Rob Roy

I never knew there was an English speaking helpline for CPAM! Thanks for the information.

The obvious thing is a little forward planning so you don't run out of milk! I'm not sure what part of Correze you are thinking about but most of it is no more remote than Haute Vienne or Dordogne; I would say the Cruse is perhaps more remote. Besides, the Correze and Haute Vienne have the benefit of easy access to the A.20 something of benefit when you want to attract clients.

I'm not sure if this is the right section for this, but as there isn't one about new self-builds here goes! My brother is building a new passive house next to us (Dept 19) and is looking for an electrician with experience of geothermal and/or aerothermal heating as well as solar panels; it would be a bonus if they can speak some English. If you can offer any recommendations please PM me.

Looking at the Haute-Vienne website it says exactly the same as I found on the Correze site. I printed the page to back up my request in case there was any query, but had no problem. http://www.haute-vienne.gouv.fr/Demarches-administratives/Cartes-grises#F1050 Scroll down to where it says 'Justificatif de conformité' and you will see it says if you have the original (complete) registration document from an EU country you don't need a CofC as well.

I didn't have a camera on me at the time. Luckily the man seems very straight and genuine; he took us into his house, gave us his name, address, phone number and insurance details, filled out the accident statement, rang our insurance agent and admitted he was at fault, rang the insurance breakdown number and arranged for the car to be collected, has kept our trailer until we can collect it and even rang us on Monday to see if we were OK.. We have been advised by French friends that we should write to him and tell him we've incurred extra expenses having to hire a car for my husband and ask him to cover the cost of it as the insurance won't.

Well it was nice while it lasted! We re-registered the car Monday of last week and received the new Carte Griste last Thursday morning. In the afternoon we took some new wood for fence posts over to a friend in our trailer and when returning we had to stop in a local town as a tractor and trailer wanting to turn across the traffic had blocked the tractor in front of us from turning left into his driveway. This tractor had to put his brakes on, but because a plastic petrol can (as we found out later) had got in the way he couldn't depress the pedal so started to roll backwards (we were all on an incline); there were 4 or 5 cars behind us, plus our large trailer and we had nowhere to go so the tractor, complete with a log splitter attached to the back, rolled into our car. Watching it roll gently backwards, thinking at any moment he would stop, was quite surreal - I kept thinking that at any moment he would stop, he was even looking back at us over his shoulder! He freely admitted it was all entirely his fault, which was lucky as not one of the other cars bothered to stop and offer to be a witness to the accident. My husband was booked to go and visit his mother in the U.K. yesterday and take her to a family birthday celebration at the weekend, so we've had all the hassle, plus added expense, of hiring a car for him to go away in. We have heard this evening that we can either have the car repaired, as it is just on the limit of what they will pay for, or have it written off and take the insurance payout; we will get a letter with all the details in the next few days. However, as the car has not been stripped down yet the assessor's report is based on what he can see and if there is more damaged than first thought then we would have to stand the extra costs. My husband, who was a panel beater/classic car restorer in the U.K., thinks the car is more badly damaged than can be seen initially; he thinks the front chassis legs are bent due to the way the wings and bonnet have been pushed back. In which case I think it might be a case of accepting an insurance payout and starting again. Sorry if this has been a rather long post - it has been a fraught week to say the least!

Copied from our 'Certificat Provisoire d'Immatriculation' the following sections are used: D1, D2, D2.1, D3, E, F.1, F.2, F.3, G, G.1, J, J.1, J.2, J.3, K, P.1, P.2, P.3, P.6, Q, S.1, S.2, U.1, U.2, V.7, V.9, X.1 Hope this helps.

Being France it might vary from Dept to Dept! http://www.correze.gouv.fr/Demarches-administratives/Systeme-d-immatriculation-des-vehicules#F1050

We have just returned from our Prefecture (Dept 19, Correze) where we have successfully re-registered a Citroen Xsara Picasso bought in the UK 2 weeks ago, without needing a Certificate of Conformity. Whilst checking up on the Prefecture site on the internet on what paperwork was needed for a Carte Griste (it's been 6 years since I last did one) I came across the following information:- "Si le véhicule était auparavant immatriculé dans un pays de l'Union européenne et que son PTAC est inférieur ou égal à 3,5 tonnes, vous pouvez présenter à la place de ces documents votre certificat d'immatriculation à condition qu'il comporte toutes les informations nécessaires à son immatriculation." I printed this and took it with me in case I needed to back up my argument (!) but when the lady at the desk asked me for a CoC I told her that according to their site it wasn't required as the Registration document was fully completed; one of her colleagues then agreed that if it was an EU registration a CoC was not necessary. It cost 258€ for the carte grise which we'll receive in the post sometime soon hopefully. Happy Days!

