Foreign Perspectives

Archive for the ‘France’ Category

Actually, no, it isn’t.

Obviously you can take it as read that it will be much warmer in the south of France during the Summer than it is in the UK but once you get into the December to February period it’s almost always the reverse situation that applies.

For instance, in the last week I was running around Belfast sweating with the heavy coat that you’d think would be required at this time of year in Northern Ireland yet in fact that coat is the one that you actually need in the south of France at the moment.

So, don’t just make the assumption that if it’s warmer somewhere in the Summer that it will be just as much warmer in the rest of the year because often it isn’t.

As usual when there’s a Spanish holiday, we were pretty much completely full over the last couple of days and yet nobody took a breakfast!

In some ways that suits us as it gives us a bit of a break from the need to get up very early to do the breakfasts.

But why don’t they take them though? They certainly take breakfasts in hotels in Spain so why don’t they take them in France? Although it’s hard to give a definitive answer I suspect that it has a lot to do with the absolutely pathetic excuse for a breakfast that you get in most French establishments although funnily enough the price is the same or even higher than for breakfasts in the Spanish equivalent and in Spain you get a very full breakfast for that money.

So, it’s probably down to the French not really “doing” breakfast as a proper meal.

I used to think that there was a limit as to how bad an accountant could be. After all, they’re members of professional organisations which aim to keep standards high and strike off those who fall too far below the accepted norm.

Perhaps that’s true elsewhere in the world, but not in France.

Our “accountant”, for want of a better word, still hasn’t finished the 2006 accounts despite telling us just about every month since April that they’d be ready “next week”. We gave them a couple of weeks, called and were told that they needed just one more piece of information to complete them.

Once supplied, by magic another piece of information was now missing.

We were even told last week that the accounts would absolutely definitely be completed by Monday. Yup, one more piece is missing. Just one this time: a single cheque.

So, we’re off to see them tomorrow.

For those interested in France and perhaps thinking of buying a house in France at some point there are really only two property exhibitions that are worth considering which are the French Property Show in September and the Vive la France exhibition (now called The France Show) in January.

Anyone at all serious about property purchase in France should know of both of these or else they’ve been hiding out of reach of any France related publication. I had thought they were both so well known that there wouldn’t be any need to explicit advertising for either of them other than the mentions that both get in the numerous France property magazines.

And yet, they DO advertise, seemingly quite extensively. Why?

Well, my guess is that the punters were a little thin on the ground at the last exhibition in January 2007 as they certainly were very thin on the ground in France: we had no housebuyers staying with us at all during 2006. So, the organisers have hit the panic button this time to avoid any repetition.

Ironically, the housebuyers seem to be reappearing of their own accord so it’s probably going to be one of the most packed France exhibitions seen for some time. Of course, this just goes to show that people treat the Vive la France advertising more as a note of somewhere to go if they’re serious about buying than as something which puts them into a buying frame of mind. For really serious purchases such as for houses, advertising doesn’t change opinions a whole lot.

When you look around in a new country you generally bring all your preconceptions as to what a bank is with you.

Typically, the assumption is that a financial organisation is a bank if it issues credit cards, debit cards and cheque books whereas it’s a building society if it largely confines itself to savings accounts and mortgages. Of course, in many countries such distinctions don’t exist 100% of the time and there’s usually something of a graduated scale between building society and bank in most countries these days.

In fact, a more realistic distinction these days is probably based on size (however that might be measured) and perhaps the extent of international activities. So, for example, although most people would call the likes of the Halifax in the UK a building society in fact in both legal and practical terms it has been a bank for many years. For example, it has been issuing cheque books since the 1970s if not before and has had international activities for a substantial time too.

On the other hand, the various Credit Agricoles in France are clearly in the building society camp. Yes, they issue cheque books but their debit cards aren’t run by themselves and their international activities are nil, at least as far as the regional Credit Agricoles go.

Spain by contrast has the fairly substantial La Caixa which is a savings bank in name only although with few international activities up to now.