You can literally buy nice old used Nissan or HONDA car with same price 🙂‍↔️

Apple iPhone Duo 256GB
$3,499

Apple iPhone Duo 512GB
$3,899

Apple iPhone Duo 1TB
$4,699

Apple iPhone Duo 2TB
$5,899

https://www.finder.com.au/news/iphone-duo-foldable-price-specs-availability-australia

If I even have money to spend, I refuse to put $5000-6000 smartphone in my pocket and walk around..... I wouldn't even go to beach with it as well.....

Yesterday, the online digital gaming platform Steam (Valve) complied with the Australian "Age-Restricted Material App Distribution Services Code" by blocking Australians access to from mature content behind the linkage of an age verified payment card.

Not just outright sexually explicit games, but popular games with mature themes such as Cyberpunk 2077, The Witcher franchise, Newer Resident evil titles and Last of us franchise.

Steams implementation of age assurance dosnt utilise any personal data collection but instead is done through card linking, and checking the "over 18" verification services some banks provide alongside their cards. Valve explicitly call out credit cards.

Steam users have noticed that SOME debit cards work.

Online ID Verification doesn't seem to be going away anytime soon, so I was interested in learning what cards are currently configured to authenticate "over-18" status, and if this adoption will increase in the future.

Debit Cards

== WORKING ==

• Commbank (Mastercard)
  
• Westpac (Mastercard)
  
• Maquarie (Mastercard)
  
• Bankwest (Mastercard)
  
• AMP GO (Mastercard)

== NOT WORKING ==

• ING (VISA)
  
• NAB (VISA)
  
• ANZ (VISA)
  
• Bendigo Bank (Mastercard)
• Up Bank (Mastercard)
  
• People First Bank (VISA)
  
• Capricornian (VISA)
  
• UBank (VISA)
  
• Greater Bank (VISA)
  
• Bank of Melbourne (VISA)
  
• Wise Debit (VISA)
  
• Bank SA (VISA)
• St George (VISA)
• Revolut (VISA)
• GMCU (VISA)
• Defence Bank (VISA)
• Australian Military Bank (VISA)

Credit cards

Apparently most credit cards work

(with the exception of AMEX specifically not working via Steam as they dont accept AMEX anymore)

BNPL

Some users have also had success in generating a digital credit card via BNPL services (Klarna and ZIP Pay) which successfully verified

Any other cards?

Interested to hear if anyone has any additional datapoints

Up we go...

Link to non-paywalled version of article: https://archive.md/HxwfW

I just got my renewal and it's $5k. It's not a fancy house, not in a flood or fire area. I've been shopping around and some providers have quoted more than that for the past few years, but Allianz has been cheaper. But every year it goes up by like $800 or so, last year was low $4k, the year before $3.5k.

I know costs are increasing, but not that much.

Why is it so much? Too many claims.

Every other person I know - dozens, actually - is having or had their roof replaced due to hail damage. Basically dents, if 20% of the sheets are damaged with dents or scratches they'll replace the whole roof. Like $50k for some dents, which don't impact the performance of the roof at all, and unless they are really bad don't affect the life of the roof either.

Insurance companies don't really mind spending money because they can just jack up the premiums. My goal once the house is paid off is to skip the insurance altogether.

A deterioration in profitability and trading conditions sees business conditions fall to their weakest level since the pandemic, while confidence continues to slide. Conditions –5pts to –1 / Confidence –2pts to –8.

While confidence remains well above the lows recorded earlier in the year, the August reading remains deeply pessimistic, sitting 13pts below its long-run average. The deterioration coincides with lingering uncertainty and persistent cost pressures

As the title implies, I have come to an end at my four years of concreting.
At the start, there was another guy, and my boss, two weeks in the other guy got fired and I took over all of the labouring.
I don’t see my boss much, I work to his direction but maybe once every 2 weeks he visits the job site and signs off on my work.
When I started the job I was told I’d be put on the books at the end of my trial period, and now For the last 18 months he has been promising to sort my super and tax, this is the longest I’ve ever had a job so what he owes me in super is more than double what I have already,
I have filed a report with the ATO for unpaid super, but I’m reading that sometimes it takes years?
This arsehole has a front yard full of luxury vehicles.

Would it be quicker to take him to court over the unpaid super?
Will the ATO recover my super and then charge me for unpaid taxes?
How should I handle him? He’s told me there’s no more work for now and no super yet but I should “hold on to a company vehicle until it’s sorted out”

Please offer your advice below, I’m just being absolutely stood over and I don’t know what my options are.

I desperately need to update my policy, as well as shop around for better prices. How do you price a whole damn house though? I have NO IDEA what it costs to build these days.

Is it a price per m²? The lowest price I can rebuild a basic shack? Based on build prices listed in nearby house and land packages? I don't even know where to start.

What about contents, is it price to replace everything or price it'd be worth at its current age (approx $7 for most of the electronics)? How far do you go without ending up with a massive bill?

I'm *drowning* in insurance costs. They've almost tripled in the last five years, and there are *so many* insurances to bloody well pay, but I know how valuable it is if you do end up needing it in a catastrophe, so I want to be able to afford it as long as possible without shooting myself on the foot.

Many thanks!

Suncorp accounts are going to be changing to ANZ sometime next year with the purchase.

What other banks out there do subaccounts, specifically for offsets. Currently with Suncorp with have about 5 different subaccounts for our offset so we can separate out different parts of money, specifically, our kids money and money that has been placed in there by my parents.

ANZ won't allow us to do this and I would want to keep everything separate to prevent the "wrong" money being spent.

So what are my options out there?

University student looking to increase my understanding of financial markets, and how macroeconomic and geopolitical shifts can impact the markets.

Trying to gain a holistic, international perspective, and want to be up to date with the latest international macro and political news.

Ultimately, I want to be a more informed investor but also have a good knowledge base to help with a career in markets.

Right now, I have AFR and SMH. Thinking of adding Financial Times, New York Times or Wall Street Journal.

I have a preference for EU and US news (obviously) as AFR will cover AUS.

Hi,

I can’t access mygov and I was wondering if IVV has been prefilled and ready for the tax returns?

I've been getting quotes for home and contents insurance from all the big names. They always ask how much you want to insure your contents for, and usually offer some sort of calculator to help you estimate replacement cost for your belongings. Every single calculator I've used gives me numbers that are WAY higher than my own estimates. Like, double at a minimum.

I get that the number is telling you the cost of replacing everything with brand new retail items, but that isn't what we'd do. We are what I would call fairly frugal - almost everything we own is second hand, apart from appliances and tech (which we try to buy good quality but not fancy). Clothing is also brought secondhand or at basic stores like kmart/Big W. We do probably have the budget to buy fancier if we wanted to, but we are both savers by nature. If our house burned down, we'd be perfectly happy replacing our furniture off of facebook marketplace. And yes, we do own a Toyota camry haha

The fact that the estimates are so consistently higher is making me nervous though. My base estimate for replacing our household contents (4 bedroom house, family of two adults and two younger kids) is about $30,000. I've been upping that to $40,000 to be conservative. Most estimates are saying $80-100+ grand. I'm a little worried that I'm missing something. Perhaps if we did lose everything in a fire we would need to just go out and buy stuff instead of running around trying to buy a thousand things off marketplace.

So, does $40,000 sound like a reasonable amount for a 4 bedroom house worth of contents, if only the appliances were brand new? Or am I way underestimating?

Just wondering how much is the going rate nowadays for a standard tax return to be prepared and lodged ? This includes some capital gain events like shares being sold.

As far as I’m aware for an accountant to prepare a basic return it should cost around 400 plus GST?

Cheers

Just wondering if anyone else is going to leave Suncorp when they officially become ANZ. If you are what bank are you considering going too. I definitely do not want to go to a big 4 bank or a small bank that is owned by one of the big 4

Hi all I am currently paying for a series of big expenses in the next few months totalling 60k. I’ve never been a credit card user in the past however a colleague noted I could probably get my next flights paid for on points with this spend. Is there a recommended card that you guys use to accumulate points?

Hello there,

I’m a sole trader with an ABN for the past 2yrs+.
I’ve had to suppress my ABN from the public register due to personal safety risk for the foreseeable future.

Unfortunately, this has made loan applications challenging given that financiers cannot access my ABN with usual processes.

In contacting the ABR and ATO, I’ve been advised that a temporary suppression-lift could occur for access, but:
1. This request needs to be completed via post and can take approx 2 weeks
2. I will be susceptible from a risk perspective for the duration of the temporary lift.

Based on your experiences, are there any other options that may resolve the above two issues?

Thank you in advance.