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.

Greedy bugger!

Greedy yes, but there is no evidence he was a bugger.

Well according to the man for all seasons.....

How bloody annoying - I've just opened a pack of digestives to have with my coffee - only to find they are all broken :-((

Sounds like they have been victim of a supermarket aisle rage Skinny!

I think you are right - having persevered with a couple of broken bits - I've discovered that wet digestives and keyboards do not make good bed fellows :-((

Goodbye to my England, So long my old friend



Your days are numbered, being brought to an end



To be Scottish, Irish or Welsh that's fine



But don't say you're English, that's way out of line.


The French and the Germans may call themselves such



So may Norwegians, the Swedes and the Dutch



You can say you are Russian or maybe a Dane



But don't say you're English ever again.



At Broadcasting House the word is taboo


In Brussels it's scrapped, in Parliament too


Even schools are affected; staff does as they're told



They must not teach children about England of old.

Writers like Shakespeare, Milton and Shaw


The pupils don't learn about them anymore


How about Agincourt, Hastings, Arnhem or Mons?


When England lost hosts of her very brave sons.


We are not Europeans, how can we be?


Europe is miles away over the sea


We're the English from England, let's all be proud


Stand up and be counted - Shout it out loud!


Let's tell our Government and Brussels too


We're proud of our heritage and the Red, White and Blue


Fly the flag of Saint George or the Union Jack


Let the world know - WE WANT OUR ENGLAND BACK!!!!

Stable,

Excellent and unfortunately true. Have copied (hope you don't mind) and sent it via e-mail to many people.

regards Greek.

Agree 100%, but nevertheless..........










...........Cymru am byth!

:o)

Today ; I have just been ripped off by a plumber in London 579.02 to fix a siphon in the bottom of a toilet cistern.....at the start the going rate was : 65 a half hour plus vat....well I know plumbers have to live and so do we, so I thought well this will come to somewhere between 250 to 300 (that's plenty I thought ), this cowboy has charged me three and a half hours work.....he came in looked at the job.....a few days later comes back, stayed on site for 2 hours and then he charges me another hour for getting the materials....don't ever ring LOCAL (the blue advert ) in the yellow pages or even think about employing a "Mr Paul LEVEY" of 1st Access Limited.....they won't pull that stunt again on me !, after the first half hour the going rate should be less....that's what I thought it would be....that works out at 130 per hour.....there should be a law against criminal activities like that....criminal it is !.

I've had another look under Electricians and the same cowboy ad is there too...page 380....I suppose that that would be the same story if anybody decided to ring them....by the way the page number for the rip off is page 701 in the London yellow pages ...BE WARNED !.

Required Field,
It would have p****d me off as well.
Ever since I was overcharged for a vehicle repair years ago, I now always obtain a written quote. A quote has to be abided by unless there is extra work of which the customer has to be informed prior to that work being carried out. An estimate by virtue of the name, is just that an estimate.
Obviously cowboys in any profession get the (bad) publicity and quite right, but there are some good (not many now days) fair craftsmen out there. I can give 2 examples.

1 Several years ago, our local builder gave me a quote for a dormer extension. When the work was completed, the actual bill was for 75 less than the quote. He explained that the bill for drawing up and submitting the plans as less than he had thought.

2 Our plumber of many years (recommended by our builder who we called first) came at short notice to fix a leak from the roof that was being caused by a twisted piece of leading that had slipped. He fixed it in less than 10 mins. When I asked him, how much he said, there was no charge as it was such a quick job and he was nearby anyway and also we were regular customers (we had a new bathroom suite fitted about a year earlier).

Both these craftsmen are in such demand, the builder ended up only working around the village and the plumber for many years has not taken on new customers, but only does work for previous customers.

I now only have work done by recommendation from these 2 professionals, as most builders/plumbers know others that can be trusted. That's how we got the services of a good reasonably priced electrician.

Have you thought of contacting Watch Dog. I appreciate they are probably inundated by such stories but you never know, they may be compiling a list of over paying customers by this cowboy. I would also inform the Local (the blue advert) as rip off merchants like Mr Levey don't do the circulation figures any good.
As to there being a law against such practises, I have no faith in such as the laws re business practises already out there have about as much bite as a Rottweiler with no teeth.

Thanks greekman for the advice....there are plenty of very good workmen out there but it seems that the yellow pages have a few cowboys advertising in there....I never expected LOCAL who are big advertisers in there to be running such an operation....my mistake....if you live in London...or nearby...don't even contemplate ringing them....one of the laws that could be brought in is that after the initial half hour or one hour that the terms per hour must be halved, this should be backed up by a law put throught parliament !.

Don't believe all that you read in the papers, even The Times. Imagine what the fly on the wall at The Times would have witnessed when this got out!


http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/blog/2009/jan/15/masal-bugduv-moldova-hoax-player

T_I_M, that's a classic!

I've done a search this morning...................sadly Gordon Brown does exist!

R F, that was a hell of a price you were charged, not a good advert for plumbers! I don't want to rub salt in your wounds, just let others know who may not be aware; if you have a Britsh Gas Home Care policy, it covers incidents like yours. We recently had 2 toilet siphons break down on the same day. They were fixed within 24 hours by Dyno-Rod (part of Britsh Gas now), I thought they just did drains but they have sorted various things out in the past 2/3 years for us, non-drain related.

Steve,

You were lucky. My brother had so much trouble with his British Gas Home Care Policy, re not turning up, not available for over 48 hrs he cancelled his policy.
On contacting BG he complaining that his contract stated a 24 hours emergency service, he was informed that the 24 hrs availability was for the call centre only.
If you look at reviews re this you will see many dissatisfied customers. I appreciate British Gas are a huge company, so obviously there will be many complainers, but I feel the rot set in years ago due to them vastly reducing engineers to save money. A friend of mine worked for BG for many years. He told me that things would go down hill due to cost cutting, re engineer reductions. It appears he was right.
I still feel that once you find a reliable tradesman, you can't go far wrong in asking them to recommend someone. After all if the person they recommend is a cowboy, it reflects badly on them.

Yes Greek, I've read a few of the complaints! I live in a relatively unpopulated area compared to some, so maybe that is why the service we get here is nearly always of a very high standard. Or maybe I am just lucky!

Some legislation is needed to combat these fraudsters, that is why I suggest that after the first hour a half rate must be imposed, this would prevent people from being ripped off as : for callouts at the start they try to catch everybody.....I did not ask for an emergency plumber, and he made me sign a "customer estimate and authorisation form" invoice before even looking at the job,.....don't ever do that when you have a plumber coming.....I'll never do that again.....you could say that I've been taken to the cleaners...euuhhh sorry plumbers !, the rogue.....so remember give LOCAL and 1st Access a miss along with mr Paul LEVEY (if that is his name) !.

RF,

If you still have the evidence re the high charges (and I'm sure you have) I would use the power of the Internet and splurge him on every blog, and/or complaint site I could find. You will find putting, scams rip offs in google it will bring up loads. Presumably you have already thought of that though.
Also if he was a member of any sort of federation of master (sic) plumbers you could also try and cause him some pain through them.