Foreign Perspectives

Archive for the ‘Miscellaneous’ Category

One of the problems that we have these days is that sometimes there’s just too much choice of little gadjets available.

Take the Palm series of handhelds for example.

Now, you can pretty much discount the Z22 as a teaser product or toy as it’s basically just there to fill in a gap at the bottom end of the market and not, in my view, a really serious contender.

Move up about 50% in price and you get to the likes of the Tungsten E2 shown here. That gives you a pretty wide range of funcions with everything from a sensible SD card slot to hold movies and whatnot to Bluetooth. You can even surf on this if your phone has bluetooth too.

However, add another 50% in the price and you’ll get the TX. This little baby has a much bigger screen and adds wifi to the list of functions (along with a massive list of capabilities).

Both will let you work with MS Office text and spreadsheets and you can even exchange e-mails with them.

Just to complicate your life even further, you can get the TX on ebay for much the same price as the E2 in the shops.

I find myself in the peculiar situation of having finished all the foreign language segments of my modern languages degree and so have “just” one more course in the english language to do next year.

That completes the degree but I’d like to do something following it so have been tossing around a few ideas over the last few weeks since I’ll need to sign up for the first course of the next degree before next summer and won’t really have a whole lot of time to think about it once I get going on the english course next month.

One easy option, or at least easy choice, would be to complete the Diploma in English which means doing one more english course following the one I’m about to start. I’ve already eliminated the “art of engligh” course as being something that I’d not really be able to stick at which leaves the english grammar course. To be honest, I’m not really fired up about english grammar so that’s looking doubtful at the moment.

I’d also quite like to do their Creative Writing course but that seems to mean that I need to do the humanties course first. I’ve already read all but one of the recommended books for the humanities course so that’s a possibility I suppose though, again, I’m not really fired up about it either.

Which leaves the chemistry or physics degree that I’ve always meant to get around to doing. That’s also a realtively easy choice in that they both start with the same course so it puts off the choice of final degree for at least another year. I’ve heard really good things about that so chances are that I’ll run with that.

Whilst the principle of going on holiday over Christmas sounds nice, the reality is often different.

You’ve to content with the traffic jams on the roads in and out of towns for a start which can easily add hours to your travel time before you even get onto the open road.

Then there’s the business of booking travel components.  Whilst there are a lot of people going on holiday around this time, there aren’t nearly the numbers that you get in the summer peaks. However, the winding down of everyone towards their Christmas break means that if there are problems then they aren’t always fixable. For example, you’ll frequently find a discrepancy between the availability as displayed online, in ticket booths and in automated ticket sales machines. Just today the message was “no seats available” in two out of three outlets.

And, of course, there’s the business of closures over the Christmas period. If you’re going to somewhere that you’ve not been to before over this period it’s often far from clear what’ll be open and what’ll be closed.

Don’t let all these complications put you off a Christmas break though. Just make sure that you do your research in advance so you aren’t surprised when something essential for you isn’t operating over Christmas.

MBNA Europe seem to be in the process of an across the board increase in their interest rates to 34.9% in an effort to force their credit card customer base into taking secured loans with their affiliate company loans.co.uk at equally extortionate rates from 10.3% to 17.5% (vs more like 7% for a normal mortgage).

If they’ve hit you with this increase you don’t need to simply accept it as a fact of life though. Approach them in the right way and you can get the rate decreased.

First off don’t get angry, get even. To do this you need to remain calm and polite with them on the phone.

The number to call is 0800 783 1116 which is the direct number for their “Rates and Fees” department.

Ask why your rate has been increased and point out (if applicable) that you’ve managed your account with them well and not missed any payment. Their usual stock answer is that it was due to an “account review”.

At this point tell them that you do not feel that this represents a fair treatment, that the rate is punitive and that you’d like to make a formal complaint. It’s important to use wording along those lines as that will highlight to them that you’ll proceed further which, of course, they’d prefer you not to as they’d almost certainly lose a case that got as far as the Ombudsman.

Usually, they’ll have to consult their manager at this point and, all being well, will come back and confirm that your rate has been revised substantially downwards. Ask them to confirm this in writing.

If that doesn’t work, inform them that you propose to make a formal complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service and ask them how you should first take up the complaint formally with MBNA (as required by the Ombudsman). Also, ask them how you should make a Subject Access Request with them (to get all the information that they hold about you) as you’ll need that for the Ombudsman.

Hopefully, that will be enough to shake some sense into them re your interest rate. If not, just carry on as you said you would and take it up first through the MBNA complaints proceedures and then through the Financial Ombudsman Service.

If you’re upgrading the look and feel of your home it’s important to do it in a consistent way to avoid the impression that it’s just been splattered with various bits & pieces that you’ve come across by chance over the years.

The longer you’ve been living in a house, the more likely that effect is going to gradually creep into various rooms and therefore now and again you need to stand back and review what’s happened in terms of the look of your home overall and of each room individually. That’s not to say that every room needs to be done in the same style as every other room but rather that the look should flow through your home.

So, for example, it’s fine to have an olde worlde look to your bedroom with antique furniture throughout but a much more high-tech look to your living room might well be more appropriate if you’ve collected a lot of gadjets there as many of us have. Antique furtniture with flat screen TVs and computers is a look that needs a lot of care if you want it to work and it’s probably simpler to run with a modern look if you want something consistent.

You can even carry the feel of your garden part-way into your house by way of a conservatory perhaps with hanging wrought-iron baskets of plants or marble pedestals for them depending on the style you’ve used around the garden.