Postal services

[Martha]

Hi,

I was just wondering what those of you who don't live on site do about post? Anything important *should* go to our UK address - bills, taxes etc. But what if it didn't?

Thoughts:
- I could get international redirection from La Poste (presumably - I can't find any reference to it on their site but I'm sure they do it). But that will probably be expensive and not really neccessary

- I could ask the managing agents to check the postbox every so often and keep the mail for me

- I could just check it myself and hope that nothing important goes there - but it's possiblr that we could not be there for two months at a time sometimes...

What do other people do? Any advice much appreciated

[Giddy Goat]

Hi Firebug - any post which doesn't come to our UK address gets sent on to us by our caretakers - but it tends to happen 'when they remember' .... so far it has worked out OK though.

[Fraise]

I have everything sent to our UK address, everything else satys in the box until we arrive, which lately has been many months apart! I do have a caretaker but she doesn't send the stuff on, most is rubbish anyway. I must admit I do have a friend with a key to the postbox, he sometimes takes a look since our court case v a big bank ( which I forgot to tell everyone- WE WON !!!!!!!!!!! No money back yet though !!) and sends stuff from the solicitor to us. Yes, yes, of course the solicitor has our UK address and has been asked to send it direct, but no, he doesn't do it !!

[enid]

which I forgot to tell everyone- WE WON

Hurrah for you

[Giddy Goat]

Congrats Frise, what a load off your mind. Delighted for you!

[Fraise]

Thankyou. We may have won against CA, but they are deciding whether to appeal, then it could take another 2 years !! Doh !! Meanwhile, we are still 14,000 euros lighter - only in France, hey?

[Martha]

Thanks all

I think, then, I'll just ask the managing agents to check every so often and send on anything that looks important, that sounds best.

Glad to hear that Fraise, it must be a weight off your mind...

[vrooje]

Fraise, I'm so glad to hear you won, even if it turns out to be only a first step.

Our property manager sifts through our mail and forwards us anything that isn't junk. It's part of their weekly duties, and it has worked well so far.

[Guest3]

Congratulations Fraise! Well you've won Round 1...just hope Round 2 is a not a long one..it must be frustrating to have to wait for reimbursement of your own money!

[gh]

Good on you Fraise, slowly slowly catchie monkey especially French ones .

Firebug, you can arrange for services to your maison secondaire to be sent to your primary address.

Taxes (2) we pay when due usually recieve these once a year from October . We bank with La Bank Poste for everyday business in France and they are good, we check on-line and can send money across via our bank in Scotland and pay telephone, insurance with on line banking.
Electricty provider for us has changed, we used to pay online until recently, as far as we know, need to pay en France for our area.

We pay oil for central heating when on site, usually there every six to eight weeks which is time enought to top up storage levels and pay our taxes.

New digital water meter gizmo thingie installed last month, knew nothing about this, they needed access to cave where water meter is; luckily our caretaker was cleaning the pool that day as they have keys, wine laid down accounted for , dont know as yet if we can still pay on line.

Anything in the post box other than 'publicitie' our care taker forward's on to us via stamped addressed jiffi bags left with them.

It's a 'suck it and see' situation for us absentee owners.