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As its name suggests, Escrow.com provides online escrow services for e-commerce sites by holding payments for goods or services until a transaction is successfully completed. Its commercial partners include eBay, GoDaddy, AutoTrader.com, and Flippa.com. Escrow.com was founded in 1999 by Fidelity National Financial, then merged with iLumin in 2002 before being purchased by an unnamed private investor in 2004. Freelancer .com said it will acquire Escrow.com from the same investor.
Freelancer.com already has a version of escrow services called Milestone Payments, which means the site holds funds from an employer until it is released to a freelancer following the completion of a service or a dispute resolution. Holding payments is designed to give employers some peace of mind, especially after the site’s rapid growth through a series of acquisitions starting in 2011 and its initial public offering on the Australian Securities Exchange in 2013.
The Milestone Payments system, however, is the frequent target of complaints from both employers and freelancers who claim that payments aren’t issued in a timely manner and that the system doesn’t provide adequate protection against bad jobs. The acquisition of Escrow.com may help Freelancer.com solve some of these issues.
Escrow.com claims that in fiscal year 2014 its gross payment volume was $265 million, and that it has processed over $2.2 billion in transactions to date.
THERE'S no first prize for guessing which country has spawned a new business called No Worries Insurance.
Sunshine Coast man Tony Venning has launched a global insurance company, and he has timed it for the festive season when holidays are top of mind.
Mr Venning's company specialises in personal and property insurance for the adventure travel and sports market. Ski and snow boarding, surfing, golf touring and cycle touring are all covered as well as specialist cyclist insurance for road, mountain and even electric bikes for professional riders, weekend Lycra warriors or recreational cyclists.
As a bit of an adrenaline junkie himself, and after a 20-year career working with a major international insurance company in London, Melbourne and Sydney, Mr Venning saw an opportunity for a specialist insurance provider that understood the often specific needs of this adventure market.
He has developed insurance coverage packages for the 2012 London Olympics, the F1 British Grand Prix, the 2010 Rugby World Cup, the Rolling Stones, Ozzy Osbourne and Meatloaf. So why did he want to start up his own company?
"A desire to let people enjoy the things they love with less worry, hence the No Worries name," he said.
"People who love skiing, cycling, surfing or travelling can be shocked when they need to make an insurance claim and then find out there's a clause in the fine print that prevents them from doing so.
"For instance, most other companies won't provide cover for (push) bikes valued at over $1000. Lots of bikes, especially carbon fibre frames, can be as expensive as a car. Most insurance companies will insist on trying to repair a broken carbon frame rather than replacing it.
"For the serious cyclist there's no way you'd hop back on a 'patched up' carbon frame especially when you're travelling at speed. We understand the difference and provide new-for-old-replacement on all bikes less than two years old in the event of major damage.
No Worries Insurance is 100% Australian owned and has the backing of one of the world's biggest insurers, Lloyd's of London. In its first two months it is well ahead of its targets for new policies and will soon expand into other specialist markets such as camera equipment and musical instrument insurance.
It has offices on the Sunshine Coast, Sydney and Brisbane.
Dozens of cyclists have staged a demonstration in Aberdeen over the lack of dedicated paths on the city's new bypass.
The road project is expected to be fully open by late autumn.
Aberdeen Cycle Forum said there should be segregated bike paths along the route and better provision to allow cyclists to cross it.
Transport Scotland said the bypass would reduce traffic levels on other routes, increasing cycle safety.
Campaigner Rachel Martin said: "I think they think cycling is just for leisure. Actually, cycling is a legitimate form of transport.
"Building direct, safe, segregated cycle paths to important destinations like the airport, the Deeside Way, the beaches could be a huge boon for the region but we have missed that opportunity because they didn't build the path at the time the road was constructed."
Transport Scotland said it had given the city council a grant to improve cycle infrastructure where it saw fit.
The council said it had applied for funding under a bypass mitigation scheme for "several pathway and cycleway improvements" around the city.
The £745m, 28-mile (45km) Aberdeen bypass was given the green light by Scottish ministers in 2009, but was delayed by legal action.
The first main part - between Parkhill and Blackdog - opened in June.
