Martin963

Why make it so "ciblé"? Why not allow an option to look at the national picture? Why restrict an app so tightly? Why should the app be entitled to check my geoloaction, some people (although I'm not that bothered about it) don't want snooping of this sort?

Frustratingly - and perhaps typical of "the French attitude" - I finally got it (the app) to admit (after several attempts) that I am not entitled to download or use the app as I am not resident in France. In other words it's geo-blocked. I do honestly wonder what goes on in the heads of some of these people...... And it's a stupid stupid restriction as I can still look at the info on the RTE website, it's just less easy to access quickly. I was amused to see that traffic lights won't be exempted from power-cuts in France, that should be good for a laugh as a spectator sport..... I might add that even on this very cold morning here in Britain (-5 deg C in Devon) we're still exporting power to France to keep their lights on.......

I expect Hidalgo is planning at this moment how to tax the poor little beasts......

Sadly it seems that Boursorama only offer bank accounts for people abroad provided they are French: ""La sélection d'un pays de résidence autre que France est réservée aux ressortissants français à l'étranger."" (I'd got some way through the process before it came up with that message, it's not clear when you start the sign up process).

Just answered my own question - the application form seems to allow one to choose Royaume Uni. I shall investigate further - thanks for the tip off NormanH.

But does Boursourama allow people who no longer have a French address to open an account?

Truly awful, there are some sick people around. Watching French TV though one sees more and more incidents of this sort where Mayors are attacked, often in public places with apparently no concern or worry on the part of the perpetrator about being witnessed or even filmed. One gets the impression that the increase in hassle - from low level insults and incivilités right through to being <<grièvement blessé>> is putting a lot of current Mayors off seeking re-election when the time comes. One can't blame them.

Thanks NormanH. Interesting idea about "virtual cards", I saw mention of them but thought "too complicated for me", as would be linking my phone to the account. But I'll investigate further, it's a fascinating idea. Sadly LCL are refusing to budge from these eye-watering charges (in spite of which they said they'd like to speak to me on the phone, but when they tried they then claimed that they weren't allowed to ring numbers in Britain, which seems a bit ironic when they're trousering €60 a quarter from me henceforth). Talking to French friends the reputation of LCL is at rock bottom, slow, blundering, out of date and expensive. It'll take a couple of months to empty the account but I shall consider myself well out of their grasp.

I get the impression that this problem hasn't affected anyone on here, tant mieux, but an agreement has now been concluded and the TF1 stable will be back with all five channels on TNTsat and Canalsat as of Monday 7th Nov.

Thanks Lehaut. From what I can gather the "no limits" ties in with what you've found. I did enquire yesterday both from Wise and Revolut as to how they treat larger sums coming in - forcement the money from the sale of our house in 2019 is not an insignificant sum. I offered to send a pdf of the sale agreement to them in advance, but they seemed happy to review any incoming payments on an as-and-when basis and ask questions on legitimacy as they arise.

Thanks Lehaut. Presumably there's no limit on incoming amounts (as I will have to do moving money from LCL to Revolut) provided it stays in the same currency? I've also set up a Wise account, and interestingly LCL who first said that I'd just have to lump the new charges are now saying they'll consult higher up to see if they can bring the new charges back down nearer the old. Clearly a bit of Anglo-Saxon intransigence has had an effect, I told them I was off and would start moving money and it's concentrated a few minds. They're due to phone me to negotiate later today. Awful dinosaur of a bank though, at the moment I can't do transfers to Britain or Belgium IBANs without applying and then waiting for a courrier with a code to enter on the internet. With huge charges and out of date procedures no wonder so many complain about LCL.

Update - silly me, just unfamiliarity. I've found the way to open the € account. Steep learning curve for those of us not so familiar with smartphones!

Bother! I've opened my Revolut account, which has appeared in sterling as I expected. However, I can't see an option for creating a € account into which to transfer the funds in LCL. I rather think I've completely misunderstood the concept of Revolut. With Ferratum you could have separate accounts in separate currencies, I'm rather afraid I've got the wrong end of the stick with Revolut. Unless anyone can give me guidance?

