Lost credit cards and French bureaucracy

Its ages since I've written in here - and sadly not much progress since the last entry.

We had planned to fly to France on 10th May for five days and had the flights car park and car hire booked - along with appointments with the bank, notaire and builders. That all went west when DH lost (or more accurately mislaid) his wallet. Having established he had put it down in the house somewhere we (I thought) had decided to just wait and see if it turned up. I didn't want to cancel the credit cards because we needed a credit card to pick up the hire car. DH had other ideas and, after another fruitless search, called me to announce that he had telephoned and cancelled everything. I pointed out that now we wouldn't be able to hire a car - and no car in rural France was not a good idea. After telephone calls to the bank (who couldn't reinstate the cards) and the car hire company (who were intransigent about the requirement for a credit card rather than a debit card - despite us having the deposit for our French house currently residing in our current acount) - we gave up and admitted defeat. So no flying to France and no refund on the travel insurance - apparently its 'consequential loss' and not covered.

Plan B - the suggestion of DH - we finish work on Tuesday, drive through the night and arrive in France Wednesday lunchtime - a nice relaxing break - not! With no other option other than to drive, we called the vendors to see if they would mind if we took some things over and left them at the house. No point travelling down with an empty car. They were fine about it - in fact we had a really nice chat with them. So we loaded up the car and set off. We had to have a stop at about 4.30am - by which point DH could hardly follow the road - but we eventually arrived in Brantome at about 12.oo noon. After lunch, and feeling pretty 'bog-eyed' we arrived at the bank in time for our 2.00 pm appointment.

Bank account opened and confirmation that transferred funds had cleared we ventured to meet our new neighbours with whom we were staying. Mr & Mme P were delightful and the place was lovely. The appointment with notaire also went fine - as did the appointment with the builder. Then on Friday afternoon we went to Mr Bricolage - big mistake. Hubby made first purchase for French house - a strimmer, petrol cannister, petrol and 2 stroke oil - and then spent the next 4 hours strimming the grass. I did point out that we didn't actually own the house yet but.... Saturday we spent wandering around Perigueux - very pleasant. Sunday was the long drive home - we left at 8.30am and arrived back at 11.00pm absolutely knackered.

Then things start to go pear shaped. I had anticipated I would need an appointment with the nurse for weight etc and so had called the day after I had left the request to arrange one - the earliest available appointment was two weeks off!

I arrived for my appointment with the nurse to be greeted with 'Dr T can't complete this - he has to have a letter of consent from you and the insurance company must send the request directly, enclosing your letter of consent - its the law'. I offered to sign a letter of consent there and then but no - I have to send it to France and they have to send it back. Groaning with frustration I leave the GP surgery clutching the original letter and translation.

I draft a letter (in French and English) consenting to the disclosure of my medical information plus a fax to the insurance company with an idiot's guide (again in French) of what they have to do. I head off into work to fax the documents to the insurance company - only to find they have removed the old fax (that allowed international faxes)! So back home (via PC World to buy a fax / modem - we have ADSL - so no fax facility) to spend the next half hour scanning and sending fax to insurance company with copies to the bank giving fax number and address of doctor (doctor has agreed to communicate by fax to speed things up).

I asked the bank to confirm that everything was ok - and got the response that doctor 'must write his report in French'! Why I ask - he's English and he can't speak French - 'sorry', came back the response -'the insurance company will only accept the report in French'. So after a frantic few hours of tooing and froing and messages on LF we manage to find a sworn translator who will translate report to the satisfaction of the insurance company. Apperently it is quite acceptable though for me to translate the request letter for my doctor :S. Which is about as logical as asking for a medical report on me - 44 and non smoker and not on my DH - 54 and smoked for 30+ years! I don't ask anymore - just nod sagely and sing the party tune!

I write to the bank to confirm this is ok and to confirm that the insurance company are going to resend the information request and all I keep getting back is - 'Your doctor must answer the questions in the original letter and send answers in French to insurance company' - its like a stuck record. By this point I'm going frantic - don't they understand they have to resend the request??? I telephone the bank - our contact is busy call back later. I call back later (all via mobile as she is only available during my work hours!) and eventually get to speak to her. She understands my emails but hasn't had time to call the insurance company - she will call later. When I get home there is an email waiting. Insurance company have sent the request to my doctor today. Relief - finally!!!!!

