graemef.com

If personal blogs aren’t for ranting, then what are they for?

If a payment is taken by direct debit from your bank account in error, your bank or building society is obliged to give an immediate refund:

Under the rules of the Direct Debit Scheme, should any money be taken in error, then the customer’s bank or building society must, on request, make an immediate refund to the customer’s account. [link]

We tried this with the Halifax yesterday:

1. Phone banking said it takes around three weeks for the refund to happen.
2. So, Lynn (the wife) took time out of her busy schedule to visit the local Halifax branch today. She quoted the direct debit guarantee to them and was told that would only apply if she went to a “main” branch. Would have been nice if they had told us that yesterday.
3. Lynn’s aforementioned busy schedule and my pedal-powered transport mean that neither of us can get to a main branch today, so “immediate” slips to “at least 2 days later.”

I can’t say we’re impressed with the Halifax’s handling of this. Hardly in the spirit of the Direct Debit Guarantee, is it? I wonder where we’ll be sent when we get to the main branch?

Need one of these!

The CradleVue, A Cheap Car Entertainment System

…The brilliantly designed CradleVue laptop travel harness. It’s basically a set of straps that attach to the front seats and can hold your laptop in place, facing baby. Pop a DVD in, and you’ve got yourself a $25 “entertainment system”. Laptop obviously not included.

We received my son’s first school report this week. Here’s a choice quote:

Physical Development

Harry moves confidently and imaginatevely in Music and Movement and is learning to take more care with the safety of himself and others.

Nicely put, I thought.

My holiday photos are now on Flickr!

In one of those "life is a sitcom" moments, it seems that my sister-in-law’s home telephone number has been entered into the Thompson Local directory (like the Yellow Pages) for our area as the number for a local funeral director.

Genius. It took me a good 5 minutes to stop laughing.

BTW - She assures me she’s being very tactful with the resulting calls.

We’re off to “sunny” Clacton-on-Sea tomorrow for a bit of a holiday, so I’m not going to be posting for a while.

You might have noticed I’ve enabled unmoderated, anonymous comments so there could be a bit of comment spam to be cleared up when we get back. I’d like to apologise in advance for anything offensive that gets posted in my absence. All I can say in my defence is “it wasn’t me!”

James went back up to Stanmore yesterday and had his halo removed. He won’t frighten quite so many small children now, as long as they don’t notice the holes in his head which apparently “oozed blood” all the way home.

Anyway, it’s a happy ending to a long and stressful 12.5 weeks. Well done to James for getting through it, and thanks to all the hospital staff that helped him make a remarkable full recovery, and thanks for all the messages and support from family, friends and complete strangers! We’ve all come a long way since Bad Friday.

JAMES IS MAKING HIS WAY DOWN THE M25 RIGHT NOW AND SHOULD BE HOME BY 5PM!!

James could be home by tomorrow afternoon - I will keep you up to date via this site.