Blodwyn
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Posts posted by Blodwyn
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I don't know where that stat comes from, but I have a feeling it's utter rubbish!
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On my rare UK visits I also fly to East Midlands. A friend waits at a nearby service station and I phone her when I arrive. My son uses the very frequent bus service to Nottingham. I think we will lurk elsewhere and wait for him to phone us when he's near the from of the customs queue next time. I don't know of supermarkets close to Bergerac airport as we don't pass any on the way.
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The car park has been done up, most of the parking is under cover - with solar panels on the roofs. I always wonder at the number of British registered cars there. Why, why would people who live in Britain leave their car at a French airport? Surely theydon't live in France but neglect to register their cars here?
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I know British airport parking can be very expensive but you can't compare Bergerac with Gatwick! There is no public transport to Bergerac airport and there is one small café. . As far as I'm concerned if it's free for half an hour - very good! - then we did pay 4 euros for the extra 15 mins. I still don't understand why they laboriously type in passport numbers with one finger, but still put them in a machine as well. The UK-Bergerac flights are mostly Brits and a few French - so EU passportholders for now.
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Not much help for us down in the south west!
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I was talking to the local insurance agent today and, as a friend recently had a trailer stolen from outside their house, wondered if we were insured for stuff outside.Apparently only if things are in a locked shed (proper lock, not padlock) and if things are also stolen from the house. So our ride-on mower, other mowers, garden furniture, trailers, are not covered. We have no garage and the sous-sol has a mostly sloping earth floor and a narrow door. Also is difficult to accessible from the terrace where we have furniture.I don't think the above ground pool would be covered (by insurance!) either. We cannot secure our outside space with fencing - it's mostly steeply sloping and over 2 hectares. Also a farmer needs access to cut the hay.Our box trailer has no carte grise, because the UK company who made it do not supply them, So I guess we should not use it. Oh dear......
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A tiny airport with one or two flights a day and the slowest possible passport check! We went to meet our son this morning. The plane had already landed and we thought we might get away with the half hour free parking. No chance! People emerged from the arrivals hall at a rate of about one every two minutes. We overstayed by 15 minutes and had to pay 4 euros - not much, but a lot for 15 minutes. There were still quite a few people waiting for people to appear. It's not recent, it's been like that for a year or two. The officials type passengers' passport numbers into a computer, then put the passport into a scanner. I think they are paid by the hour! A bit annoying.
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I don't think there are birds in the loft and the web and the deposit seem more likely to be produced by spiders or insects. There isn't enough space beside the stove to get up close and look.
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Thanks for helpful advice. We got our above ground round pool set up at the end of last summer. We had to get someone to dig out a flat area because our land is sloping, then covered it with sand before putting the pool together. Unfortunately we left it late to dismantle the pool and it got damaged in strong winds. This year we a friend welded the damaged bit of frame and we are up and running. The cover supplied is lightweight and has no chance with the winds here. A bit of a nuisance that there was a tree with blossom not far away!I read in The Connexion that if you make alterations to the land for an above ground pool, you may be taxed on it. We were hoping to have a wall built to stop the soil behind crumbling, and possibly some decking on a level with the top of the pool, as our son in law would not manage the rickety ladder to get into the pool. Wondering now!
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Six weeks? Ha ha! Not in Tarn et Garonne. We only took the form in 2 months ago, marked 'urgent' by our GP as OH has terminal cancer. Last year a friend (who has little French) asked me to go with him to enquire about his application as it had been three months since he sent it in. The response was ' Oh no, far too soon, maybe 6 months'.When/if it's approved we then have to send in photos....
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Is the interest rate worse than UK accounts? I had a bit in an ISA and left it there when I moved to France. I realise there is no point in keeping it and the interest is currently 0.25%. I was thinking of starting a Livret A as it's interest free and you don't even have to declare it on the French tax return, which would simplify things.
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I think it's brick! The pipe from the stove goes straight up and is blocked in at ceiling level. (It's a single storey house).The fireplace is in the corner and the wood is the framework to hold the plasterboard in place over the chimney breast. This seems to be where the stuff falls down. The black dots in the web that fell down seemed to move, could be tiny spiders. The deposit is like rough sawdust but dark brown. It's been happening for quite a while now. I just wonder what might be being eaten up there.
