Thought Id start this one going because its rather dead on this board at the moment and I suppose all my usual muckers are either at the Stella tennis event watching Dim Tim (lose again) or at Henly Regatta eating cucumber sandwiches (they wish,...NOT).

Anyway please feel free to just talk to yourself blast away and let it go on any company or subject you wish. Just wish Id thought of this one before.

cheers GF.

Allister Heath ‏@AllisterHeath
4G auction raises £1.1bn less than Osborne hoped for. So deficit now even more likely to go up, not down, this year.


Triple A rating on the line.

I have received 2 e-mails recently from Halifax on line banking which have been in my junk box - Starts off "Dear Valued Customer, bla bla bla they want one to update online banking details and phone no. etc., then it says click here". I have ignored both but rang the Halifax this morning and I am not the first. It is a scam which I thought it was as they would address the person by their name if they wanted to contact the customer by e-mail!!!! Hope this is of some interest to some of you out there.

I wish I had as many bank accounts as the scam merchants think I have.

They are a b. nuisance.

Me too, but it was of concern when it happens to be a bank one does use.

never ever ever ever respond to that type of e-mail .... they are GUARANTEED to be scams

GF - trust funds have been in existence for decades if not since income tax was introduced! ..... in fact, they rarely produce the result hoped for, not only because trust law is forever changing, but also unforeseeable events and circumstances

Still tax avoidance, and should be tax evasion.

The current 'apprentice National Minimum Wage' is currently £2.65 per hour*.


Is the number of those "working as apprentices in the various schemes" considered to be employed and is that number deducted from unemployment figures generally quoted?

Alex Belardinelli ‏@abelardinelli

On 4G auction shortfall IDS tells @BBCNews, "until the receipts come in, you don't count that money" - exact opposite of what Osborne did


LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL

this tory government is falling apart.

IDS gone to pieces since Grayling left him.

What is happening to a once great club?

GF - you can go too far! :-)

I seem to have been filled on a limit FTSE short @6,397 - I thought I'd cancelled it last night - the day is not going well so far!

Swap positions.

Yesterday I had a smile on my face.

Somebody has nicked it.

I had a motto, when you think it is going well, prepare for shots.

I must obey myself more often!

Ps. In the present market one can learn a little more each day.

The problem is remembering what you have learnt and then using that information appropriately.

Give a little whistle.

GF - don't be such an ass ...... if the law allows avoidance by the use of taking a certain course of action, then it is neither illegal nor even reprehensible .....

even writing a simple will is potentially or actually avoiding tax, and certainly taking out life policies and similar is ...... are you saying that that action is reprehensible?

i certainly have every intention of leaving my (grand)children as well-provided for as i can manage without taking "agressive action", always ensuring that i do not cripple my own standard of living in so doing ..... i'm only sorry that i cannot afford to give them the chance to be put through private education which, like it or not (and i don't care either way), tends to be to a higher standard that state ..... though the state schools in my grandchildrens area happen to be very good

3m
My wife got the same letter from Halifax and the 'salutation' says Dear Mrs ... I used to own a software company and a part of our business was direct mail. We used to send out 2m plus letters every month. The software generates the salutation from the details held on your account. If it cannot be sure it is correct then it uses a default salutation such as Dear Traveller, Dear valued customer. Have a look at the window address and see if there is anything odd.


I know of another company that was mailing high net worth customers of Nat West. They could not decide on a default salutation and forgot about it. The mailing went out with the salutation put in by the programmer for testing. It was "Dear filthy rich bastard".

I am afraid that there is no prospect of a cure for dyed in the wool lefties like GF. Where I live at the moment, most of the properties are more than or close to £2m value. These houses and flats are inhabited by mainly old people on fixed incomes. Many of them are cash poor and live on the state pension. The house was left to them in many cases or they bought it many years ago. They have no ability to pay a mansion tax. Are they supposed to sell their houses to pay the tax. Are they to be penalised because their house has turned out to be in a trendy area and has consequently rocketed in price. The houses were fairly cheap when they bought them.

Hays,

It sounds like many of the described are dying in fur coats.

Perhaps, they should be advised to dispose to use some form of "equity release" and turn the heating on.

The "Tax" regime could be modified by raising proportional level on disposal of the property at time of sale.


Ambivalent about it.

Well then Haystack can you tell us how we can stop these bar stewards sending us these dam e-mails. If, in the case that your wife was a client of the Halifax and they had used her correct name then she would probably have opened it up, to probably find that her account was empty minutes/hours later. I am sick of getting junk mail from Inland Revenue/ppi claims/and numerous other banks. As we probably all do, there must be a solution to this.

Fred
The whole point is that the many of the owners of expensive houses could not afford fur coats. Why should they have to sell or release equity to pay tax. In the end the equity release money could all be spent and then how do they pay the tax. An interesting point is that with equity release them maybe the equity release company would be liable for the mansion tax a the new owner.