[quote user="EuroTrash"]Hi Rob Roy (you sound very male, how come you have a hubbie??!!??) [/quote] Maybe I am male, you never know nowadays! No, I'm not, but I am one of RR's direct descendents. Thanks for the advice. We'll see how it goes. Hope tomorrow is a better day for you. :)

My husband has also received a demand for payment, but he is now retired. He has received an 'attestation de radiation' from the RSI and we are in the process of registering him at the CPAM so he can receive a new Carte Vitale. Does he simply write to the Centre des Finances Publiques that issued the demand and explain he is now retired and perhaps send a copy of the RSI letter? To be honest we still don't quite understand what the CFE-IFER demand relates to.

I'm a Facebook user, having resisted it for years and I have to admit I find it useful for sharing photos and keeping in touch with extended family more easily. It has also helped me reconnect with some friends I had lost contact with since moving to France. Twitter I have no interest in and have never used - I don't even use a mobile phone.

Thanks, you've said more or less what I thought. Apparently the man walks the dog without it being on a lead past the person's house. The first time it killed was a couple of months ago and the second one it killed the other day had young chicks it was rearing. It's also killed another neighbour's hens too - you'd think he'd keep it on a lead on its walk wouldn't you?

What is the situation if a dog enters your garden and kills any of your chickens? Should it be reported to anyone and/or can you claim through the dog owner's insurance? This has happened to someone I know of and they accepted 20 € from the man on the second occasion it happened, although the hen was worth more than that. Have they done the wrong thing by accepting a payment?

Once your leeks have grown they are very nice wrapped in ham and covered in cheese sauce. Cut off the green part and the root, cook the whole leeks until just tender (I do mine in the microwave in butter) then wrap each leek in a slice of ham and place in a single layer in an ovenproof dish. Make a cheese sauce, pour it over the leeks, covering completely, sprinkle with grated cheddar cheese and cook in the oven at 180/200C for about 30/40 mins.

Send them over to me, I've got too many and will happily let them take one.

Hello and welcome to the forum. We live just to the north of Uzerche, having moved here six years ago from 15 kms further south (Perpezac-le-Noir) where we were for 7 years. Looking at your preferred area the first thing I would say is that property in Correze/Haute Vienne is generally cheaper than in the Dordogne (Perigueux) and the Lot (Gourdon). The second thing that occurred to me is that if you using it for holidays and planning holiday lets getting to the property can make quite a difference, so being within reasonably easy reach of the A.20 autoroute, the two airports at Limoges and Brive Souillac and maybe even the main line train from Paris to Toulouse can be very relevant. I have also sent you a PM

Our vet also recommended Flexadin Plus for our Labrador; after the shock of paying 72€ for the first packet of 90, and he had to have 2 a day, I then bought some on-line from VetUK but even that was quite expensive so I started comparing what was in the Flexadin with animal supplements from a firm called Simply Supplements based in Gurnsey, from whom I buy Glucosamine/Chondroitin for my own arthritis. I now buy from them at £14.99 for 120 tablets and he gets one a day.

We bought ours from le Bon Coin - two individual sellers though; husband fitted them himself then the nice man at the CT station adjusted them for us

Thank you everyone for the good wishes and all the information. I'll come back when I have some feedback in case it's of interest to other.

No reason at all for not changing his licence, Sweet, we tried to do it when we first lived here (13 years ago) and were told at the Prefecture it was not necessary. Thanks NormanH for all that very useful information; I'll peruse it and try and make sense of it tomorrow, I picked up OH today from hospital and he's like a bear with a sore head (he loaths hospitals) so I'm not in to mood to try and unravel anything tonight! [:@]

It's that old chestnut, isn't it, regarding the address and DVLA!

I'm not sure I should post this here in or in the Health Section, but I'll try here first. My husband fainted last week whilst working on a house project and fell about 2 metres breaking three of his ribs. This resulted in a visit to the hospital where he was admitted to find out why he fainted and it was found his heart rate was very slow, so he's now had a pacemaker fitted. Up until now he's kept his U.K. driving licence but I presume that he'll now have to surrender it for a French one as he'll need to inform DVLA about the pacemaker. Has anyone else been in a similar situation, or got any advice please?

[quote user="dwmcn"]wooly, I'll second that. We have had lots of cats and some have moved away because they didn't get along with the others and several have appeared out of nowhere and stayed. At the moment, we only have two or three visiting cats from nearby because we have an open catflap policy. David [/quote] I agree. We have a varying number of cats, between 12 and 15; they come and go as they please - although most of them are not house cats most of them are friendly and affectionate. We've also had visitors for a week or two that are not ours, but they know it's a good cafe! We have one who spends most of the day inside, but she doesn't like any of the others and is not allowed to stay in at night; sometimes we don't see her for a week or more, but she always turns up eventually. I've also had cats killed on the road outside, it's sad but it happens and each one has it's own marked 'plot' on our land. Cats are independent creatures, they like to roam and wanting to control them and enclose them because it suits the owner, or they don't like the idea that cats hunt and kill instinctively is not, IMO, kind to the animal.

Thank you. I've done all that and the Attenuation and Noise margin haven't moved at all - I presume you mean they would be changing when you say they "should be virtually constant" and the Max rate down is 2424 kb/s, but I have no idea if that's good or not!