A special event at the weekend allowed thousands of people to walk and cycle part of the bypass route ahead of it opening.
It also gave them the chance to see structures including a special bridge for wildlife.
Is Oil Bad For You?
I'd always believed that things like coconut oil and olive oil were part of a healthy diet. I ate them regularly with just about every meal — I cooked with olive oil, spread coconut oil on my toast, and drizzled avocado oil on my hummus. A few months ago, though, I learned that oil is technically not part of a whole-foods, plant-based diet. I was shocked to learn that there was virtually no nutritional value to the oils that we're so used to eating on a daily basis.
Julieanna Hever, MS, RD, CPT, a plant-based dietician and health and fitness expert, confirmed that this is true. "Oils are a processed food," Hever told POPSUGAR. "Basically, the fat is stripped out of the intact food (be it an olive, coconut, or avocado), leaving behind the fiber and many other nutrients."
Hever also reminded us that oil "contains 120 calories per tablespoon, almost 2,000 calories per cup!" But even worse than that, there isn't any satiating fiber in oil, so eating oil regularly is an easy way to consume way more calories than your body needs — and that can quickly lead to weight gain.
This was hard for me to believe at first, but I decided to go cold turkey and cut out all oil from my diet. It was strange at the beginning. I thought I wouldn't be able to roast vegetables or even sauté an onion. You'd be surprised, though, to find that lots of foods release their own natural water or oil, so you don't even need something like olive oil to cook most things. For example, onion naturally contains oil that's responsible for its smell and taste, and you can see it being slightly released when you sauté it in a pan with nothing else. Besides, if I felt like some foods were sticking too much to the pan while I was cooking, I would simply add a little bit of water.
After two months of eating no oil at home and very little oil while eating out, I noticed my belly was a bit flatter than it was before. It was a small change, but it was a gradual one that became more noticeable over time.
That being said, healthy fats are an important part of our diet, and Hever says we shouldn't ignore them completely. "The best food sources of healthy, disease-fighting fats are nuts and seeds," she said. "We only need about one to two ounces a day to meet our essential fatty acid requirements." You can also opt in for some avocado in your dish rather than cooking with oil.
I upped my intake of avocado after I gave up oil, while also logging in all my food to the macros app on my phone to make sure I was getting enough healthy fats. Between avocado, almonds, and chia and flaxseeds, I was getting more than enough of what I needed.
"Because of their high caloric density, I recommend minimizing intake of oils," Hever said. It could save you a lot of empty calories that you really don't need.
RALEIGH, N.C. - Jan. 30, 2017 - PRLog -- Online magazine, Infinite Minds partners with the North Carolina Museum of History to host the screening of CreativeNC on March 18, 2017, from 4:00 p.m. until 7:00 p.m. For the past four years, Devon Smith—Founder of Infinite Minds and Digital Producer at REVOLT MEDIA & TV has worked to capture the essence of North Carolina's creative culture through the eyes of creatives through both print and film. The North Carolinians featured come from all over the state and chose to travel off the beaten path towards non-traditional, arts-based professions and entrepreneurship.
The film focuses on the growth, potential, and resources within the state and addresses the topic of whether or not creativity is stifled by society and the educational system. Organizations across the state have rallied to support the interactive event intended to bridge the gap between creatives and business. In addition to the North Carolina Museum of History, partners include the North Carolina Arts Council, American Dance Festival, Triangle Art Works and Sheila A. Huggins, PLLC. The screening has also garnered attention from some outside of the state. Founder and former CEO of the multi-million dollar lifestyle brand—Karmaloop, Greg Selkoe is a confirmed keynote speaker.
Devon has called Fayetteville, North Carolina home since 2005 and attributes the outpour of interest in the film to the desire of those trying to connect the dots to make a living in nonconventional fields, more common to states housing more popular metro hubs such as New York, Los Angeles and Atlanta.
"North Carolina tends to be a bit more conservative. The project grew from a film to a full on initiative when I realized many of my peers were looking for resources to build on their ideas, and none of us knew where to find them. There seems to be a lack of direct access or communication between the entities offering the resources, and the creatives who need them. Higher institutions and entities offering funding must provide equal opportunity for everyone to gain access and inclusion so that the best talent truly gets the chance to blossom," said Smith.
