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Work Experience.... 6th November 2014 1:42 AM

Had a young lad working with me last week during the half term holidays for some work experience, was a bit apprehensive about having him did it more as a favour for a mate that anything else. Have to say, he kind of changed my attitude completely by the third day. On the Friday, his last day I offered him an apprenticeship and gave him £50 for the week.... Its a funny old world  

UK Living Wage up to 6th November 2014 1:25 AM

I'm not sure where I stand on this, I'm all for paying a fare wage even the minimum wage. But the London living wage is now bordering on paying unskilled labour nearly £500 a week, which is kind of hard to justify and puts me off even considering taking on a general dogsbody. If I'm paying someone that then I want a return of more than £500 just for the headache it entails by taking someone on.....

And it is reasons such as this, why people end up wanting to leave the EU. We'll have another bunch of overnight companies spring up offering to make any claims on your behalf. Businesses could be forced to close if they are inundated with claims..... And just how far back can a claimant claim for? Can you imagine the cost implications and time of having to go through your entire workforces time sheets for several years? 

Very few service personnel sign up thinking about what will life be like if they get injured and given a medical discharge. As a boy when I signed up you started the enrolment  process around the age of 14 1/2 to begin service at 16 when you left school at no time did I ever see a glossy brochure about the reality of war, what sort of care you would get if any, should you be medically discharged. Never got to see any pictures of service men with missing limbs or with their faces half blown away. What we got was glossy brochures about how we would travel the world, make great mates, live in comfortable barracks, how we would learn a trade and have the best health care available, but absolutely nothing about being sent into conflicts around the world.

You could argue what on earth were you signing up to join the army for then? For me it was a guaranteed job when I left school and a means to learn a trade, something I actually did when I left the forces, the thought of going into battle somewhere or tiptoeing through a mine field in pitch darkness with a gale force wind and rain pelting down never crossed my mind and was never mentioned in the joining up process only the glamorous side was ever mentioned. As the saying goes as you get older you get wiser, and when you look at service personel who have left the forces, with nothing but a handshake and a bus pass home and maybe a bit of financial compensation you have to ask yourself was it worth it. I'm a member of one of the Sapper groups on Facebook and with nearly 6k of members many of them are coming to realise just how much they have been let down by this country after they have either returned from a conflict or have been told their services are no longer required. One member said something the other night which is very true, in that it takes a minimum of 6 months to train a soldier to basic standard and it takes 24hrs to train him back into civilian life. Many ex-forces have become so institutionalised  they will never grasp civilian life easily. For those who have recently been laid off may find they end up with PTSD which may only become apparent years after they have left the service and the only people to put them back together again are charities. If I knew at 16 what I know now about how this country treats its ex-forces, I would have more than likely joined the production line at Wrigleys chewing gum factory instead....

.uk domains - will you move to one? 29th October 2014 1:26 PM

Funny enough some of the .london domains have recently been up for auction, I'm a bit confused about it all though. I've just bid for the domain londonplumbers.london, mainly to prevent others from getting it and may or may not use it. My concern is, is that it conflicts with Google's exact match domain name, so its probably absolutely useless in trying to use as I'm guessing it would be penalised as soon as it was used. I'm not overly fussed as the bidding never went above £10 and that was with 16 in the auction. I wouldn't waste thousands on getting a website for it without knowing if it was likely to be penalised, have done that with the .co.uk version and still no one can give me a diffinitive answer as to what happened. All I get is well it could be this or it could be that, but it might be something else....

Looking to expand my business 29th October 2014 12:12 AM

I'd try this company this must be the best card ever..........haha

I've banked with the Bank of Scotland for at least 15 years and have yet to walk into one, in fact I don't know where one is. Okay I know its now known as HBOS, but the last time I went into a Halifax would have been around 5 years ago. I had to go into a branch of Barclays last week to get the address changed on my statements, something that should have taken no more than 5 minutes to achieve. I sat there for over 45 minutes listening to the business manager flirting with some floozie, in the end I got so rattled I had to get up and say something to him...... much to the delight of other waiting customers..

I'd be inclined to put your business in the name of a partner / spouse / friend, at the end of the day your previous employers contract is with you and not with anyone else. I guess technically you wouldn't be advising anyone if you talk a lot in your sleep....

UK to pay an extra 24th October 2014 12:04 PM

I've never believed that our economy is what we've been led to believe in that its booming. Half the workforce is on tax credits or some other benefits, the government are forever borrowing money which increases the country's deficit. So exactly how are we booming? Just how is the state of the economy calculated? National debt runs into trillions, yet we're in a booming economy. 

Maybe the government are running the country a bit like Tesco's Plc, initially produce glowing financial reports but the reality is somewhat different. The majority of businesses would be shut down in no time at all if they were to be run using the same business plan as these two organisations i.e. Cooking the books.

I'm not too sure how I feel about this, as when i was in the national press, they sent the photographer around who spent the entire afternoon taking photo's of me and a one of the cats. Only to get a telephone call 48hrs later to be asked if they could come back and just take one of the cat as they did not want me in it.... Make of that what you will...