Personal Finance, Loans & Insurance

Leveraging on a 14-year experience in the financial markets, Jon McKee Queen now serves the Managing Director for Jaspen Capital Partners headquartered in the Ukraine since 2008.  The company is considered a boutique investment banking firm positioned in capture the capital markets in Central and Easter Europe.  His expertise runs the gamut of financial services in corporate finance, securities trading, and asset management, to mention some.

Flavoring his financial and trading expertise is his profound grounding in the legal and financial implications of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol and promptly works in various ecological business initiatives since graduating as an economist in 1997 and as a lawyer in 2002. Right after graduation from law school in 2002, Jon McKee Queen joined the law firm of Latham & Watkins as an Environment Attorney at Latham & Watkins until 2006.  He then got appointed as a Senior Vice President for Carbon Credit deal organization at the International Environment Trading Group. In 2008 when he joined the Anemone Group, he was posted as its Central and East European Head in Ukraine.  At the same time, he served as the official advisor to Ukraine’s National Agency of Ecological Investments until 2010.  He also assists Ukraine’s Foundation for the Development of Environmental and Energy Policy, an NGO promoting the provisions of the Kyoto Protocol.

After graduating from Cornell University with a BS Economics degree in 1997, Jon McKee Queen got his career start as a licensed broker at the John Hancock Financial Services firm in New York. He then completed his Juris Doctorate degree at the University of Pennsylvania in 2002.  He served in the US House Banking and Financial Services Committee under the Clinton administration and prior to his current work, he was the Director and Head of International Sales at the Phoenix Capital Investment Bank in Ukraine.

Safety at work is paramount. The consequences of accidents in the workplace are manifold, at the most dangerous, at the least, potentially very costly to the employer.
That’s why businesses must make sure they have solid, clear health and safety guidelines in place. These should be known to all, and should be accompanied by protective clothing and equipment.
It’s particularly important to do so if your employees deal with dangerous substances, where there is a heightened risk of accident. Take nothing to chance. Ensure staff receive thorough training and equipped as appropriate to safely carry out their daily tasks. Make sure training and refreshment courses forms a regular part of their role.
Familiarise yourself with advice provided by the Health and Safety Executive, the body set up to minimise workplace accidents. Make sure that their posters are displayed in prominent, communal areas, i.e. the kitchen. This is a legal requirement.
Invest in safety equipment to minimise the risk of accidents. Fit rubber safety matting safety matting around any electrically-charged machinery to protect employees from shocks. Provide goggles for those who cut materials. Issue high-visibility jackets to those working in dim conditions.
It’s not just the ‘shop floor’ workers that need protecting, the back office requires health and safety provision also. Ensure trailing wires are tidied away using a cable protector. Use hazard tape to raise awareness of any dangerous items that cannot be moved. Make sure that employees chairs are comfortable and supportive.
The responsibility, while to some extent does lie with the individual member of staff, ultimately rests with the employer and their perceived duty of care. Should an accident happen, it is far more likely to be because someone wasn’t trained, didn’t recognise a hazard, they simply didn’t know and that’s down to the employer. At least, that’s what the court might say when that individual pushes a compensation claim your way.
Don’t take the risk, make sure everyone is sufficiently educated.

Rubber o rings, for all their simplicity, are one of the finest examples of precision engineering and usefulness on the market.
They are cheap to make and buy. Proof of their practical value is that they are used in not only most machines, but in many different component parts.
Yet, despite their availability and cost effectiveness, it’s still worth knowing exactly which size o rings you need to buy to ensure you don’t get in a job lot of incorrect ones.
In the UK, o rings are measured on the BS scale (British Standard), ranging from BS001 to BS932. It is hugely important to get the right size when ordering as just a few millimetres out can deem them unusable or detrimentally affect the whole running of the machine they are fitted to.
As the BS numbers rise, the size of the o ring goes up too. To look in detail at the size, there are plenty of conversion charts which show the size measurements exactly. The format is written as ID x CS. The ID is the internal diameter, stretching across the length of the inside of the ring through the middle in one straight line. The CS is the Cross Section, or the thickness. This is measured by calculating the depth of the rubber at its thickest part (i.e. the centre of the torus). All measurements are in millimetres.
BS001, for example, is universally seen to measure 0.74 x 1.02. At the other end of the scale, BS932 would measure 59.36 x 3.00.
There are between these two numerous other variations, offering individuals the chance to order exactly the right size of o ring to ensure the product they end up fixed to works flawlessly. So, in just knowing the facts behind the jargon and abbreviations, you can be sure to order exactly the right size of o ring.

While there are a number of energy companies available today and many offer competitive electricity prices, the costs of electricity remain extremely high for many businesses. It is because of these high costs a number of businesses are beginning to implement a variety of easy and basic steps that will reduce their business electricity bill.

Businesses that employ computers are beginning to place their computers on sleep mode when not in use. This can save a substantial amount of electricity, especially for businesses that feature a number of computers on the premises, such as offices.

Another easy step that could lower your business electricity bills is by replacing standard light bulbs with energy efficient light bulbs. While this requires an initial pay out that is slightly higher than standard light bulbs, using energy efficient light bulbs only use ¼of the energy and last 8 times longer than standard bulbs. Coupled with bulbs try to use natural sunlight whenever possible. A number of businesses, offices in particular, close blinds and switch on the lights, using natural sunlight instead of artificial light will lower your electricity bills dramatically.

The temperature of business premises can also dramatically increase your business electricity bills. During the winter months, try not to overheat you businesses premises, the ideal temperature for businesses is between 16 and 19°C. Lowering your thermostat by 1°C could save your business approximately 8 percent in electricity. Also, clearing your radiator space so that nothing is blocking the heat and regularly bleeding them has also been proven to lower annual electricity consumption. Ensure that air conditioning systems are only turned on when necessary and that the filters are not blocked. Unblocked air conditioning filters could lower your businesses electricity consumption by a staggering 5 percent.

Carefully monitor your businesses kitchen facilities, only install the required appliances and ensure they are organised correctly, for example do not place a fridge next to a hot appliance as it means your fridge has to work harder to keep the correct temperature. Also, ensure you and your staff only fill up your kettle with the amount they need. Boiling more than you need uses 8 times more electricity than necessary.

These are just a few of the ways you could save money on your business electricity bill. The Carbon Trust has estimated that businesses implementing these simple techniques could cut their electricity bills by almost 10 percent.