CreativeNC is meant to serve as an ongoing initiative that continues to unify the collective creative community of North Carolina. By showcasing the talent and ability that's developed within the state, the intent is to foster an industry that is more supportive of artistic and entrepreneurial endeavors.
Founded in 2013 by Devon Smith, Infinite Minds is an online magazine committed to highlighting the movers and shakers of the world, while providing a narrative to the life and times of the creative culture. The magazine continues to spotlight visionaries and innovators across various industries with the intention of inspiring readers to create their own reality with the tools already in their possession. A few notables features include producer and director, Cylla Senii; photographer, Aviva Klein; and music entrepreneur, Jesse Kirshbaum. Additional information may be found on Infinite Minds' website: http://www.weareinfinite.co/.
To view supplemental information, documentary trailer, and updates for CreativeNC, visit http://www.creativenc.info/. (http://www.creativenc.info/) To interview Devon Smith, please contact Brittany Maul at brittany@brittanymaul.com or (910) 286-8606.
Horticultural therapy, which uses gardening-like activities facilitated by a trained therapist to help patients feel better, is gaining traction in the US.
On a recent chilly Wednesday, Lori Bloomberg, a horticultural therapist with NYU Langone’s Rusk Rehabilitation centre in Manhattan, pushed a cart filled with bright green foliage down the hospital’s hallways, past a row of wheelchairs and into the room of two patients, who were sitting propped up in their beds.
Belfiore and her roommate, Carol – a food broker from Massapequa, New York, who was recovering from spinal surgery, and who declined to give her last name – carefully wrapped rubber bands around their bamboo clusters, grazing the light brown roots that puffed out of each stalk. They filled glass vases with tiny red stones, then added water and the plants.
Horticultural therapy embraces the basics, using nature and gardening-like activities, facilitated by a trained therapist, to help patients feel better. It’s often used in hospitals, but horticultural therapists also work in addiction recovery centres, prisons and wilderness therapy programs for teenagers.
Working with plants can be a modest physical challenge – Carol, 63, said it helps with her fine motor skills – but at NYU Langone, it’s often employed to promote a sense of mindfulness, and to distract or motivate patients during a tough physical therapy session.
Some benefits are more clear-cut than others. The American Horticultural Therapy Association’s formal contention that “quality of life is related to the relationship between people and plants” – reminiscent of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s view that there exists an “occult relation between man and vegetable” – suggests that horticultural therapy may facilitate a deeper kind of interspecies connection, one that would probably benefit us all.
“One patient specifically said to me, ‘The best thing about horticultural therapy is that I’m no longer the subject,’” Fried said. Often patients are struggling with uncontrollable circumstances, and working with plants is “a gentle way of trying to process that,” said Leigh Anne Starling, president of the American Horticultural Therapy Association.
“It totally decompresses me,” Carol said quietly, tearing up. “It’s calming, and everything else is stressful.” She believes her horticultural therapy sessions in the hospital have “absolutely” sped up the recovery process – and, as a bonus, working with plants has brought her closer to her husband, whose gardening interests she now shares.
Though Fried has observed that “interest seems to be growing exponentially” in the field, and said she has more horticulture interns at the hospital now than in the past, horticultural therapy as a stand-alone profession has remained a niche pursuit.
With membership hovering at just around 500 people, the American Horticultural Therapy Association has less manpower today than in decades past – in part, said Candice Shoemaker, a professor of horticulture and horticultural therapy at Kansas State University, because gardening is a fairly accessible skill that other health professionals can just incorporate into their existing therapeutic practices.
Formula One driver Lance Stroll, whose father spent a reported $80 million to help get him onto the Williams F1 team for 2017, will join Force India next year in place of Esteban Ocon, who has a development contract with the dominant Mercedes F1 team. Stroll’s father bought Force India a few months ago.
After Stoll’s father—clothing tycoon Lawrence Stroll, who ranked No. 887 on the 2018 Forbes billionaires list—bought the struggling Force India team while it was in administration, the Telegraph wrote that Lance Stroll wasn’t a fan of the “rich-kid caricatures” of him.