This thread has been a great help, but I wonder if perhaps one of you kind folk could expand a bit to my case...? I've just been hit by eye watering higher charges by LCL, of which I've been a customer for over thirty years. Instead of €12 a quarter as up to now, they are going to charge me 2 x €30 per quarter, on top of the debit card + assurance, bringing my annual charge for a bank account that I no longer really need to close to €400 per year. We sold our house back in 2019, and without going into great detail part of the funds involved are still with LCL. The given reason for LCL's new higher charges is that the accounts are not in daily use and I'm considered a foreigner now that we're not in the EU. I would like to move the money to somewhere else, and the mention of Revolut above sounds good. But I have a couple of worries, after a fairly irksome experience with Ferratum Bank a few years ago. (I'm still not sure if I think Ferratum were on the level or not, and luckily had committed only a couple of grand to them). Based as I am entirely in Britain, can I actually have a € account? I don't want to change the euro proceeds of the house into £s but am not sure if that's how it works. Do I start with a £ Revolut account and then open an associated € one? How safe is Revolut? I see it's covered by the bank guarantee but is based in Lithuania? Awfully close to the Russian border if push came to shove? Any advice or alternatives gratefully received. I'd really have preferred to open another account in France with an outfit less determined to treat me as a vache au lait, but with no French address now I imagine that's nigh on impossible. Thanks folks.

Probably relevant to very few, but if you are someone in the category I mentioned above there is now a temporary fix: TF1 have taken the initiative (no doubt to try and force a resolution to the dispute) and are transmitting TF1 and its stable mates free to air on Astra 1, entirely independently of Canalsat, so it is possible to get these five channels back on a TNTsat or Canalsat box by doing a manual scan. They won't turn up in the correct "positions" on the channel list, but will at least be watchable. 11377 MHz, 22000 kbps, Vertical pol, 2/3 FEC. Will be interesting to see what happens during the World Cup, and whether they will transmit those shows in the clear. Oh so precious copyright problems may prevent that. And of course it now means that TF1 and its associated channels are available partout en Europe on n'importe quel sat box. Affaire à suivre.

@ Lehaut - that's interesting, because the business of the submarines listening to 198 kHz comes up often in technical forums, and has often been dismissed as a myth. So it's interesting to hear that it isn't. But one thing puzzles me about the story, there are a number (or were, at the height of long wave use) of other powerful broadcast stations that shared the frequency, and in many parts of the globe it would be hard to detect the presence of Radio 4 as it would be blanketed by the other signals, and of course even on long wave the coverage isn't world wide. But certainly in a huge area of the waters nearer Britain it would be a useful indicator. Although even Droitwich hasn't been without its problems, at various times the T aerial has blown away in a storm and the station has been off for three days at a time. I seem to remember that one of the longer outages co-incided with the Christmas invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviets! As you say, it's been a reference for years, but its days are numbered, with a close down currently thought to be penciled in for 31st March 2023. The cost of the power for Radio 4 is now partly funded by the Electricity Providing companies (ie to keep the Economy 7 meters alive) and the BBC certainly want rid of it. Not dissimilar situation with Allouis on 162 kHz which carried France Inter and was France's radio willy-waving contribution to the race to be the highest powered station (over 2000 kW). Radio France no longer needed it in about 2016, and all was set for it to be turned off, until with two months to go someone pointed out that all the clocks in SNCF stations, and many other civilian clocks in France, were synchronised by an inaudible signal buried in the carrier (similar tech to what is used at Droitwich for the electricity meters). Emergency discussions were had, and now the ANFR (I think it is) pays for Allouis to radiate unmodulated carrier at about 900 kW, ie no audio but with the clock signal still available. It must have cost a fortune to run it for the last six years, and with the increase in industrial prices for power I guess there's even more urgency to finish the job of changing the clocks throughout France, that could - with modifications - perfectly happily run on the German time signal on about 77 kHz. Long wave is getting emptier and emptier, with Allouis gone in 2016 ish, and in the last three years both Saarlouis Europe 1 and Roumoules Radio Monte Carlo have been silenced. For the French peripheriques only Radio Luxembourg is left......

