Tackle Debt With Tech In 2013 [Infographic]

Now that you’ve received your first credit card bill of 2013, you’re probably wondering how on earth you’re going to pay it. The spending season is over, and now it’s time to pony up the cash or fall victim to interest rates. Keeping track of bills, due dates, and APRs is hard. And if you don’t keep up, it means more money out of your pocket. But hey, you’re a tech savvy person. You’ve got all this figured out, everything is automated. You can just handle all your debt with tech in 2013. Automation is nice until something goes horribly wrong. You have to keep an eye on what money is going where and when, and it can get a little confusing.

Smartphones, computers, and tablets could be your ticket to financial responsibility. You just have to get on the bandwagon. This infographic titled Simply Your Personal Finances by Green Dot helps you kickoff a productive 2013 by explaining how you can tackle your holiday debt with tech in 2013.

Those dollar signs may seem daunting, but you can completely change the game with a little mobile magic. Mint, a personal finance tool, is a free service that lets you keep track of your bank accounts, bills, credits, and investments. Pageonce will let you track and pay your bills across multiple accounts (for a neat little $0.30 charge). And they both have the mobile apps you need in order to keep that New Year’s resolution of staying in budget. Using financial tools and tech in 2013 can really make it all easier to manage.

But simplifying your personal finances isn’t all about planning – it’s about scaling down on what and where you’re spending. Automating your credit card bill can bite you if you spend more on one month (say, December) and take a bigger chunk of your budget than you were betting on. If you want to get really simple, you can forgo a bank altogether for a prepaid debit solution, like Green Dot’s reloadable Visa cards. You wouldn’t be alone since nearly $35.7 billion was uploaded to prepaid cards in 2011. You won’t miss out on bank-like features like direct deposit, either.