“I felt that the way I was criticised was not entirely fair,” he says. “Obviously I’m struggling right now in a difficult car, but I have done a lot to prove that I’m not here just because of my family’s wealth.
“I won championships and races and earned my super-licence to get to Formula One. Of course, I was very fortunate to be in the position I was in, but at the same time I delivered. I think I deserve a bit more credit.
As for Ocon? Sure, he’s out of a ride or whatever, but even before he officially and inevitably lost the spot on the Force India F1 team, he just didn’t get it. He’s from a different background, Lance Stroll said in August.
“Drivers don’t always know all the pieces of the puzzle behind the scenes,” Stroll says. “Potentially, my father buying this team can make it a much better team, much more competitive. It’s not, in my eyes, a big negative.
Regardless of how everyone actually feels about each other, Ocon will have an entire year to think on his views about “how things should be,” like Lance Stroll alluded to in August. He won’t have roughly 21 F1 races to compete in, after all.
Speaking of competition: If you thought five-time champion Lewis Hamilton was the winningest entity currently in F1, you were wrong. The real winners are nepotism and money. They always are.
Piyush Khaitan is the founder and CEO of NeoGrowth.
India’s digital landscape is changing faster than we can imagine, and it could mean huge improvements in financial access for many. As we speak, three key factors are converging to create a new, more robust digital ecosystem in India, permanently changing the way we do business.
The proliferation of smartphones, a government initiative and a new payments interface are changing the market, driving the rise of mobile wallets and garnering attention from major brands like Apple. For those among the approximately 233 million unbanked in India, this could be a huge step toward full financial inclusion — allowing them to save, borrow, build credit, make payments, purchase insurance and build better lives.
The first component of this digital ecosystem is smartphone proliferation. In February, India passed the U.S. to become the second-largest smartphone market in the world (behind China). There are more than 1 billion mobile phone connections in the country, and 250 million of those are smartphones. Smartphone sales continue to rise, making up a larger percentage of total phone sales. Suddenly, a very intelligent device is getting into the hands of many Indians, which is bound to change the way we reach people, even across once-insurmountable distances.
The second is the Aadhaar profile, a 12-digit unique identification number available to all Indians. As impressive and useful as smartphones are for connecting people to the internet and formal financial services, that connectivity means nothing without first having identification. Started in 2009 by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), the government agency has issued more than 1 billion Aadhaar numbers so far, which amounts to more than 80 percent of the population.
A competitive market of cashless financial services is good news for the future of financial inclusion in mobile-savvy India.
This sweeping new program gives many Indians something they’ve never had before: government-issued, formal identification. This is no small matter — MasterCard CEO Ajay Banga recently said that “not having an identity is effectively like being in prison. Everybody is going around with their hair on fire about the Internet. If you don’t have an account, it will be the Internet of everything, but not the Internet of everyone.” And to get an account, you first need to prove you are who you say you are.
The voluntary identification system makes that easier; it links a unique 12-digit number to basic demographic information and biometric data, such as fingerprints and iris scans, all of which are stored in a central database.
The proliferation of Aadhaar numbers lowers several barriers to financial access. Indians can now link bank accounts to their Aadhaar number, and the Aadhaar card is a valid ID for purchasing a SIM card, opening a bank account or accessing government services like a pension or subsidized ration. Aadhaar can help India’s new smartphone-driven connectivity reach its potential — and matter to the hundreds of millions of people living without formal financial services.
Finally, there is the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) Unified Payment Interface (UPI), which allows money to move between two Aadhaar profiles via a smartphone. For the first time, the UPI makes it possible for Indians to do a huge number of transactions that are not only cashless, but branchless. The cost is down to less than one rupee per transaction, which is the equivalent of about one penny. Ten major banks are already incorporating the interface into their mobile apps, and RBI is hopeful that more will join them. For rural Indians, the ability to conduct business via smartphone makes them less reliant on bank branches or kiosks, improving their practical access to financial services.