I was about to write much the same Lehaut. The whole situation has been made more complicated by someone high up in the industry's aim to make it simple. The idea of a price cap expressed as a "typical" annual figure is nonsense, and finding out the price per kWh on Ofgem's website has - for years - been nigh on impossible. Many people (and this was demonstrated on the radio only a week ago) believe that the price cap means that - however much electricity they use - they can't be charged more than £x. In addition, there are many people who don't really understand that one's monthly debits are merely a "contribution" to one's balance with the provider, and that periodically the actual balance is struck and - if out of kilter by a lot - the next year's debits will be eye-wateringly higher. I've heard of people who simply argue and argue that they don't owe any more at the end of the year because "my debits have covered my use" and - sadly - in the end the providers give up and let them get away with it. Again, this is not helped by infrequent meter readings by the authorities and a complicated billing system that is - even when printed out in detail - incomprehensible to many. As you also say, smart meters can and do fail, ours went AWOL from the network a few days ago and I immediately rang our provider Octopus and requested them to reset it, which they did. But here in Britain they store only three months' worth of data (so I'm told), so if a network outage is longer than that it can make things very complicated. In the case cited by Gardian it's probably not easy, but it's absolutely vital that one watches one's meter like a hawk and that one reconciles what it says to the bills one gets. Again, who prints out an internet bill? Most people glance at the link and ignore it, but it's better to get to grips with one's account frequently. I must say that I resisted a smart meter for years, but because we have solar panels and a Tesla House battery we're able to use an Octopus tariff that is incredibly cheap (if you use it correctly) but requires a smart meter to take readings every half hour. But if our smart meter's initial problems are anything to go by, the problems that they throw up for the industry are huge, and I guess that many providers privately rue the day that such a ****-poor piece of technology replaced an annual manual meter-read. And one gathers that Linkys are no better, although we never had one. There could be further ructions here next year when - if it happens as planned - Radio 4 Long Wave (ie Droitwich/Burghead/Westerglen transmitters) is finally turned off. Buried within the carrier frequency is a signal that is used to control Economy 7 meters nationwide here. When the control signal goes the Economy 7 meters will cease to function reliably, and people are being warned that they will need to have a smart meter. The death-sentence has been delayed several times, but I suspect that the 2023 date will be respected, not least because powering a 500 kW LW transmitter is getting incredibly expensive, and the BBC have wanted to get rid of Radio 4 long wave for the last ten years.

Not that you hear any of that reported on the BBC, for whom of course it's only "Tory/Brexit Britain" that has any problems, while the EU is a paradise of smooth-functioning harmonious sunny-uplands. With the French AND the Italians to watch, it could be quite an amusing winter. Of course, von de Leyen said last week that she had "tools" to deal with the Italian system, so no need for any worry..... I actually feel very sorry for Mme Borne, I can list a lot of ex Premier Ministres who probably find life in such places as Le Havre and Prades an absolute breeze after their time in office. I don't on the other hand feel sorry for Macron, in fact his current situation is rather delicious to watch. And if he has to call another election when Parliament falls apart......

It's funny how we distinguish between the suffering of a mouse (cute) and a rat (less cute). One of our three chats d'origine francais proudly brought in a large dead rat to the bedroom a few nights ago and was roundly congratulated. I daresay the rat was less happy with the situation.

Nantes was in the news yesterday following the particularly nasty attack on a woman in the early morning last weekend, and TF1 interviewed another woman who is planning to sell her flat there, which overlooks an area where the drug dealers do good business. During the interview the dealers spotted her at the window and started hurling abuse at her, and the camera had to withdraw. I've no idea though whether Nantes is any worse than anywhere else of comparable size.....? But it does seem to have attracted some bad publicity recently as to how safe it is....