The next day I call my doctors to confirm that the fax has arrived and to make sure I can collect the original report (translator must have the originals). And was greeted with - 'Sorry, we've had no fax from the insurance company'. So back to the bank to chase the insurance company - to which I have had, as yet, no response.

At this moment I feel like screaming and telling the bank where to stick their mortgage...and then spending some of the money for the house on a relaxing holiday - because - by God I need one. How anyone manages to run a business in France I really don't know - but for anyone who does, I have the greatest admiration. They deserve every penny they earn - and then some.

More delays..

I took the original letter and translation to my doctor's this morning to ask if I can have the requested medical report. The receptionist looked at me a little askance and said it was 'rather unusual' to get a request for a medical report in French - but that she would pass my request on to the doctor. I asked how long this was likely to take and was informed that my doctor only 'does' reports on a Thursday and, as it was now Friday, it would be at least next week before he would look at the request. "No chance of taking it to France with us next Wednesday then?" I hesitantly asked. "No" was the rather abrupt reply - clearly she thought I had a cheek even to ask.

Given the report requires him to include my blood pressure and weight - which he won't have - as well as provide a summary of my medical history, I'm sure the next contact I have will be a call requesting me to make an appointment, which will no doubt take another week....etc etc. You get the picture. So feeling very fed up and envisaging a signing date sometime in July at the rate things are going.

The notaire was all very matter of fact about things. He emailed us this morning to say that he will be able to tell us the precise amount to transfer into his account next week (which will no doubt now sit there for weeks earning us no interest :o( ) . He also said he would be able to give us the date that he is ready for us to sign (once the bank release the funds). But given the problems with the life assurance - well pas de probleme they would just change the date...

We, on the other hand, don't feel so laid back at the moment - we are sulking!

Things not going as planned... :o(

The supplementary 'forms' arrived today - for the death insurance. Except they are not 'forms' at all - but a request for a full doctors report - because I take thyroxine!! Sheesh - how frustrating - it's such a minor condition, been controlled for 15 years and doesn't cause me any problems, or make me feel ill or reduce my life expectancy. Yet MOH is 10 years older, puffs away on his ciggies and is happily signed off as having no health risks!! So,after I finished my rant and strop about the unfairness of it all, I dragged myself off to type out a translation of the information required for my doctor - who to my knowledge does not speak French.

The bottom line is that we are unlikely to sign by 30th - according to the bank we would have to have everything approved by the 10th (six days time) to stand any chance of signing by the scheduled date - and there is diddly squat hope of that. Though we were lucky to get the letter in the first place - as they mis-spelled our name, house name, street and postcode - and put the town as 'Stockholm' (which I always thought was in Sweden)!! - I take my hat off to the Royal Mail for managing to get it to us in 6 days! Quite an achievement all things being considered.

And then there was a problem with the funds transfer... Before we heard about the probable delay we took out a forward swap (as the exchange rate is sliding faster than a monkey on a greasy pole). We have to settle the contract next week (see my earlier post - another rant!!) so I telephoned our bank in the UK to arrange the BACS transfer to the currency brokers. When I said how much it was for and that the funds (coming from our building society into our current account) weren't going to clear into our account until the day I wanted the funds transferring out to the currency brokers there was an odd silence at the other end of the line. The gentleman tutted about the size of the transfer and what might happen if the funds didn't arrive in our account in time for the BACS transfer. Could we call on 10th and check the monies had come through, he asked. Bit difficult, I replied - we will be in France. Long silence. So I volunteered to telephone the building society to see if we could get monies transferred in a couple of days earlier so at least I could check that everything was in order before we went to France. Building society were happy to this - so all was agreed.

We now have a French bank account (at long last!) - so I also arranged a transfer of euros into our new account. Hopefully, it will have cleared in time for our visit as it will be nice to be able to use the 24 hour petrol pumps etc - and it will also be good not to have to pay tourist rates for our euros.

Anyway after all the telephoning of banks, currency brokers etc I was late for work. And with my trip to the doctors tomorrow I will be late again.

Paper work and beurocracy - it's all so darned frustrating....