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Maximizing Financial Privacy. Keep your finances confidential

Money is something that we use daily, and often it is a large part of what leads to troubles or success in our lives. Your financial privacy is something that should be taken very seriously. Often you don’t want other’s to know what you have because you can be easily sued, you could become a victim of identity theft and just because you like your privacy.Â

How much money you have and the source of your money is really no one’s business other than possibly your immediate family. Your neighbor’s and your co worker’s really don’t need to know what your bills are and if you have extra money every month. Your ex spouse or your business partner have no reason to need to know your personal financial matters either.Â

So, how are you going to take control over your personal affairs and keep your financial matters private?

At your place of employment, make it a practice not to leave personal financial materials lying around anywhere. This includes your bank statements, credit card statements or any type of receipt with an account number on it. The more that you leave in the open, the more often another is going to be tempted to use or abuse your personal information.Â

At your place of employment, don’t talk about financial troubles or success. Make it a habit from day one, to keep your personal information personal. Even when the topic comes up in conversation, make it a point to be secretive. You don’t want others knowing what you have and what you don’t have it is a personal and private matter. The more that others know about your personal financial situation the more often they can use this against you. Such as, ‘Oh, I’ll ask xxx for a donation for my child’s baseball team s/he has lots of money’.Â

At your place of employment, you want to keep your personal financial status out of the business. If you are a partner in a business, you don’t want to run up your credit or have your assets used as collateral unless absolutely needed. Keeping your personal financial information separate from the business financial matters ensures that if something would happen, that you do not possibly lose everything that you own.Â

Your friends, extended family and your co workers don’t need to know how much money you have or make. When many other people know how much money you have, you could be the brunt of a frivolous lawsuit. Protecting your assets and your personal financial information protects you from judgments and liens that are unnecessary.Â

How can you protect your financial information?

Don’t talk about how much you have in savings or in the stock market to those who really don’t have any business knowing.Â

Refrain from telling others how much you spent on your major purchases or how much you are planning to spend on your luxurious vacation. Flaunting what money you have doesn’t do your position in financial privacy any good.Â

Be sure to rip up or shred all of your receipts, credit card receipts and such when you are not in the privacy of your own home. To prevent identity theft you want to keep your account numbers private and secure.Â

Other methods of protecting your assets include:Â

If you are in business, set up a corporation to protect your personal assets from business problems. If you are in business, using a corporation is going to protect your business from personal split ups and divorce problems at the same time.
Use a safety deposit box to store your financial records during personal troublesome times. This can be a place where you know your papers are safe, secure and out of reach of anyone else.Â
Open are post office box to protect your mail from being stolen from your regular mail box. Some times people will use a post office box to protect sensitive information during times of trouble for both personal and business records.
If you are having real problems, if you have already been the victim of identity theft, change your name. This helps cover past problems personally and financially.
Never share information with those who are outside of your immediate family about how much money you have or don’t have. Someone can also pull identity theft, opening credit cards or mortgages from your personal information if they know you don’t use a lot of credit cards or loans.
Never share your pin numbers with any one for your credit cards or debit cards. This is just for your personal information and your personal use only.
Never allow any one to make a photocopy of your credit card for any reason. Once someone has a copy of your number, your signature and your personal security code on the back of your card, they will max out your credit card.
Only allow those who are responsible to be a signer on your personal or business checking accounts. If you allow another signer on your accounts, you risk someone taking all of your money, closing your accounts, or opening other accounts without your permission.