This is part 4 in a series of Home Business Tip Articles. You can read previous tips at: http://www.angelfire.com/zine/smallbiz.

This part concerns basic equipment you will need in your home office if you want to be productive.

A Computer: I assume most people reading this article already have a personal computer. Purchase best you can afford. But, if you are budget minded, you can find many computer stores selling a full computer setup for under $1,000. For starters, take a look at Dell Computer's Website. http://www.dell.com

The hardware or software you will need on your computer will depend on your type of buisiness. Most of newer computers are pre-loaded with all basic software you will need to run your home office in beginning. This would include: emailing, spreadsheets, wordprocessing, database creation. Don't forget to install a good back up system for your important files plus a good surge protector to protect computer. And anti-virus software for added protection when on Internet.

Monitor: Computers are packaged with monitors. A few years ago 15 inches was standard. Now you can easily up grade to a 17 inch screen or larger. Larger viewing areas help reduce eyestrain.

Printers: Again most computers are packaged with a printer. Printers available might be ink jet, or laser. Laser printers produce higher, crisper, professional work. A laser printer is a good choice if you do a lot of printing and correspondence. If you rarely print out your work, a lower price ink jet printer is adequate.

Scanner: If you desktop publish you will certainly need a scanner. Scanners are great for scanning images from books, newspapers, reports. Use to make copies of important business documents.

Make on mistake about it, medical billing as a home based business is Not A Scam, it's a very lucrative business, a very hands on business, a personally rewarding business and there are thousands of business owners and physicians nationally that can attest to fact that they benefit highly from it.

This industry is so big and profitable that companies abroad are bombarding medical billing owners with prospect of outsourcing our workload to them for little to nothing so that they can get a piece of pie.

There are only two reasons why this profession gets a bad rap:

1.) There are several companies out there preying on those that are not educated enough about field to realize that most companies, newspaper ads and software vendors are scam artists in disguise and...

2.) Most if not all of those that don't succeed or got scammed along way never did initial research necessary from start and then jumped in with booth feet not knowing what they were up against. Thus, they set themselves up to get scammed but instead of taking responsibility for their actions they cry foul, blame industry in general and say it's nothing but a scam.