The confluence of these three factors, alongside efforts to improve financial literacy and the increasing availability of mobile wallets, payment banks and small banks, has the potential to create a flourishing digital ecosystem with an immense amount of available data. This will be game-changing for businesses like NeoGrowth, which makes it our mission to leverage these new data sources to revolutionize lending for Indian small businesses. A competitive market of cashless financial services is good news for the future of financial inclusion in mobile-savvy India.
REGINA — The driver of a transport truck that collided with a bus carrying the Humboldt Broncos junior hockey team is facing criminal charges.
RCMP say Jaskirat Singh Sidhu, who is 29, was arrested this morning at his Calgary home and is in police custody.
He is to appear in provincial court in Saskatchewan next week.
RCMP say they will not release any details of the investigation or what they believe happened. The only thing the Mounties have said to this point is that the truck was in the intersection when the collision occurred.
The Broncos were on their way to a playoff game when the truck and the bus crashed at a rural Saskatchewan intersection on April 6.
Sixteen people, including 10 players, died as a result of the crash, and 13 players were injured.
Sukhmander Singh, owner of the Calgary-based trucking company, said in April that the driver was going to the doctor and receiving counselling.
Singh said he was basically out of business after Alberta Transportation ordered Adesh Deol Trucking Ltd. to keep its only other truck off the road.
RCMP said April 19 that they had recovered driver log books along with engine control modules which had been sent to California for further analysis.
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Can you recommend any Indian food places in Pattaya? We do not mean the commercial pizza companies, but real Indian food. We read you each week on the web and will be coming for a vacation this fall and we are all Indian addicts. Where do you recommend?
I am delighted that you are coming over to Pattaya for your holidays, and, yes, I adore Indian food too, especially when taken with French Champagne. The Indians really haven’t got a handle on champagne, do they Petal, but they do have a good handle on some other aspects of life, like selling suits! Miss Terry Diner (you can get her on the Pattaya Mail’s web site too), has given Ali Baba high recommendation. Try it and if you find any others let me know and I’ll join you (with the proviso of copious amounts of bubbly).
In the nood for love?
How much in the Tip box?
WASHINGTON - WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama singled out financial institutions for causing much of the economic tailspin and criticized their opposition to tighter federal oversight of their industry.
While applauding House passage Friday of overhaul legislation and urging quick Senate action, Obama expressed frustration with banks that were helped by a taxpayer bailout and now are "fighting tooth and nail with their lobbyists" against new government controls.
In his weekly radio and Internet address Saturday, Obama said the economy is only now beginning to recover from the "irresponsibility" of Wall Street institutions that "gambled on risky loans and complex financial products" in pursuit of short-term profits and big bonuses with little regard for long-term consequences.
"It was, as some have put it, risk management without the management," he said.
The president also told CBS' "60 Minutes" that "the people on Wall Street still don't get it. ... They're still puzzled why it is that people are mad at the banks. Well, let's see. You guys are drawing down $10, $20 million bonuses after America went through the worst economic year ... in decades and you guys caused the problem," Obama said in an excerpt released in advance of Sunday night's broadcast of his interview.
The House bill, which passed 223-202, would grant the government new powers to split up companies that threaten the economy, create an agency to oversee consumer banking transactions and shine a light into shadow financial markets that have escaped federal oversight.
Obama is seeking swift approval in the Senate "because we should never again find ourselves in the position in which our only choices are bailing out banks or letting our economy collapse."
No House Republicans voted for the bill, and 27 Democrats voted against it. Opponents argue that the broad legislation overreaches and would institutionalize bailouts for the financial industry.
The Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee is working on its own version of the package.
In his address, Obama contended that the worst economic downturn since the Depression wouldn't have happened if the rules governing Wall Street been clearer and enforcement tougher.
Obama singled out Republicans and industry lobbyists for trying to block the changes.
Last week, top House Republicans urged more than 100 financial industry lobbyists to work harder to defeat the bill. Lobbyists have spent more than $300 million this year trying to scuttle the bill.
Opponents say that the changes would limit consumer choice and that added federal oversight would stunt financial market innovation.
Obama suggested that was one risk worth taking.

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