Life changes (by alaric)

My life has been changing a bit recently...

Firstly, I've resigned from the last company I don't own that I was an employee of. I used to be a full time employee, but nearly a year after the company decided to "downsize" drastically to save expense and stay afloat (ditching all of the staff apart from myself, the MD, an admin person, and the production guy and abandoning the office in favour of us all working from our homes, and cutting our pay by 10%), I went part time to start pursuing a freelancing career. Well, I've now resigned entirely, although I may take on freelancing contracts from them.

The difference will be that such contracts will have a beginning and an end; the reason I've resigned is that the work had become a constant stream of quite menial work, most of which came in with very little notice and tight deadlines, meaning it was an endless distraction. Also, if I spent all of my time on it I'd earn enough to feed the family at the end of the month, while freelance contracts would take months to pay back, which combined with the depleted state of my savings after the move, birth of Jean, and Sarah's illness meant I had to spend most of my time working as an employee to pay the bills. The proper lucrative interesting work had to be squeezed into the evenings.

So I'm hopeful about this change. The finances will be a bit tight for the next couple of months, but my pipeline is filling already.

The other change is that I've become a cub scout leader. This is because our village is restarting a scout group, with all three ages - beavers, cubs, and scouts. Sarah got involved, but the person who was going to be doing cubs backed out. Now, I'd always planned to do something voluntary for the community; either rejoin St John Ambulance or see if the Air Cadets take civilian volunteers (I was in the Combined Cadet Force at school, in the RAF section). Being a scout leader hadn't occurred to me, but the village needed one, so I decided to give it a go.

I was very nervous up until our first meeting with the children; but now I've met them and know a bit about them, I can start to actually have some idea of what they'll enjoy, so the fear of the unknown is ebbing fast. We have to go through a lot of training before we can run the group alone; we're being heavily supported by other groups in the area and central district resources, and while I'm sure the training will be useful, what I'm planning on doing is asking if there's a nearby cub pack that meets on a Tuesday and could do with me as a helper for a couple of weeks, so I can learn from others directly. I learn fast that way.

All of this means that I'm moving rather fast along my Life Plan.

• Married - check
• Father - check
• Self employed - check
• Doing some volunteer community activity - check
• Have employees - WORKING ON IT
• Become a magistrate - SCHEDULED FOR 2009
• Implement ARGON - WORKING ON IT
• Rule the world from an orbital battlestation - STALLED DUE TO POOR AVAILABILITY OF ANTIMATTER

Minnie finds a new place to sit! (by alaric)

Happy Family (by alaric)

...from Charlee's Flickr

Driveway mess (by alaric)

Last Sunday, it rained a lot. Since we live in a valley, this has its risks; our house is next to the stream, and our driveway and the stream run parallel for quite some distance before meeting the road, which comes down the hill on one side and goes back up the hill the other side. So lots of water, laden with mud and leaves and twigs and stones, came rushing down the roads to run into the stream, but due to the way the road is laid out, lots of it comes along our driveway before diving into the stream.

Now, we try and prevent this by having a hump of gravel along the end of the drive, directing the deluge down a ditch into the stream, but on Sunday, this was overrun with the sheer volume, and so the drive was a real mess.

I started clearing it up (click it to look at the large version and see just how much rubbish there is along the drive):

I was soon joined by Barbara, and between us, we shifted about six barrowloads of mud, leaves, and twigs, then collected the gravel and stones (which had been deposited closer to the start of the drive) and used them to build up the hump to try and stop it happening again...

Carphone Warehouse (by alaric)

...appear to be incompetent.

About a year ago, we moved house. I wrote them a letter with my new address, and asking to change the bank account my direct debits come from, since Sarah and I consolidated all of our direct debits to come from the one account that our pay goes into, to simplify our joint finances.

Some time later, the mobile phone stopped working, because apparently I'd not been paying the bill. A little prodding revealed that they'd been sending the bills to my aunt (who lives next door), since they had the address somewhat wrong, and appeared to have not performed the direct debit change; I'd stopped putting money into my old account, so the DDs had been failing.

So I wrote them a grumpy letter, and they apologised profusely, and said they'd send me a new direct debit form to fill in.

Which never arrived.

Instead, nasty letters and phonecalls from a debt collection agency started to appear.

I spoke on the phone to CPW, who said they'd send me a direct debit form. Which never arrived.

I spoke on the phone again to them, and they said I could set up the DD over the phone, which I did.

Then a letter came bearing the mysterious message "We have no direct debit details for your account", which I rang them about; apparently this is SECRET CODE for "We tried to send the DD to your bank and they rejected it". They suggested I rang the bank, who said they'd had a DD come in for my account, but with some of the fields not filled on, so they rejected it. I spoke to CPW again, who said they'd do no such thing, but consented to send it again.

The debt collectors then threatened us with bailiffs.

So I went to a CPW shop in a nearby town, and they looked in their databases, and said that my DD should be working now, but it'd be a while before the next monthly billing run, so I should pay off the outstanding balance with my debit card in order to stop the bailiffs, which I did. They said I should have no more problems.

But the debt collectors keep ringing me demanding payment.

So I told them CPW said they shouldn't be ringing me any more.

They apologised, and said that CPW had neglected to tell them this, and suggested I write to CPW pointing this out, which I did.

CPW have not replied.

And tonight, at 8pm, I get called again by the debt collectors, and this time they're being nasty and saying that unless I pay up TODAY they're going to Take Further Action and Harm My Credit File. I explain the history, but they have none of it. So I say I'm not going to pay anything until I've spoken to CPW first. They say that they're very busy right now and if I hang up to ring CPW then try to ring them back I'll be in a very long queue and they close at 9pm so I might not get through, and if I don't pay today, I'm in trouble. The woman also suggests that if I just pay up then I can pursue CPW for a refund if what I'm saying is correct.

sigh

I don't like the principle of people ringing me up saying I owe them money, and when I disagree, threatening me with Trouble if I don't pay, and saying that if I really don't owe, then I can claim the money back. Since it seems to have taken CPW some trouble to understand that I paid them off, I don't fancy being out of pocket until they get their act together, if they ever do.

Anyway, I dug out a number for CPW and rang them, and went around their voice menu system, unable to find a human being, and it's now just turning 9pm, so apparently I'm in trouble.

I think I need to visit the Citizens Advice Bureau...