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Not sure which topic to post this in. When I hoover the tiles by the woodburner, I notice a pile of dark brown stuff which has obviously fallen from the chimney above. When I look up I can see what look a bit like spiders' webs with specks in high above. We tried spraying insect killer but it's still happening. I can't see any damage to the wood in the chimney, though it's very awkward to see. I' m a bit worried as to what's going on up there! Is the brown stuff chewed up wood?
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Well I've vaguely heard of these things. Can't help wondering, like with the breath test things, which member of the government has shares in the company that produces them!Our nearest big city is Toulouse, currently we only go by ambulance taxi so I think I'll wait to see when they have them. Though possibly they won't need to go into the zones which require Crit'Air stickers.
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A little off topic! But it is odd that people who claim to have little money still buy so much stuff! Can't criticise too much as they are friends of my son and lovely people. I haven't been able to go back and see recently, but I'm told they have to clear a path to cross the living room! It's a very small house and they have two kids. I also have too much stuff in my small French house, but it's been acquired after 45 years and I am trying to declutter.
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Thanks parsnips. Yes it is much more complicated than I thought. The French Property site confused me because it said you get allowed 6% per annum, e.g. if you owned a property for 10 years = 30% (why not 60%). The HMRC calculator is complicated and of course I can't say how much I sold the house for as I haven't yet. I don't even know what price it might fetch. The tenants have packed it with so much stuff they can hardly move, so difficult for an agent to view! We bought it as insurance in case we ever need/want to return to the UK so would have to buy something else as insurance anyway.
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The last item on the back of the instructions for 2016 blue form, a table seems to say that a married couple counts as 3 parts. On the table to the right it seems to say that a couple counting as 3 parts are not taxable if income is less than 37277. That sounds very generous. I'm sure I must have misunderstood!
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'Think they live in France'. Well, obviously British people who've moved here do live in France! Their lives might be different from yours, but it's still lived in France. And your description would not apply to all French people either.I agree a few Brits do seem to mainly socialise with other Brits, often because they can't speak much French. However, many of us do speak to our French neighbours, register to vote, volunteer locally, turn up at the war memorial on Remembrance Sunday and many are working here too.
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If we sell our UK house, I believe we will be liable for UK CGT (if we sell for more than when we bought it in 2007). But then we would have to declare it on our French tax form. Would we be taxed in France as well?(Wondered because someone has asked if we want to sell.)
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OH has a teacher's pension. When his state pension kicked in, the UK tax office revised his tax code, and reduced it. I assumed that meant that he is paying UK tax on the state pension.
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It's horribly confusing with all the estimated bills and deductions for massive over estimation. (Must read the meter before paying next bill!)On my Feb 2017 bill there is 'regularisation' for 2014 and 2015 just to muddy it even more.Fumbling round the website, it says we used 4350kw in total in 2016 but not how much was hc. So, back to the bills and from 17/04/16-16/04/17 it looks like: hc 1970 and hp 2870. I rang eDF who looked at our account and assured me I'm better off with Tarif Bleu. He said it would cost 35 euros to change tariff (but I think more to get our electrician in to make the water tank automatically switch over to hc!). It would only save 1 euro a month on the abonnement (currently 13,64 a month). I said people were suggesting I might save if I changed from TB and he sounded slightly miffed, saying he has no interest either way. I do wish I could do paragraphs, or even bigger spaces, to make the post clearer!
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Thanks for the interest. We have a small house! on one level. Two (too) small bedrooms, living/dining and kitchen and another room. We extended into the garage but the electricity was already on 15kva. As said above, it is very well insulated. Triple glazed and wall insulation. Our son complained last week that the house was too warm - with no heating on! How can we be paying far too much for electricity?We are all electric except for the wood burner - which we didn't use every day last winter and don't use the heaters excessively.The 6 bills up to April this year came to 2100.
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Thanks for reply. Our puissance is 15 KVA. Oven and hob are electric. As I said, washing machine is on in the daytimes. I don't do a huge amount of ironing! Computers and TV mostly before 22.30 though often recording later. Not sure about heating load. We have no heating on most of the time at the moment.
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Latest bill, after meter reading: hc 3014 kw and hp 6440. We have electric heaters (no storage heaters now) but also a woodburner - in a very well insulated small house. Maybe we should ditch the hc thing?
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