GREAT Tech Teams are Hard to Find

What constitutes a GREAT tech team? From the perspective of someone looking to hire a tech team to take on our system development, the team must have the following 3 traits:

1) Work Ethics

2) Professionalism (meets deadlines, works collaboratively with clients to develop system requirements)

3) Open Communication

Notice that all of the above did not refer to the level of technical skill of the team - I think it's because from shopping around for a tech team it appears that everybody says they can program all these things that you ask them to. So if the programming is "almost" a commodity, what other factors are going to make a team stand out?

I found that I am especially eager to work with a team that displays honesty, a high standard of work ethics and professionalism - most importantly, they let me know what they CAN and CAN'T realistically do within the set timeline. A lot of other developers that I have met with have over promised and of course this means further contracts down the road are out of question.

Here's a tip to those tech teams out there trying to win contracts...businesses are looking for teams that make them feel prioritized, considers the business team's contributions (you may know the best way to build a system, but we know best in terms of what the system needs in order for us to profit off this thing you're building for us), and delivers on time or at least shows a best efforts to meet the set milestones.

I believe that good people cluster and I have always worked off this theory. This is how I found my current contractors, employees and advisors. I know there are tons of other great people out there but until I know them on a personal basis I am hesitant about bringing somebody onto the team. It's really true that people like to do business with people they know...not what you know, but who you know.

December Thus Far

Money is going through the system! So far we know that for a transaction complete it takes 3 business days. Here's how it works!

Day 1: Customer books the transaction and sends the money to PeerFX
Day 2: PeerFX converts the funds and sends the money back to Customer
Day 3: Funds arrive in Customer's bank account!

For the transaction we completed, our Customer saved roughly $1000 CAD converting $35,000 USD to CAD!

I'm crazy excited that it works! IT WORKS!

So we are up and running but we need to go through the customer identity verification procedures before we can add users to the testing platform. Let me know if you are interested at info@peerfx.com!

November Featured User: Jason C.

This month's Featured User is Jason C.

Jason spent some time going through the transaction process and placing an order with PeerFX on our Closed Testing platform. He emailed us several suggestions that we have decided to implement, which including the following points:

1. Explain what an EFT is and how to go about setting that up. Jason actually went through the effort of speaking to his bank about setting that up. Our solution is to provide instructions on how to do that in the transaction confirmation email that we send out after you have a booked a tranasction with PeerFX.
2. WHAT?! There are costs associated with sending you an e-mail money transfer? Yes there are. It can be up to $1.50 for an individual. IF you are a business and have EFT set up through your bank (PeerFX uses DirectLine for Business with the Bank of Montreal) then it can be $0.10 per transaction. Solution: We will also list the associated fees charged by your bank on the transaction confirmation page. We are all about transparency and agree that listing out potential fees charged by your bank is important. Keep in mind that the "hidden fees" are charged by your bank and NOT PeerFX.
   

We would like to thank Jason for his time and effort put into providing us with his valuable feedback. We look forward to having other users provide us with feedback - YOU included.

YOU can become a registered user today through sending us an email to participate in our Closed Testing system at info@peerfx.com.

Join us today in Changing Exchanging!

Tax Free Savings Account - Too Good to be True?

With the current economic conditions, efforts are being made to help people save money - such as this new financial product that I came across the other day.

New product from the government, my friend Alireza Fadaie of Investors Group Inc. passed this on to me:

"Put the money in the account and don’t pay any tax on the interest and withdraw it without any tax consequences! Too good to be true?! Why has government become so generous?! The savings rate in Canada is horrific and has decreased significantly in the past 20 years. Now here is the great way to save!"

It does sound like something that everyone can use and if you are interested I can put you in touch with Alireza to learn more about the details. Here's some additional info I found through googling:

(Information from Department of Finance Canada)
http://www.budget.gc.ca/2008/pamphlet-depliant/pamphlet-depliant2-eng.asp

(Information from HSBC)
https://www.hsbc.ca/1/2/en/personal/chequing-savings/savings-accounts/tax-free-savings-account/how-does-tfsa-work

Hope this helps! Happy savings! :)