Word of warning: moving/combining ISAs with Halifax

I don’t know why in this day and age, we still have to fill out forms and have them mailed to Halifax’s head office to transfer some ISAs!

Basically, I’m trying to combine two ISAs that both have terrible interest rates, into a new ISA (all with Halifax). An investment guy at Halifax did the paper work for me and sent it off – it’s been 3 weeks and nothing has happened!

He did mention if nothing happened after 10 days then give them a call (because the form might of got lost). I bet forms going missing is a common occurrence at Halifax and this really needs to be resolved quickly.

We’re in 2012 so there’s really no excuse for not being able to do this all online.

Carl Fernandes : 21 Apr 2012 10:00 |  Tags: Halfifax Isa |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Virgin trains are crooks – NEVER buy an "e–ticket" as you won't get a refund

Do you really think I’m going to read that small print saying e-tickets are non-refundable?

Absolute JOKE.

Carl Fernandes : 20 Jan 2012 15:18 |  Tags: Non Refund Refundable Trains Virgin |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Does moving to Australia for work == career progression, or just a good time?

Following on from my post about huntsman spiders in Australia I thought I’d write a post about the pros and cons of moving to Australia.

Many people in my industry get offered jobs in Australia, sometimes paying double of what they are earning in London.

The reason Australian companies are willing to pay so much in the digital advertising/media scene is that their industry is that it’s kinda assumed that the industry is a couple years behind the UK and US.

I know about 5 people that have moved from London to Sydney to work at various agencies. Some of them are still out there now and some have come back to London for one reason or another.

I get a message every couple of months on Linkedin asking if I’m interested in moving to Australia for a fat salary, sponsorship, relocation help etc and so far haven’t really given it a thought. Partly due to the massive spiders and partly because I’m not sure how valuable that move would be from a career progression point of view.

Think of it this way, if you’re a top football player in the UK, would you want to move to Russia to play? I guess you might want to if the salary is massive. But long term I’m not sure you’ll get the champions league glory you’re looking for.

I’m keen on getting on the property ladder as soon as I can, and it’s near impossible to buy anywhere in London if you’re not earning millions… Australia presents a opportunity for investment in my eyes.

I’ve been doing a bit of research on home loans in australia and used a home loan calculator I guess the same principle applies here in the UK but the strength of the pound vs. the Australian dollar makes the deals look more attractive. House prices are decent over there (not like London) so repayments on an Australian salary would be more than achievable.

I think of Australia catches up to the UK in terms of the advertising/marketing industry I’ll start to think about the move. But they will certainly need to rid the country of huntsman spiders before I could do it.

Carl Fernandes : 16 Jan 2012 21:48 |  Tags: Abroad Australia Career In Working |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Raisins in muffins at Starbucks and EAT

Last year I bought a muffin from EAT on Tottenham Court Road and assumed there were no raisins in it (it didn’t mention raisins on the ingredients). What annoyed me was that there were lots of raisins in there. If I buy something, I want to ensure I get what it says on the tin.

Last week I bought an Apple and Cinnamon muffin from Starbucks. Again, no raisins were mentioned in the ingredients but I decided to check with the barista anyway (remembering what happened to me at EAT).

I was told “No, there are no raisins in this muffin” so I purchased the muffin and went on my way.

When I got back to my desk I was shocked to discover over 15 raisins in my muffin! I was so angry that I put a message on the starbucks facebook wall, and emailed them directly.

To give Starbucks some credit, they quickly replied to my Facebook wall message and after a bit of back and forth they said that their store manager at my local Starbucks would sort me out with a free muffin.

I will be claiming this muffin next week. I think I’ll stick to the Lemon muffin this time.

Carl Fernandes : 16 Jan 2012 21:33 |  Tags: Eat Raisins Starbucks |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Huntsman spiders & Tropical Heatwaves – there's no place like Australia

Last September I went to Australia for my cousin’s wedding in Melbourne. It was the first time that I’d ever been in Australia and needless to say I was apprehensive after reading up on huntsman spiders:

Strangely, after spending 3 weeks in Australia I did not see any huntsman spiders at all!

I put it down to staying in a fairly nice apartment hotel in Melbourne. From what I hear, if you’re out in the sticks you will definitely see more of the wildlife.

Quite a few of my mates have gone travelling to Oz and to keep costs down they either stay in the cheapest hostels they can find or use services like campervan hire australia to allow for a bit more freedom when travelling around.

We thought it was worth hiring a campervan in Sydney for the final week of our trip. The main reasoning for this was that we wanted to explore not only the traditional Sydney tourist sights (e.g. opera house) but also do a bit of exploring on our own. Needless to say I was convinced I would see a huntsman spider in the campervan and enforced a nightly ritual of checking every inch of the van before going to sleep!

From what I hear huntsman spiders are dangerous, but not in the way you might expect. Apparently a lot of deaths are caused in australia because the spiders will drop down from the roof of people’s cars when they are driving, causing them to crash!

This was one thing I was particularly nervous about while my dad was driving us around. Again, we got lucky and didn’t see anything!

