Debt free in ten years-my new, more realistic challenge.

HappyNow

Hi Pooh, just had a catch up on your diary. You've had a rough time of it, first your virus and then your ribs. Hope you're all mended now.

Our nearest railway station is a tiny, unmanned, but quite busy one. There's a man there every morning selling hot drinks from a catering-type flask (no electricity there), just stood behind a tressle table. Every now and then a woman, probably his wife, arrives in a car and swaps his flask for a new, full one. I've no idea if he has the relevant permissions/certificates etc, but he seems to sell an awful lot of drinks at rush hour and he has no apparent overheads at all. Could that work for you?

I was thinking also about your cottage and how you have to pay such a lot to Cottages4u. Could you maybe give each guest a few of your business cards as they leave? One for them and some for their friends who might be interested in booking direct with you? People love word-of-mouth recommendations as it takes the risk out of booking a holiday, and if you were saving on the Cottages4u fees, you could even afford to give them a small price discount? Sorry if that's rubbish, I have no expertise in that sort of thing at all, just thinking out loud!

poohbear59

Thanks for the ideas Happy. I have listed the cottoage on about 5 websites and ebay over the last week. No takers yet (private sales, that is) but we have also put our leaflets in lots of tourist information centres etc. I am a bit worried I may have spent too much on advertising this month but we will see how it goes.

My HUGE news is that LloydsTSB have agreed to repay almost £7000 in PPI to us!!
I was shocked when I received the letter.

We won't be too quick to spend it as I have read on here that it can take months to arrive, but it can go on a car for Mr Pooh and towards some form of heating boiler for the house if we have any left.

I know it should go on debts but we will get it back as the vehicle is for Mr Pooh's business, and he will hopefully earn enough to pay for it. The bad weather has meant he has had very little work recently so things have been very tight.

My ebay sales have been rubbish. I didn't charge enough postage and the three items I sold made a loss I had to learn the hard way

beanielou

Great news on the PPI :j :j

brizzledfw

I second that!! Thats brilliant. A real boost to the income:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:beer:

HappyNow

£7000!! That's brilliant Pooh, congratulations . Hopefully you will have enough left after the car for a new boiler and you'll have a warm winter next year.

Can I ask if it took ages to sort? I put in a claim against Barclays seven weeks ago. I thought I would have at least had an acknowledgement by now, but nothing. They say to allow eight weeks so I will be patient a bit longer. I doubt ours will be succesful anyway because it ended in 2002 but thought it was worth a shot.

poohbear59

Thank you everyone

Happy it took just about a month from me originally phoning them to receiving the offer. I don't know how long it will take to actually receive the money.

I wrote to Halifax and Debenhams too,but haven't heard from either of them yet.

PinotGrigio41

I am soooo behind here !!

£7000 :j:j:j "lots of loud delayed whooping noises for you ! " Such fantastic news and what with the cottage booking things are really looking up for you Pooh. Well Done !

Sounds as though you got a repsonse very quickly. Just out of interest did you use the FOS forms for the PPi claim or did you write your own letter to them ? I used FOS for Halifax, have never had an acknowledgment, the FOS forms for LLoyds but they are pretending they arent recieving my letters :rotfl: and I decided to try a different tack with MBNA and wrote to them without the FOS claim form, just detailing the situation.

Just wondered which route you followed, if you dont mind me asking .

I hope you hear back from the others with good news shortly !

How are you feeling now, much better I hope x

brizzledfw

hey pooh....how are you? I miss your posts on here...

Or are you just off spending your PPI compensation:rotfl:

Hope weather is better for you today than it is here..no washing on my line thats for sure:mad: just looking like a commercial laundry inside

poohbear59

Hi brizzled and Pinot,we have family staying in our cottage and had all our family home and a cousin too so it has been really hectic here.

Don't worry I haven't touched the PPI cash yet. Though I think Mr Pooh has spent it about ten times over in his head.

We haven't had the bad weather that seems to be hitting the rest of the UK. We have had lots of sunshine with some very light showers but I have my washing hanging inside just to save on dashing in and out.

Pinot, I phoned LloydsTSB and wrote my own letters to the others. Brittania lending is actually Halifax and they have acknowledged my letter but nothing more yet. I thought about using the letters on here but as I was turned down when I tried to get my bank charges back thought I would try a different way. I hope you hear something soon and that it is good news.
Mr P still hasn't written his letter to National Insurance to ask for his overpayments returned. It won't amount to much but better in our pocket than theirs.

I had a meeting with another award body for the cottage and received another Gold award for running a 'green' business so we are delighted with it too. The assessment was very thorough and took a whole afternoon.

Did I mention I had a sleep test. Well I have significant apnoea, no wonder I feel like a zombie. That was with the sore ribs when I felt as though I wasn't sleeping at all. The ribs seemed okay until I tried to help DD to clean a mark off a wall in the cottage with a magic sponge, all of a sudden the rib pain was back so I am taking things easy again.

Yesterday I had amazing success on ebay too. I sold 100 dressmaking patterns for £50: that was a good bit of decluttering done. Still a few more to go.

I am trying not to get carried away by having a bit of extra cash and letting things get out of hand. We are first doing some research to try to find an affordable 4wd pickup and we are also researching heating systems.

hillside777

:wave:

Hi.

I've been reading your posts for a few weeks now and wanted to pop in and say hello.

I know what you are talking about with sleep apnoea. I have been diagnosed with moderate apnoea and am off to see the specialist today. How nice it would be not to wake up in the morning feeling exhausted.

It sounds as though you've had a busy few days and need to jave a well deserved rest.