a heart made of coffee beans

Caf or Decaf? New Study on the Health Benefits of Coffee Just May Surprise You!

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Caf or decaf? No matter how you like your buzz, there’s a new study out and it’s worth knowing about. Coffee, caffeinated or decaf, is still my favorite beverage. You already know where to find all my BEAN Around the World posts (best places to drink coffee), but from time to time, I like to talk about coffee in general.

I wanted to make sure that you knew a new study came out on the benefits of coffee, no matter the caffeine content. It’s what’s called a correlation study covering a half million adults in the U.K. It was published in JAMA: Internal Medicine. They found that coffee drinkers lived longer. And in fact, they found that people who drank a few cups per day had a 12% to 18% lower risk of early death.

What I alluded to that was so interesting about this study is that decaf-coffee drinkers received the same benefits. We forget sometimes that although many people drink caffeinated coffee for the stimulant effect, both regular and decaf coffee contain antioxidants. Antioxidants fight off inflammation, which is a good thing! Inflammation damages our cells, and over time it causes diseases like heart disease, Alzheimer’s, and type 2 diabetes.

If you want to know more about these studies, look here.

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Tiny Seats, No Legroom on Flights: Does The F.A.A. Care?

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“We have space regulations for transporting animals, for transporting prisoners,” he says. “But we don’t seem to have anything for regular passengers.” This quote comes from Paul Hudson, president of the group Flyers Rights. Tiny seats, no legroom, dangerous conditions should we need to evacuate; those are just some of the points discussed in this article. It puts the Federal Aviation Administration square in the “middle seat” of this debate. I found this article both informative and a little bit scary. It’s a good read.

a blue letter with white text

Do This Now: Change Default Payment Setting in Venmo to Private

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Good afternoon everyone.  Venmo just updated their app and made privacy a key component of the app.  Doctor of Credit also shared this article from a researcher who analyzed 18 million Venmo users from last year to see who users were paying and what they were paying for.  The main conclusion from the researcher was that most users’ transaction details (except dollar amounts) were publicly available and that most users had no idea that they could make their transactions private.  You might think that sharing your Venmo transaction details publicly is no big deal, “I have nothing to hide.”  But what if you went to the same bar every Thursday evening and paid you friend for “Drinks at Bar123.”  If you had a stalker, they could easily figure out your habits and find you.  That might be an extreme example, but it is possible.

In today’s post, I will show you how to easily change your default payment settings to private.  You can also retroactively change your past payments to private.  As an example, when I sign into my Venmo app, I can click on the globe icon and it will show me all public payments in real time from around the world.  I do not know any of these people, but yet, I can see who they are paying and what they are paying for.  Let’s go through the Privacy on Venmo screens and learn about the different privacy setting levels.

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a credit card with numbers and symbols

Synchrony Bank Cathay Pacific Credit Card Churning 12 Month Language

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Good morning everyone, happy Friday.  I don’t know about you, but I am exhausted.  This (Prime) week has been draining and I am thankful that we made it to the weekend.  I just have a quick post to share about the Synchrony Bank Cathay Pacific Credit Card.  I got this credit card on August 25, 2017 and knew the $95 annual fee was coming right around the corner.  Usually, I like to wait for the annual fee to post, see if I can talk the rep out of charging me for the annual fee or downgrade to a no annual fee card.  I had a bad experience recently where I tried to do that with the TD Bank Aeroplan Credit Card and it was a real headache. Let me explain…

I called TD Bank the day after my statement closed that showed the annual fee.  I asked the rep if she could waive the annual fee (not possible), then I asked if she could downgrade my card to a no annual fee version (also not possible), so I decided to close the card.  I thought all was good until a month later, I received a statement in the mail showing the $95 annual fee, a $35 late payment fee, and a $1.50 interest charge.  Furious, I called TD Bank and told the rep that I closed the card so I should not (and I would not) pay the annual fee and other fees.  She said that since I called after the annual fee posted, she could not reverse the charge.  I complained that that was not correct.  She put me on hold for a few minutes, talked to her supervisor, and then said that all charges were taken care of and no payment was necessary.  Dealing with TD Bank left a bad taste in my mouth and I didn’t want to go through a similar experience with Synchrony Bank, so I decided to close the card before the annual fee posted.  The following day, I received this email from Synchrony Bank with a link to a letter.  What the letter said interested me…

a screenshot of a email

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NYC: Here’s What You Can Do For Free!

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Free is good, right? Even a pay-what-you-wish policy is great for saving money. And in expensive cities, it’s wonderful when premier attractions, museums, and performances offer free or pay-what-you-wish experiences. On a trip to Madrid, I was able to enjoy the world class museums for free by going on certain nights.

And in one of my favorite though expensive places like New York, it’s especially helpful to know which attractions have free or pay-as-you-wish visiting times. Here’s the information I use when I’m planning my days in NYC. I hope you’ll find it as useful as I do!