EH - Essex > Hebrides...the next step of the adventure?

milann

Enjoy the roll of activity…..long May it last 👍

girlatplay

I used FD a few years ago (switched to them purely for the switching bonus and the 8% (at the time) connected regular saver).  I found the customer service to be really great.  The only two reasons I moved were the regular saver interest rate dropped and I got a switching bonus going somewhere else.  I was a bit sad about leaving them as they really were good.

Well done on eating that frog.

Sunshine_girl2

I recently switched to FD have found them very customer friendly . Hope you sorted out your dates etc with Mr EH yesterday . 

EssexHebridean

Thanks all - I'm not entirely convinced that the little flurry of proactive activity hasn't already receded but we'll see...it did continue to a degree last night anyway!   

Great to hear more good feedback on FD - although I'm not surprised, I don't think I've ever heard from anyone who's been unhappy with them! 

Other stuff achieved then:
Travelodge booked for future Birmingham trip
Enquiry made for trip away between Christmas and new year through Airbnb - but has now been declined by the hosts (property is apparently already booked - so why the heck was it showing available then?!) 
Flooring man came round as planned last night - we both liked him and he's quoting. 
Hidden London visit to Shepherds Bush booked - and on a day we can combine with our planned visit to the London Wetland Centre too.
Duxford ticket booked for Saturday for me. weather looks OK and the price is decent for a good lineup. 
Foldy bike booked to go in tomorrow for it's service, and a price got on that - £52. That comes from the car account though as the foldy is used for commuting. Need to remember to pick it up on Sunday. 
EDF account checked to make sure that they HAVE registered our correct gas reading - it is showing on the readings page but still not in our actual account so I assume there is a backlog.

We're now reviewing other options for the trip between Christmas and NY - just a short trip ahead of visiting friends on NYE. Still need to get the accommodation for the overnight near them booked. 
- I must message Andy and check exactly where we should be booking

The frog has paid off - we now have a meeting next week with the relevant person, and can discuss some minor concerns with her then. the meeting itself is still a bit "froggy" but at least we've got that far! 
- Need to make some notes ahead of that about the things for discussion.

There needs to be a LOT of money shuffling going on in the next little while! Annoyingly Airbnb decided to charge the credit card for the failed booking before it was confirmed - I've messaged them about that as that's pretty poor IMO. I know they'll claim it was just the authorisation but it still shows on my CC and will do for the up to a week it might take them to credit it back! Our "joint fun" account will pay for some of Birmingham costs, the Christmas/NY trip will be paid for from our "incidental trips" money. the Duxford ticket has come straight from my own personal spends - I probably won't even transfer that out of my airshow account to be honest. Hidden London we'll almost certainly just clear from our own personal spends - we got a £5 each saving on that as part of our "Friends of the Museum" membership too so that's handy. 

Still looking at Airfryer/multicooker type things - seen a possible good option on the L@kel@nd website and we have a voucher for money off a "big spend" as well so gut feeling is we might go for that - if we do it will come from VSP money as we'll be regarding it as a treaty thing rather than an actual need. 

The chilli last night was ace - SO much flavour, and we both agree that the black beans worked if anything better than kidney beans in it as they hold their shape so well. I'll make a mental note to get some more tins of those next time I see them in Al's, and that use of them is a keeper for sure. Tonight is a straight repeat of the same night last week - pulled pork buns (must get Mr EH to get the buns out of the freezer!) with potato wedges. Still got no idea what to do for tomorrow but I'm sure it will all come clear when I review the freezer tonight! 

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savingholmes

Chilli sounds tasty.

Glad you liked the flooring person 

redofromstart

Hello, I am also thinking of shifting the PBs to an interest account. 

Switch bank accounts, I just had to have two standing orders to qualify, which I set up to two saving accounts to qualify for switch and cash back. 

milann

That’s naughty of them taking the cash before it was confirmed. Hope they don’t keep you waiting too long. Everything sounding good 👍

EssexHebridean

Evening all - hope everyone is well? Thanks for popping by SH, Redo & Milann!

Well I seem to have once again lost a huge chunk of my life to wrangling EDF today.  Call 1 I got cut off by the operator - I suspect deliberately when she realised they’d not even started the switch and she didn’t want to tell me. Call 2 the advisor claimed their systems were down and suggested I called back in 24 hours - or “after our lines are closed tomorrow” in other words! Call 3 the advisor said she couldn’t work out what was going on but she was going to check with the back room team, could I hold…I did, for 14 minutes after which she checked I was still there before cutting me off again…🙄 Call 4 we were back to the pretence that the systems were down again - clearly they weren’t! I asked to be transferred to a supervisor, and after another several minutes on hold got told that wasn’t possible - I terminated the call. Call 5 left me holding for a record breaking hour and 16 minutes - I hung that one up just before 6pm as clearly I was about to get cut off anyway when their lines closed and I was losing the will to live by that stage. 

Bottom line, we’re giving up. I have confirmation from GEUK that EDF have made no attempt to take the supply, when I told the lovely lady at GE it was meant to be arranged a week ago she was astonished - they’d usually expect to hear at the most a couple of days after a switch has been instigated. I’ve messaged EDF tonight to tell them we’re cancelling the switch under the terms of the cooling off period, and we’ll look at shifting to Octopus instead. Still a substantial saving over GE, and only about £75 a year more than EDF would have been - we’ll switch the gas to them as well. It’s a small price to pay for never having to deal with EDF again! I’m also going to report them to Ofgem for deliberately trying to obstruct customers switching to them. 

Made it to the gym as planned this morning after dropping the foldy bike off for it’s service - turns out foldy bikes are not so far off as expensive for servicing as cars are - a whisker over £100 by the time you include some bits that need replacing, but in fairness it sounds like it’s all right on the money for the mileage it’s done so that’s fair enough, and I definitely get value from it! The gym felt like a satisfying workout too - I’ve starting building the weights back up a bit now which is rewarding. This afternoon ended up being mostly  about the shysters at EDF but I did manage to cook a double batch of dhal - red lentil and coconut from a recipe I devised myself so I’m really pleased with how well it turned out. I’m less pleased with managing to melt the top of my excellent microwave rice cooker though - in some sort of mad brainstorm I managed to put it on for 3 minutes on combi instead of micro…I reckon I’ve had the rice cooker for around 30 years and it’s of a type you can replace now. Handily Mum was about to get rid of her identical one though so I’m getting that now - phew! Honestly, I felt like such a Wally! 🤦🏻‍♀️

Signature updated with gym cost per use - it’s getting there! 

savingholmes

Ouch to utility saga.

My DD blew the microwave when she was little by putting noodles in without water

Cheery_Daff

Goodness me,  what a faff you're having with your energy providers!! 

I'm struggling to even find anyone who will fix my foldy bike 🙄 normal bike shop did a service and replaced a gear cable, but that made it worse,  and they decided the whole gear hub needed replacing (not easy on a brompton) and neither they nor any of the other local ones will touch it. Yet another thing for my "for goodness sake, it'll be easier if I just learn how to do it my damn self" list! 🙄😂 (I have a few other avenues to try first but I'm not ruling it out!)