The reason I decided to post this now, is that one of my friends has spotted a huntsman, or something very similar in his house. I’m now paranoid we’re on the verge of a spider invasion (I read something in The Sun a few months back suggesting 2012 will be a year of spiders in the UK).

Let’s just hope that doesn’t happen.

Carl Fernandes : 08 Jan 2012 13:26 |  Tags: Australia Huntsman Melbourne Spiders Syndey |  Comments (3) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Is 2011 the first year I buy my parents proper christmas presents?

I am famous for not caring about Christmas. Until a year ago I had basically never bought my parents Christmas presents (to be honest, I barely had any money until about a year ago!).

Last year I bought my mum a wonderful Candle that cost £40, yes FORTY pounds from Selfridges. She did not appreciate this gift at all, even though the idea was she could light it when she missed me… I thought it was rather thoughtful.

My dad on the other hand got a standard aftershave, also from Selfridges. The total time it took to complete my christmas shopping was about 10 minutes. I get away with just transferring my sister some money online each year which saves a lot of hassle.

This year I’ve had a bit more time to get in the zone, so I’m half tempted to buy some decent presents. Needless to say I will be minimising the amount of effort I need to put in by shopping online – I know Littlewoods is one of my mum’s favourite shops (or at least it was when there used to be one in Swindon when I lived there 7 years ago!) so I’m bound to find something.

For my dad I’m really not sure what to get. Like a lot of dads he has absolutely no hobbies other than watching the news. Another aftershave may have to suffice but I’m almost certain he wouldn’t have opened the one I got him last year. He doesn’t seem to realise that smelling good == success.

Home shopping is definitely the way to go though, I simply cannot deal with the current climate when it comes to shopping… even though I live 10 minutes from Westfields. I’m half tempted to buy an iPad (or a cheaper Android equivalent) online as a joint christmas present. I feel this would kill two birds with one stone. My mum loves reading emails and my dad loves watching the news. He’d be able to watch AND read the news at the same time with a tablet!

Would gift vouchers be too thoughtless?

Carl Fernandes : 08 Dec 2011 14:09 |  Tags: Christmas Online Presents Shopping |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

My new side project

How do you say I love you in Italian?

Let’s see how it does!

Carl Fernandes : 14 Nov 2011 23:01 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Virgin media need to sort themselves out

Telecoms/Broadband companies have it easy… easiest job in the world?

We just moved into a new house, that happens to already have a virgin media installation. The line still works so we’ve been using the internet & TV over the last few days while we wait for our Virgin account to be moved to the new house on the 5th of October.

I just called Virgin and asked them to switch my name to the existing line so that we have no period without internet… this is impossible.

I don’t understand why this is such an issue for them. It shouldn’t be a technical/engineering issue as there is already a working line into the house that we’re using with our old equipment. There must be a database somewhere storing account number against active/deactive line that someone just needs to switch.

I would have been happy to pay for a month’s service, just to not lose internet for a week.

Telecoms/Broadband companies’ front office staff have a piss easy job. They never have to think outside the typical FAQ style requests.

If they were more dynamic, they would have gained an extra 50 quid or so from me (and probably 1000s of other people in similar situations).

Get your act together!!

Carl Fernandes : 26 Sep 2011 10:51 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Halifax are **ing morons – don't use them

Just tried to do a simple bank transfer to my estate agent and got locked out of my online account…god knows why.

Then I tried to call the number they provided (0845) only to be forwarded through two people who didn’t work in the right department. This is basic usability…wtf give me a number that doesn’t get me in touch with the person who can unlock accounts straight away?

Anyway, the second person forwarded me onto another team, that put me on hold for 22 minutes. Then finally someone picked up, only to HANG UP on me after saying hello. 22 minutes on a mobile would have cost me a shit load, it’s an absolute joke that their telephone systems are so unreliable that this could happen.

I then called back and got through to the “correct” team only to be told there is ANOTHER team (security/fraud team) that has to do the unlocking, turns out they go home at 8pm!!

Frankly Halifax are absolute criminals for this lack of service and costing me loads in telephone calls & time. The whole damn bank needs a restructure to sort out this mess.

Security team should work 24/7 to ensure accounts can be unlocked as and when needed, any delay is UNACCEPTABLE.

I’m going to have to switch bank account, I just don’t want to associate myself with such low quality…Coutts might be a good choice.

EDIT

Phoned this morning and got through straight away, he guy said my account would be unlocked in 15 minutes. I tried logging in when I got home for work and it STILL doesn’t let me in.

Carl Fernandes : 19 Sep 2011 20:15 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Zoopla

The freshness of the houses up for rent in their database is laughable; so many of the estate agents I called told me the houses I was looking at were already gone.

I ended up purely sorting by “recently added”, anything on a housing site longer than day in London will already be gone.

There’s clearly a market for a real time house hunting website. Who’s going to solve the problem?

Zoopla, primelocation, rightmove and the rest are basically glorified directories for estate agents.

The lettings industry needs to get it’s act together, what a joke!

Carl Fernandes : 15 Sep 2011 06:04 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem