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                                                                                        TERM 3 - ACCOUNTANCY

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                                                                                        TERM 3 - ACCOUNTANCY

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Recognizing Risk

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- The uses of data analysis and what information can be learned, and by who
- Company assets/liquidity/trends
- Best uses of different ratios
- How can margins and ratios be improved
- Understand, assemble and Interpret a  break-even graph

- What is tax for?
- What are different taxes used for?
- What sort of money/cash/funds run between households, business and governments?
- Tax Fairness including wealth
- How taxes influence behaviour - and what taxes can change behaviour?

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Week 3 - Ratios

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Week 2 - Examples of Differential Analysis

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Week 1 - Things to Learn

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QuickBooks has partnered with Bigcommerce-a leader in ecommerce creation, optimization and automation-to offer essential tips and best practices to help entrepreneurs launch and manage an ecommerce business. From ideation, to sourcing, to competitive analysis, this series of guest posts will highlight everything you need to get started. The first post offered tips on picking a product to sell, while the second featured ways to source those products. In this last installment, we'll walk you through the steps to conduct a high-level competitive analysis, so you can identify, understand and overcome your competitors on your way to ecommerce success.
Completing an analysis of your competition before you open up shop is not only wise; it's essential to staying in business. By monitoring your competition on an on-going basis, you'll get to know their behavior, enabling you to anticipate their actions and stay one step ahead.

As we all know, competitors are simply alternative options for your customers, and we want to make sure they pick you over everyone else.

Although performing a competitive analysis isn't rocket science, it does go beyond completing a few simple Google searches. Watch the video below for some high-level tips on how to not only identify your competitors, but also how to categorize them, dissect their websites and understand their overall approach, so that you may develop and sustain your own competitive advantage. For more in-depth info on conducting a competitive analysis, continue reading.

Examine Their Website and Customer Experience

Once you have identified some of your competitors, the first thing you'll want to take a look at is their website. We're going to dive into specific information around this, but take some time to examine top-level takeaways around overall website experience.

Take a close look at the following items:

How solid is their product photography? How do they display their products and help communicate details?

How detailed are their product descriptions? What information do they include? What information is missing?

Where are their calls to action throughout the online shopping experience? Are they obvious? Or do they get lost due to a poor color scheme or positioning?

Are they trying to build an email list with a newsletter sign-up prompt? How prominent is it?

Where are their social-media icons positioned?

Do they have a blog? How frequently do they post? What type of information do they tackle?

Is their site optimized for mobile?

What methods for contact do they offer? Do they have limited hours specifically for phone support?

How long does it take them to respond to email, live chat and contact-form submissions? Go ahead and test this yourself.

Do they have a feature to recover abandoned carts? If so, at what cadence do they send them out, and what messaging is included?

What information is included in their marketing banners and call-outs? This may help you start to uncover their positioning within the overall market.

How frequently are they running promotions? What benefits do those promotions provide to their customers and potential shoppers, as well as their business?

Again, these are just to get you started. Each website and industry will be different depending on the market they are trying to reach and the products or services they are working to sell. The goal here is to not only get a handle on their strengths and weaknesses, but to help you start thinking as a dynamic business owner as well.

Identify Their Market Positioning

By identifying your competitor's positioning strategy, you'll be able to get a feel for a number of variables related to your market's demands and expectations. To do this, take a look at their overall messaging via website and marketing copy. Ask the following:

What are customers really buying from them? Are they going for price? Experience?

How are they differentiating their product from their competition? What features and benefits do they highlight the most in their marketing copy?

What makes their product or service unique (according to them)?

Completing this practice will help you start to understand whom your competitors are speaking to and how they position themselves within their industry and the overall market. This is going to pay dividends as you work on how you'll position yourself against or alongside them when you open your own online store. If you're struggling, or if you're just seeking as much information as humanly possible (as you should), be sure to:

Sign up for their newsletter: Get an understanding of their business and examples of communication.

Subscribe to and follow their blog: See what types of content they are covering and at what cadence.

Follow them on social media: Get a feel for how they speak and serve their customers via social media.

Purchase a product: Check out the product itself, but also note the time it takes to ship and how their packaging looks.

Put an item in your cart, and abandon the checkout process: Monitor whether or not they send an abandoned-cart email series and what language and structure they use within their emails.

Take a Peek at Pricing

Your pricing strategy is going to be one of the most important aspects of your online business, and there are several factors to be considered when setting prices for your products.

However, at this point in time, start by taking a look at how your competitors have priced their products. You'll learn what your target market is willing to pay and get an understanding of what prices will work best for your offerings.

Now, your prices don't have to necessarily be less than your competition. You'll want to take the information from the section above on market positioning and determine what it is you're actually selling to your customers. Your target market may be willing to pay more for peace of mind, expedited shipping or just overall website experience.

Problem Solve for Shipping

As with pricing, at this point in time, you'll just want to gather intel as to how your competition is solving for shipping, as well as how they communicate expectations around shipping.

As we know, shipping is a top reason for cart abandonment during the checkout process. Therefore, having reasonable shipping costs that also stack up to the rest of your online competition is going to be pivotal in the success of your online store.

If you cannot stack up your shipping prices against your competitors at the start, what little things can you offer or do differently to set yourself up for success (i.e personalization, gift cards, etc.)?

Take a Temperature Check With Reviews

This is just a no-brainer. Take the time to find as many reviews of your competitors as humanly possible. This can include everything from product reviews on their website, to business reviews on social media, to comments left on their blog. Get a temperature check from their audience as to how healthy and client-centric their business is, and mark this down as a strength or weakness you can capitalize on.

Also, if you're finding lots of reviews of a product that's similar to one you also plan on selling, this is a good sign since people are obviously interested in buying it. However, if you're finding reviews where customers aren't happy with the service your competitor provided, the condition in which the product arrived or just the quality of the product, this could be an area of focus for you to help differentiate your business.

Complete a Social-Media Analysis

Taking a look at your competitors' social-media following has a plethora of benefits.

If they have many followers, and especially if they are actively engaged (by liking, commenting and sharing posts), this is a good sign that a market for your product exists. Plus, you are going to get a great temperature check on how their customers feel about their business. You'll also see some great examples of what works well and what doesn't work so well when engaging with your client base.

However, if they've got a great following and overall engagement, that means you'll be needing to step up your game and come up with a new way of engaging this market or choose a different mix of customers altogether.

Now, if your competitors don't have a decent following, it could indicate the market is weak, your target market doesn't use social media or just simply that there is room for your business to take the lead at engaging with customers. So take a look at all of the social channels you can think of, from Pinterest to Facebook, Reddit to Twitter, and ask:

What is their overall social presence like?

Which social channels do they use the most?

How do they speak with their client base?

How often do they interact with their following?

How frequently do they post something new?

Which social channels are they missing? Is there opportunity for you there?

What are they posting?

What percentage of their posts are about their business?

What percentage is solely to increase engagement or gain followers?

Last but not least, check out some of the non-traditional channels as well. This could include things like knitting groups, forums, meetup groups, blogs and beyond.

Bonus Items and Tools to Complete a Competitive Analysis

Get the gritty details: Want to know how long your competitors have been in business? How about the date they registered their domain, their contact information, server statistics and more? Check out WHOis.net, and enter the URL of a competitor to uncover some informative secrets.

Watch if they're hiring: Take a look on their website and job-search platforms to find out what kinds of positions they are hiring for, if any. This can help indicate the health and status of their business; plus, you'll get a feel for the culture of their company.

Find out about funding: Are they seeking additional funding? This could help indicate the health of their business and give you ideas on how to best position yourself when you're seeking funding. Check out places like Indiegogo, RocketHub, Peerbackers and even Kickstarter, to name a few sites with great reviews and track records.

Get industry updates: With Google Alerts, you can receive email notifications of the latest Google updates based on your queries. Although you should certainly set up alerts for your own store, it's a good idea to also set up alerts for your competition. You'll save time and get details you couldn't otherwise attain. Set up alerts for industry terms, and monitor the broader market for new developments that could affect your ecommerce business.

Remember, this process can and should evolve over time, and you will want to complete a regularly scheduled competitive analysis. This doesn't mean you need to watch your competitors like a hawk and let them keep you up at night, but you will want to keep tabs on how their business is changing and what other competition emerges.
Bigcommerce and QuickBooks have partnered to become your source for everything ecommerce. Featuring easy integration with QuickBooks, a simple but robust site builder and in-depth analytics, Bigcommerce's ecommerce solutions have everything you need to sell products and manage your finances.

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How to Conduct Competitive Analysis on An Idea | QuickBooks

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QuickBooks has partnered with Bigcommerce-a leader in ecommerce creation, optimization and automation-to offer essential tips and best practices to help entrepreneurs launch and manage an ecommerce business. From ideation, to sourcing, to competitive analysis, this series of guest posts will highlight everything you need to get started.

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Dubai: More and more unsuspecting residents are falling victim to identity theft, experts say, leaving them facing legal action over unpaid loans, maxed-out credit cards and phone bills, all fraudulently taken out in their name.

In today's digital world, with personal and financial details floating about in an endless ocean of data, anyone can be a victim of cybercrime, which is locked into a perpetual race against anti-fraud technology.

Some of the cases are high-tech, making it virtually impossible to catch the perpetrators. However, some cases are the result of glaring oversight of paperwork and procedures.

A Dubai woman's identity was stolen to take out loans and credit cards worth around Dh1 million, from five UAE banks, one of which processed her "application" with a man's photo. In another case, a woman whose wallet was stolen, which included her ID, was shocked to learn a man had subscribed to phone lines in her name, many times over.

Another fraud was accomplished even though the signatures of the imposter and the victim were nothing alike, the salary certificate was fake and the victim wasn't even in the country at the time.

Law enforcement agencies, tech experts and legal specialists have repeatedly urged residents to stay vigilant and guarded regarding their documents, ID cards and online transactions.

But as criminal tactics and technology continue to evolve, almost on a daily basis, is there any safe haven for our identity, be it represented on paper or digitally?

Gulf News spoke to identity theft victims and experts in the field to bring you a comprehensive overview of the issue, which potentially impacts everyone with a name and face on record.

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Identity fraud a significant issue: experts

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Dubai: More and more unsuspecting residents are falling victim to identity theft, experts say, leaving them facing legal action over unpaid loans, maxed-out credit cards and phone bills, all fraudulently taken out in their name.

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A four minute video that discusses steps teens can take to protect themselves from identity theft.

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10 Ways Identity Thieves Get Your Information

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10 Ways Identity Thieves Get Your Information

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Identity theft is when someone fraudulently uses your personal information, such as your name, date of birth, Social Security number, and address, for their financial gain, including to obtain credit, get a loan, open a bank, or credit card account or obtain an I.D. card.

If you become the victim of identity theft, chances are it will cause severe damage to your finances and your good name, especially if you do not find out about it immediately.

Even if you catch it quickly, you can spend months and thousands of dollars trying to repair the damage done to your credit rating.

You can even find yourself accused of a crime you did not commit because someone used your personal information to perpetrate the crime in your name.

Consequently, it is important in today's electronic age to protect your information as best you can. Unfortunately, there are thieves out there just waiting for you to make a mistake or get careless.

There are different ways that identity thieves go about stealing the personal information of others. Here are the most common methods used by identity thieves and ways for you to avoid becoming their victim.

How Do Identity Thieves Get Your Information?

Dumpster Diving

Dumpster diving is when someone goes through trash looking for personal information that can be used for identity theft purposes. Identity thieves look for credit card bills, bank statements, medical bills and insurance, and old financial forms such as old tax forms.

Stealing Your Mail

Identity thieves will often target a person and steal mail directly from their mailbox. Thieves will also have all of the mail redirected through a change of address request made at the post office. The identity thieves are looking for bank statements, credit card bills, tax information, medical information and personal checks.

Stealing Your Wallet or Purse

Identity thieves thrive by illegally obtaining personal information from others, and what better place to get it but from a purse or a wallet. A driver's license, credit cards, debit cards, and bank deposit slip, are like gold to identity thieves.

You Are a Winner!

Identity thieves use the temptation of prize winnings to lure people into giving them their personal and credit card information over the phone. The identity thief will tell the person that they have won a contest for a free vacation or some grand gift, but that they need to verify personal information, including their date of birth, to prove they are over 18-year-of-age. They will explain that the vacation is free, except for the sales tax, and ask for the "winner" to provide them with a credit card. They usually make it sound like a decision must be made immediately, or the person will lose the prize.

Skimming Debit or Credit Card Numbers

Skimming is when thieves use a data storage device to capture the information from the magnetic stripe of credit, debit or ATM card at an ATM or during an actual purchase.

When skimming from an ATM, thieves will attach card readers (called skimmers) over the real terminal card reader and harvest data from every card that is swiped.

Some thieves place a fake PIN number pad over the real one to capture victims' PINs (personal identification numbers) as they enter it. Another common way to do this is by installing tiny cameras to capture the PIN entered on the number pad. Shoulder surfing, which is when a person reads over the shoulder of the card user, is also a common way to obtain personal identification numbers.

Once the thief has returned to the ATM and collected the file of stolen information, they can log into an ATM and steal money from the harvested accounts. Other thieves clone the credit cards to sell or for personal use.

Skimming can occur anytime someone with a digital card reader gains access to your credit or debit cards. It can be done easily when the card is surrendered, such as in restaurants where it common practice for a waiter to take the card to another area to swipe it.

Phishing

"Phishing" is a scam in which the identity thief sends an email falsely claiming to be from a legitimate organization, government agency or bank, to lure the victim into surrendering personal information such as a bank account number, credit card number or passwords. Often the email will send victims to a phony website that is designed to look like the real business or government agency. eBay, PayPal, and MSN are regularly used in phishing scams.

​Obtaining Your Credit Report

Some identity thieves will obtain a copy of your credit report by posing as your employer or rental agent. This will give them access to your credit history including your credit cards numbers and loan information.

Business Records Theft

Business records theft involves the theft of files, hacking into electronic files or bribing an employee for access to files at a business. Identity thieves will sometimes go through the trash of a business to get employee records which often contain social security numbers and customer information from charge receipts.

Corporate Data Breaches

A corporate data breach is when a corporation's protected and confidential information is copied, viewed or stolen by someone who is unauthorized to obtain the information. The information can be personal or financial including names, addresses, telephone numbers, social security numbers, personal health information, banking information, credit history, and more. Once this information has been released, it will likely never be recovered and the individuals affected are at an increased risk of having their identities stolen.

Pretexting

Pretexting is the practice of obtaining someone's personal information using illegal tactics, then selling the information to people who will use it to, among other things, steal the person's identity,

Pretexters may call and claim that they are calling from the cable company and doing a service survey. After exchanging pleasantries, they would ask about any recent cable problems, and then ask if you mind completing a short survey. They may offer to update your records, including the best time of the day to provide service to you and the obtain your name, address and telephone number. People will often volunteer information to cheerful, helpful company representatives who are good listeners.

Armed with the personal information, the pretexter may then decide to do a search for public information about you, and learn your age, if you are a homeowner, if you paid your taxes, places that you lived before, and the names of your adult children. They may look at your social media profile to learn about your work history and the college that you attended. They will then call companies you are associated with to gain enough information to get access to your financial information, health records, and social security number.

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10 Ways Identity Thieves Get Your Information

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Identity theft is when someone fraudulently uses your personal information, such as your name, date of birth, Social Security number, and address, for their financial gain, including to obtain credit, get a loan, open a bank, or credit card account or obtain an I.D. card.

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Credit Card Thieves Caught on Tape Using Skimmers

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About 134,000,000 results (0.32 seconds) Search Results When Should I Use Credit and When Should I Use Debit ... lifehacker.com/when-should-i-use-credit-and-when-should-i-... Lifehacker Jul 22, 2013 - When you have the option to use debit or credit, you're probably using a debit card, or a card issued by a bank, backed by your checking account, but also with a Visa or Mastercard logo on it.

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Credit Card Debt Explained With a Glass of Water

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Week 7 - Credit, Credit Cards and Interest Rates

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Week 7 - Credit, Credit Cards and Interest Rates

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The scariest thing about identity theft is how easy it can be for someone to be impersonated. A quick root through the weekly garbage can sometimes be all that a con artist needs to take on the identity of an innocent victim and rack up debt in their name, or even steal their assets. Perhaps there is some comfort in the fact that celebrities aren't immune to this problem, and indeed at times are deliberately targeted by the identity thieves. When your own name is at the core of your personal business, and squarely in the public eye, maybe you're more likely to fall victim to this kind of white collar crime than most - though the thieves are also more prone to getting busted.

10. Tiger Woods

Despite a striking lack of resemblance to the world-famous golfer, Anthony Lemar Taylor managed to successfully impersonate him. Taylor used Woods' social security number and date of birth to get a drivers' license in the golfer's real name, Eldrick T Woods, and from there, credit cards. He got himself $17,000 worth of presents including a luxury car and a 70-inch TV. However, there's unlikely to be any room for those falsely obtained goods in prison, where Taylor was sentenced to spend the next 200 years, or life, whichever comes sooner. Talk about landing in the bunker.

9. Ty Law

Former New England Patriots star Ty Law thought that all he had to worry about was the next big game. What he didn't know was that Jonathan Hoskins, a complete stranger, had managed to get a driving license from the state of Ohio in Law's name using a copy of the football star's birth certificate. Hoskins then used the license to withdraw $10,000 from Law's account - not once, but twice! Adding insult to injury, he then had the cheek to sign autographs as Ty Law before making his getaway. Hoskins was busted when he tried to pull the same trick on Kevin Mitchell of the Washington Redskins and was sentenced to 1 year in prison.

8. Ricky Gervais

Using information gained from bank insiders, a dead pensioner's passport and a picture of Ricky Gervais cut out of a DVD box, two men stole £200,000 from the British funnyman's bank account. The next step in their plan was to exchange the cash for gold bars, but the entire scheme was foiled by the gold dealer, a huge fan of the Extras star. When one of the thieves telephoned to arrange the sale, he claimed to be Gervais, but the dealer didn't recognize the voice and alerted the authorities. Gervais' fame saved him a pretty penny.

7. Ruben Studdard

Poor Ruben Studdard wasn't conned by a stranger - his own manager decided to fleece him for more than $250,000. The American Idol winner accused his adviser and godfather, Ronald W. Edwards, of using his credit cards, improperly accessing his bank accounts and even using his money to pay off a $10,000 loan. The courts decided in Studdard's favor, awarding him a total of $2 million in losses and punitive damages. Studdard needs to be more careful who he trusts with his ATM card.

6. Michael Bloomberg

New York City mayors often try to portray themselves as tough on crime. So imagine Michael Bloomberg's horror when he found that he himself had been the victim of identity theft. Charles Nelson used an online transaction to net himself $10,000 from the mayor's personal account. Meanwhile, Odalis Bostic tried to deposit two fake checks from the same personal account into his own, one for $190,000 and one for $230,000. Banking officials smelled a rat, but it was only during the investigation of Bostic that they found evidence of Nelson's crime.

5. Lily Allen

The English pop-star Lily Allen always had a weakness for cab rides, using them to travel all around London. But imagine her surprise when she saw a bill for $7,500 worth of taxi journeys, none of which she'd taken. It probably wasn't close to the confusion she must have felt when she saw that many of the journeys were to and from strip clubs. It turns out that a stripper stole the details of her account with the taxi company and used Lily's money for her own transportation.

4. Will Smith

Carlos Lomax charged over $30,000 worth of purchases to Willard C. Smith - the legal name of the actor famous ever since his days as the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Lomax used a total of 14 fake accounts to make the purchases and was apprehended when Will Smith's business manager noticed over $5,000 dollars in charges payable to Sears. The identity thief was sentenced to 37 months in prison for his crimes.

3. Steve Smith

It seems that Carlos Lomax really didn't like people named Smith - or liked their names rather too much! When Lomax was arrested for the identity theft of Will Smith, it turned out he was already on probation for the theft of another Smith's identity. Lomax had managed to take out an American Express card in the name of Steve Smith, the Atlanta Hawks basketball player turned TV commentator. He racked up an impressive $81,000 in Smith's name before he was finally caught.

2. Liv Tyler

People often tell their hairstylists and beauticians intimate details about their lives, but it seems that you can't trust anybody these days. Liv Tyler was just one of a host of A-list clients whom beautician Maria Gabriela Perez, owner of the Beverly Hills salon Chez Gabriela Studio, swindled out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Perez used their credit card information for her own gain, netting over $200,000 from Tyler alone. Among her other victims were Jennifer Aniston, Anne Hathaway, Melanie Griffith and Cher.

1. Oprah Winfrey

As a teenager, Abraham Abdallah appeared in an anti-fraud video for the State of New York. Clearly this brush with fame gave him an idea, as years later he used Forbes Magazine's rich-list as his hunting ground for identity theft victims. His copy of the magazine was filled with home addresses, social security numbers and other personal information. The restaurant busboy used personal details to convince banks and brokerage firms to authorize purchases from his victims' accounts. Apart from Oprah Winfrey, his targets included Martha Stewart, Steven Spielberg, Warren Buffet and Ross Perot. He was finally apprehended when his greed and ambition spurred him to attempt to move $10 million of software tycoon Thomas Siebel's money.

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10 Celebrities Who Got Burned By Identity Thieves

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The scariest thing about identity theft is how easy it can be for someone to be impersonated. A quick root through the weekly garbage can sometimes be all that a con artist needs to take on the identity of an innocent victim and rack up debt in their name, or even steal their assets.

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Best Identity Theft Protection Services

Why Use Identity Theft Protection Services?

Our reviewers have spent over 60 hours researching identity theft protection services, reading product information sheets and comparing them side by side to come to our ranking of the 10 best. Subscription prices range from $9.95 to $29.95 a month. The best services we reviewed cost between $17.95 and $26.99, so premium services don't necessarily have the best features. These costs also include credit monitoring; if you want a more basic service that just includes credit monitoring, you'll pay about $5 less.

Identity Force is our pick for the best identity theft protection service. It offers the complete range of fraud notifications and recovery assistance that we consider necessary in an identity theft service. Identity Force protects your basic personal information but also monitors public records, loan databases and criminal records to ensure that there's no suspicious activity.

LifeLock is nearly the equal of Identity Force. It monitors personal information like your Social Security number, address, name and credit card numbers. LifeLock offers services to reimburse you from any money lost in the event your identity is compromised. It is more expensive than other services, but provides a more complete service than the majority of ID theft services we reviewed.

ID Watchdog is another service we recommend. It will notify you and the credit bureaus when suspicious activity occurs on your account. Unlike other services we reviewed, ID Watchdog can't remove your name from direct mailing lists and you'll be charged an additional fee for credit history reports. But for the price and the depth of its coverage it offers great value.

What to Do When Your Information Is Stolen

Events like the Equifax hack of July 2017 or the Yahoo hack in 2014 can leave your personal information vulnerable. The aftermath of these breeches can expose you to all manner of identity fraud - stolen credit card info and loans being taken out in your name, for example.

After an event like this, you'll likely be offered free credit monitoring. This is useful, but some monitoring services take up to 60 days to notify you to fraudulent activity. These services usually don't tell you about other ways your information can be used, such as if a thief uses your information to forge a driver's license or passport. They also don't stop tax fraud, and don't monitor retirement or brokerage accounts. Some of the more robust ID theft protection services we've reviewed offer more comprehensive services than the free ones you'll be offered in the event of an event like the Equifax breach.

We recommend putting a credit freeze on your credit if you suspect your information will be at risk. A credit freeze prevents creditors from being able to pull your credit file without your explicit permission. To do this you'll need to notify each of the credit bureaus - Equifax, Experian and TransUnion - that you want a freeze. This can usually be done online, but in some cases you may need to call. Once this is done you'll get a PIN you'll use to unfreeze your account in case you need to apply for credit. Depending on where you live, you may need to pay a fee to place a freeze. This fee should be $15 or less.

Another step you can take is to put a fraud alert on your file. You can do this every 90 days. A fraud alert requires potential creditors to contact you and get permission before opening new lines of credit in your name.

How We Researched Identity Theft Protection Services

To find the best identity theft protection service, we researched the top companies in the industry and found comparable plans for each that included credit monitoring, identity monitoring and identity recovery services. When evaluating plans, we looked for one from each service that provided the broadest range of credit and identity monitoring possible.

We read through each plan's available documentation to find the scope of what each one covers. We also read reports on the industry by government agencies and independent research firms to determine which aspects of your identity are most susceptible to fraud.

What Can Identity Theft Protection Do for You?

The first thing to know is that despite the name, an identity theft protection plan won't keep your accounts from being compromised. These services are rapid-response teams that monitor your identifying information and notify you immediately when there's suspicious activity.

An identity theft protection service can alert you when someone has gotten access to one of your credit cards or bank accounts. These services also monitor your credit report to see if someone has fraudulently opened an account in your name. More advanced services monitor databases of non-credit loans (like payday loans) and other types of money transfers. The best services check your Social Security number to see if a thief has used it to apply for a loan or to create a fictitious identity.

Identity protection services can help you recover if your identity is compromised. The best services employ recovery experts who contact credit bureaus and financial institutions to make sure your good name is cleared in the event that a thief uses your personal information. The recovery experts will make all the calls and fill out the paperwork, saving you the time and effort. Other services may only provide you with contact information, scripts and questions, but you'll need to do the contacting yourself. Some ID theft protection services will reimburse you for the costs associated with recovering from and ID theft.

Identity theft protection can also keep track of your credit history. Besides monitoring for fraudulent charges, it also includes free access to credit reports from the three bureaus: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. For some services these reports are distributed annually and for others you can see how your score changes month to month.

What to Know Before You Sign Up

Identity theft is becoming more and more common. A nationwide study on identity theft by Javelin Strategy shows that identity fraud increased 16 percent from 2015 to 2016. Losses from account takeovers were $2.3 billion. Credit card fraud is the most common type and, fortunately, the easiest kind to remedy. More damaging types of fraud that involve using personal information to open a new account are less common, but they are far more damaging.

Most banks offer fraud protection to account holders. If any fraud occurs, you'll get called to approve the transactions. Online shoppers are more likely to be the victim of fraud but are also the quickest to notice any discrepancies.

Signing up for an identity theft protection plan can add an extra degree of protection, and these services monitor more than just credit card transactions. It's important to know that they can't prevent your accounts or personal information from being stolen. These are reactive services that help discover fraud and then help you recover from it.

Most of the services we reviewed offer $1 million in ID theft insurance. This insurance can reimburse you for up to $1 million in lost wages, legal costs or other out-of-pocket costs associated with having your identity stolen. Your bank or credit card company will reimburse you for any money taken from your account.

Out-of-pocket costs associated with identity theft are uncommon, so ID theft insurance is rarely necessary. Most of the services we reviewed include this insurance for no extra cost.

What We Evaluated and What We Found

In our research of identity theft protection, we found these to be the most important considerations.
Monitoring & Notifications
Good identity theft protection needs to quickly notify you about any fraudulent activity. Most identity protection services will monitor your accounts, and the best will also keep an eye on black-market sites to see if your personal information is being exchanged. You'll want a service that will notify you quickly if your information is compromised. Some will simply give you a monthly update, but the best will notify you as soon as they learn that your information has been compromised.

Look for a service that also sends fraud notifications to credit bureaus. By putting a fraud alert in place, you'll be contacted for approval any time a line of credit is opened in your name.
Recovery Assistance
If your account is compromised, another benefit of an identity protection service is that it will help you recover any expenses and move quickly to cancel any stolen cards. Most basic ID theft services will provide you with contact information and written instructions for dealing with identity theft. If your wallet is stolen, these companies will contact each credit card or bank to cancel your accounts.

When choosing ID theft protection, make sure the company offers full-service identity theft restoration or has Certified Identity Theft Risk Management Specialists (CITRMS) on staff. With full-service restoration, the ID theft company will work on your behalf to contact the necessary government agencies and other organizations to help you recover your identity.

When you sign up with an ID theft protection company, usually you'll give the service a limited power of attorney. The service will work with the credit bureaus to put a seven-year fraud alert on your account. This means you'll get two free credit reports per year from the three bureaus and your name will be removed from prescreened credit offers. The ID theft company will mediate claims, process any credit disputes, manage paperwork, find legal representation and pay any court costs.

All the services we reviewed offer a $1 million recovery insurance policy. This covers any out-of-pocket costs you may incur as you work to recover from the theft of your identity.
Information Protected
With any ID theft service you can expect to have your basic personal and account information protected. The service will monitor your Social Security number, street address and name to ensure they aren't being used to open new accounts or engage in other fraudulent activity. The best services cast a wider net and comb through non-credit loan databases and sex-offender registries as well as public and criminal records to make sure that your identity has not been used for anything illegal.

Fraudulent use of medical insurance information is becoming more widespread. Most of these services monitor your medical records to ensure this doesn't happen.

Other Things to Consider

Every service we reviewed monitors your credit reports for fraudulent charges. Many services provide you with regular updates on your credit score from the three bureaus - Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. The best services can remove your name from direct mailing lists, which is another way identity thieves can get your information.

If you need customer support, you can usually contact the service through email, but the best services offer 24/7 phone support as well. Most services also offer a variety of blogs and articles that give advice on protecting your identity from being stolen.

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Best Identity Theft Protection 2018 - IdentityForce, PrivacyGuard & More

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Our reviewers have spent over 60 hours researching identity theft protection services, reading product information sheets and comparing them side by side to come to our ranking of the 10 best. Subscription prices range from $9.95 to $29.95 a month. The best services we reviewed cost between $17.95 and $26.99, so premium services don't necessarily have the best features.

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