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1. Make a realistic budget & stick to it
   The best way to make a budget is to gather your bills from the past few months and make a list of all your recurring expenses. Then rank them in order of importance, with true necessities such as housing, food and healthcare obviously taking the top spots. After that, you can simply cut from the bottom of your list until your take-home exceeds what you plan to spend. Finally, keep track of your monthly spending throughout the year to make sure you're abiding by your budget.
2. Pay bills right after getting your paycheck
   Taking care of monthly obligations before letting yourself indulge in any luxury expenses is a helpful budgeting strategy. It also helps you avoid ever having a late payment reported to the major credit bureaus, which is one of the easiest ways to damage your credit score. Furthermore, paying your bill early improves your credit utilization, and thus your credit score, by reducing the balance listed on your monthly statement.
3. Add one month's pay to your emergency fund
   Building up some reserves should be one of the first orders of business for any financial makeover. We recommend ultimately building a fund with about 12 to 18 months' take-home income. But it's important to understand that won't happen overnight. In other words, you don't need to put the rest of your financial life on hold until your emergency fund is complete. Rather, chip away at it over time.
4. Use different credit cards for everyday purchases and debt
   The most basic example is using a rewards credit card for everyday purchases and a low interest APR card for balances that you'll carry from month-to-month.
5. Focus on physical health, given its strong connection to financial health
   There is a clear connection between physical, emotional and financial health, and it was particularly apparent in 2021. For starters, the average person spends about $5,177 on health care each year. Money and the economy are also our biggest sources of stress, according to the American Psychological Association. And people who get regular exercise tend to have better credit scores. Feeling better often leads to wiser financial decisions that focus on the long term.

We are excited about our new Video Tellers. Simply touch the screen to activate the Video Teller and one of our friendly EFCU tellers will greet you to assist you with your transactions. Video Tellers are available during normal drive up hours, please have your photo ID ready. Video Tellers also operate as ATMs 24/7 using your EFCU ATM or Debit card.

Every year scammers add new twists to well-known tax-related scams and 2020 is no exception.

Taxpayers should remember that the IRS generally first mails a bill to a taxpayer who owes taxes. There are special circumstances when the IRS will call or come to a home or business.

Click the links below to visit IRS.gov for more tips to help you spot email phishing scams and phone scams and avoid becoming a victim.