A wholly appropriate and dignified day. Like others I thought the little heirs behaved so well, no doubt largely because Princess Katherine is real quality in everything she says and does. My only gripe was the use of "Holy Spirit" rather than "Holy Ghost" throughout the litany. For the D of E it was "Ghost", and I'm sure he would have carefully and firmly stipulated that in his wishes. I'm only sorry that the Queen didn't! 😀 May Her Majesty rest in peace.

I'd be the first to admit that Truss is something of an unknown quantity to me. But to say that all she has done other than make a speech about cheese suggests that you haven't perhaps been paying attention. At the lunchtime of the day the Queen died she announced more useful policies in an hour than we've heard in the last 18 months, a British "tarif bouclier" and the re-starting of fracking being just two. As to her comments about Macron, many of us would entirely agree with her measured remark about the jury being out. In my lifetime I have never known anyone - claiming to be a friend - attempt to do so much damage to Britain, and I for one will never forgive him. Rubbishing the vaccine (and still refusing to admit he told lies about it), threatening to cut off electricity to the Channel Islands, supporting the invoking of the suspension of the NI protocol over vaccines, using Beaune as a constant attack dog against us whenever he couldn't be bothered to do the job himself, playing the constant bad cop against us in the Brexit process, need I go on... Macron has undone Anglo-French relations to such an extent that I doubt they will recover in my lifetime. Even I - a lifelong lover of France *and* its people - no longer rush to their aid when someone cracks a joke about them, and I no longer buy French products. I will review my stance when Macron goes, but in the meantime I would urge any British politician not to trust France or its president until 2027. I know, an extreme position, and I never EVER thought I would come to feel anything like this level of animosity. It grieves me, but Macron is the culprit, the only culprit. The only thing I would say about his utterances on the Queen is at least he recognises quality, and perhaps is dimly aware now after his election humiliations and his current political weakness that he will never EVER be fit even to wipe Her Shoes.

Probably only affecting a few people on here with Canalsat or TNTsat boxes, but not for the first time, a battle of wills is taking place between Canal and TF1, which led two days ago to the TNT service on 19.2 deg E (TNTsat and Canalsat) suspending TF1, TMX, TF1 Series Films, TMC and LCI from their offer. Something similar happened five (ish?) years ago. A battle over who pays what, Canal feeling they give TF1 access to their customers and TF1 arguing that their presence enhances Canal's offer. In the past this would have been stamped on by the CSA, but TNTsat is no longer recognised as an "officially sanctioned" method for receiving the whole set of TNT channels, unlike Fransat which retains the badge of approval. The last dispute lasted about four days, will be interesting to see where this one goes. It should be stressed that reception using a TNT box with a terrestiral aerial, Fransat, BIS, and the unofficial multistream versions of the TF1 stable are unaffected. My TNTsat box just gives a message saying the channels are no longer part of the offer.

French TV reports that the Germans are all over the east of France hoovering up petrol which is 50 cts cheaper; they're even bringing jerry cans (how appropriate!). Apparently their fuel price subsidy was taken away at the same moment as the French subsidy increased. As Ken says, sooner or later someone is going to have to pay for all these subsidies. My theory is that this is Macron's sh*t-scared tactic to avoid another Gilets Jaunes uprising, given that they often start during the rentrée and - oh my goodness me - it happens to be the rentrée right now..... Coincidence - non non non.....

Meanwhile here in Devon I've just looked at this morning's temperature and we are at a giddy 8.5 deg C.... That said, it's incredibly dry even here, our well is empty and we're syphoning out the bath water via a magnificent half-inch hose to water the apple trees, more to save water costs than to save South West Water, lest anyone thinks that I'm virtue signalling. The ground is hard as iron and the fields a very un-Devon-like brown..... Still, in this part of the world a dry August is a bit of a novelty!