trustee" of the account. You're certainly implying by your statements to the banker that you are taking on a trustee relationship with the "savant" involved, and this MAY result in your having specific legal obligations both for operation of the trustee account as well as legal reporting requirements to the government, which is required in some states for all trustees, precisely to prevent someone from abusing an incompetent person.

I'd suggest you need to look into the trustee aspect much more carefully before proceeding.

Also, Jack and I had a private correspondence about the whole nominee idea in which I outlined some potential legal pitfalls. I hope he'll address these concerns. I'll only illuminate one potential pitfall that needs consideration. The first principle of law is that a power of attorney is ALWAYS revokable at will. The problem is that if your nominee knows about the account, even to the extent of knowing which bank it's located at, I believe it is perfectly legal for her to wait till you dump some money into the account, then go to the bank and give the banker a written revocation of power of attorney, and demand that the account be closed and she be given the cash.

It is, after all, according to your own claims to the banker, "her" money, and you are just managing it for her, with her consent. But she can withdraw that consent at ANY TIME and fire you as her money manager, and claim the proceeds, which legally speaking, belong to her.

The only way that you can gain irrevocable control over another person's money is by court order, and to do so you have to prove that the person is permanently incompetent, and you will have to file reports with the court on a regular basis to prove that you are properly fulfilling your fiduciary duties to the beneficiary of trust.

The law is set up precisely to PREVENT exactly what you're trying to accomplish when done by, for example, relatives with greedy intent who wish to take control of an elderly person's finances for their own benefit. The government takes a VERY dim view of such arrangements because of their propensity for abuse, and the laws regulating such things are very strict.

I cannot agree that this is a wise plan. I see a serious potential for you to lose all your money AND potentially end up in jail.

... Note to Jim:
Seth makes a few valid points but I am not as concerned as he is about nominees. Perhaps this is because I have used nominees with great success and over a long lifetime. Or perhaps it is just because I have an unusual tendency to trust people. (My test is, do they first trust me? If so, I then trust them. I have some great stories to tell about that, but not in this forum. Suffice it to say that I could come up with 10 names in five minutes of people I trust with my life. Maybe even 20.)

As for losing the money in the account, if this worries you, then don't put more in the account than you can afford to lose.