It may not be a huge sum, but if was me, I'd pursue it. That interest, if it had been properly credited to your account would have compounded...etc. I'd start with the payroll service; they may try to discourage you, but I'd start there. Heck, they may be familiar with the procedure. If this happened to you, it could have happened to others as well. Of course I'd keep records of every phone call (date,time, name of person, etc)and would follow up every phone call with a letter (keeping a copy for yourself). Be prepared for some time, patience, and paperwork. Best of luck!

Just moving it back up a bit. Some who might find it useful may not have seen it earlier. That amount that a single person can earn without being liable to pay one cent of income tax claimed above is incorrect. The correct figure was $46,345.00. in 2006 ... if solely dividends on Canadian stocks, with no other income, no income tax is payable by a single taxpayer. Have yourselves a lovely late?-winter weekend, everyone. ole joyful

RE: STUDENT LOANS: URGENT: JULY 1 2006 DEADLINE !!! Consolidate NOW - RATES INCREASING. I came across this on June 2, 2006 for my son who has Student Loans. He said he doesn't qualify. Check this link out: http://www.creditunion.coop/news/story.php?id=26992 "http://www.creditunion.coop/news/story.php?id=26992" I don't know your situation, nor if you qualify either, but should read B'C according to THIS, rates on student loans will be going up! Since time is short, I think you should check this FIRST and IMMEDIATELY. ===================================== Next, you haven't stated how much your CC's charge (APR on each), but I agree - pay off the CC's first. You say you owe about $2000. That may seem like a lot, but if you can apply a minimum of $200/mo, for example, towards those, they will be paid off in approx 12 mos, (I'm including fin chgs "buffer"), as long as you don't charge anything to them! I also know that 12 months may seem like a long time to a young person - but it really isn't! I don't have much to say about your savings/retirement, etc. accts at this time - I wanted to pass this info on the student loans to you. Good for you for recognizing this important topic at an early age! You shall do well!

To clarify some things about our ideas to buy on Isle of Palms - while we're going to hold off on buying, and may not ever buy on the island itself, the area around it seems to be exactly what we're looking for our retirement years. The island is less than 13 miles to downtown Charleston, and only 20 miles to the Charleston Int'l airport. Even closer than Charleston is Mount Pleasant, about 4 miles away (across the Inter-coastal waterway and a marsh), which has plenty of shopping, restaurants, medical care including a decent hospital. In addition to wanting to live close to the ocean, we want to live near good medical care (this is most important), shopping (I'm not going to stop doing DIY projects on any home I live in until my body gives out - it's my hobby), airports, etc. I love the beach - every vacation we can we go to a beach - we've visited many of the east coast beaches over the years - I never get tired of it. My husband loves salt water fishing. We have a boat that he takes onto the Chesapeake Bay all the time to fish, and we go tubing on the Potomac River with our grown kids and grand kids (who are still very little). We've planned on retiring to as close to the (right) beach as possible for at least 20 years and I think it's safe to say that we're not going to change our mind about that between now and when we actually retire. And I definitely don't want to ever live someplace rural again - did that as child and have family still there - definitely not for me. Even if we were young I don't want to live in a place where there aren't plenty of doctors, including all types of specialists, and I don't want to live someplace, where if one of us was in the hospital, the other would have to drive over an hour back and forth. I'm honestly surprised at how many people I know who retire who don't care about that aspect at all. So - given what we know we want/need, we've been considering all the areas close to the Atlantic between Wilmington NC and Jacksonville FL. A few years ago we visited every place that even seemed to come close to what we want. But when we were looking before our income and savings were a fair amount less than they are now, and housing costs and interest rates were higher, so it limited where we would be able to afford to buy, so we didn't consider some of the areas we could afford now. And this is a retirement place we're talking about - being able to vacation in it before retirement is a bonus. We could wait until we retire to buy, but as I said in the original post, I don't want to miss an opportunity to buy while the prices are low AND the interest rates are low. But I do think we need to slow down and take our time - visit and stay there during different seasons, including the heavy tourist season, and make sure that it's what we want. We may find that living on an island/beach itself is not that great and that we should go back to what we always considered to be our only option - living on the mainland, but close to the beach. People seem to think that prices will be low for a while - I don't want to buy and then see prices drop even lower - and that interest rates will be low for a while too. So I realize that there is no rush - but I still don't want to kick myself years from now for missing any "deals of the century". I know this was long - sorry about that - but I think my first post gave the impression that the whole idea of buying at/near a beach, and this one in particular, was hurried and not thought out. While rushing into it right now is undoubtedly a bad idea, I don't think the concept of buying a home sometime soon for retirement in a few years, if the prices and interest rates are really low now, is a bad idea.