So, this is my first proper holiday from work - a full week rather than the odd day. I'm in Lowestoft, staying with Pip and The Boy. Steve can't take time off work at the moment, and Pip no longer has a car, so the biggest problem has been sorting out the logistics of getting me about, not just to and from Lowestoft but also around places while I'm here.
The first plan was to hire a car for Pip, so that he and Steve could both drive towards each other and hand me over at the halfway point. This way neither of them would be spending the whole day driving. But Steve found that the company he wanted to use wouldn't allow Pip to pick up a car that he wasn't paying for, and furthermore, this payment would have to be by a credit card on which he was named.
Unsurprisingly, as a single parent Pip doesn't have the means to pay for a week's hire of a car. The only possible solution that company had was that Steve should drive me all the way to Lowestoft, hire the car himself, have Pip named as an additional insured driver, and then drive all the way back, causing a marvellous amount of additional expense and inconvenience for Steve's weekend. By this point I think Steve was about at the end of his rope so he agreed to collect the car in person on Saturday, at "about lunchtime, depending on traffic" as he would be driving all the way from Warwickshire.
As such, on Saturday morning we got up at a weekday kind of time and got to Pip's at about 1.30. We brought my stuff in from Steve's car and phoned the car hire place to check things...
... and the call rolled to a diverted number. The person who picked up - apparently nothing to do with the car hire place - told us that the car hire place had closed at 12noon. Just like they had done every Saturday for the last fifteen years. For some reason, this hadn't seemed like a relevant point to raise for the person who agreed we could pick up a car at lunchtime.
We started hunting for alternatives, but it seems that every car hire place that isn't based at an airport closes at lunch on Saturday and does not reopen until Monday morning.
Alternative plan: since the Boy spends Saturdays with his mother, we spent Saturday afternoon relaxing. We all went for a coffee with friends, and then Steve drove back home. Pip and I intend to try and hire a car between the two of us on Monday morning.
It has been really nice to be able to just relax and chatter with Pip.
Day Two
This morning we went out to get a booster seat for the Boy to use in the car, and then to the park where we fed the ducks. This was more complicated than it might sound at first, when you consider it was me in a wheelchair and the Boy on his new bike. Pip definitely got a good workout.
This afternoon we've been rediscovering Sonic the Hedgehog. I lose to a four-year-old. It's mildly distressing, but testament to intuitive gaming controls. Still, I'm managing a good line in getting him past a section when he gets "stuck" which is nice.
Mostly though, I've been taking the opportunity to rest, which was the whole point of the holiday. The Boy had difficulty believing that all I was doing upstairs was having naps, he felt sure there must be something more interesting going on.
Day Three
Okay... I've recovered from getting here and had a good night's sleep. I've made plans to get fed at my mum's and also to get together with several friends, which should be good. The Boy has got used to me being here again and everything is going smoothly.
Plus, Pip and I successfully managed to hire a car. First thing this morning I called Lowestoft Car Hire and arranged to pick up a car from them at about 10am. They were perfectly happy for me to pay and Pip to drive, in fact they seemed quite surprised I was asking whether that was okay. We were really impressed by their customer service. The taxi to take us to their unit arrived here at 9.45, we got there, we were offered several choices, we chose one, did the paperwork, paid, got "shown around" the car, and were driving away by 10.10. That's a LOT more like it.
On with the holiday!
Monday, October 20, 2008
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Remploy and MPs
Finally, a response regarding the Remploy problems. My MP referred the matter to Anne McGuire, the erstwhile Minister for Disabled People. The response consists of a letter from Anne McGuire to my MP regarding the matter (dated approximately two weeks before she was replaced by Jonathan Shaw), and a covering letter from my MP, as it went via his office.
As you'll see from that article, whilst in office Ms McGuire was all about welfare-to-work. And my MP is James Plaskitt, the Benefit Fraud Minister. Surely if anyone should be up in arms about a company like Remploy skewing the stats for disabled people entering employment, it's these two.
Oh dear. While I like having faith in humanity, and believe that people as individuals are generally good, fair, and basically nice, I really must stop being so naive as to extend this to politicians.
According to my MP, "It appears that there has been a genuine and unfortunate error in the handling of your case, for which Remploy and the Government offer their sincere apologies."
Not fifty quid, then. Nor any thanks for my honesty in not taking the money and running, or for alerting them to the problems. And I wonder, Mr Plaskitt, if you uncovered a Benefit Fraudster on the claimant side rather than the government side, would you let them off with "apologies"?
No. Even if a benefit claimant made a "genuine and unfortunate error", they'd be hounded through the courts and at the very least, be required to pay back the funds which they had received on the basis of the erroneous information.
The letter from Ms McGuire was a little more illuminating. Sort of. I'm not going to reproduce any of it here as it's full of management gibberish and unashamed weasel-speak, but ten years as a fan of Dilbert has enabled me to boil it down and so I present the basic content in English.
1. Contacting me: Oops.
2. Only sending the signature pages: Oops.
3. Wrong dates: Oops.
4. Telephone call: Oops.
It seems Remploy contacted a whole list of clients to try and get them onto the Workstep programme. The list contained the details of 16 people, myself included, who should not have been on the list. No one noticed until I spoke up. The other 15 are being 'reviewed'.
For each point there's a lot of meaningless flannel about "ongoing continuous improvement programme" and references to undefined "additional measures" which will be put in place. Oops is about the size of it, though.
As for the '£50 for returning some forms' business: apparently £50 is considered a perfectly reasonable "incentive" for people to return information. Neither Remploy, nor the DWP, nor the wider government see anything dodgy about that at all. My apologies to Wat Tyler and Dr Crippen.
As you'll see from that article, whilst in office Ms McGuire was all about welfare-to-work. And my MP is James Plaskitt, the Benefit Fraud Minister. Surely if anyone should be up in arms about a company like Remploy skewing the stats for disabled people entering employment, it's these two.
Oh dear. While I like having faith in humanity, and believe that people as individuals are generally good, fair, and basically nice, I really must stop being so naive as to extend this to politicians.
According to my MP, "It appears that there has been a genuine and unfortunate error in the handling of your case, for which Remploy and the Government offer their sincere apologies."
Not fifty quid, then. Nor any thanks for my honesty in not taking the money and running, or for alerting them to the problems. And I wonder, Mr Plaskitt, if you uncovered a Benefit Fraudster on the claimant side rather than the government side, would you let them off with "apologies"?
No. Even if a benefit claimant made a "genuine and unfortunate error", they'd be hounded through the courts and at the very least, be required to pay back the funds which they had received on the basis of the erroneous information.
The letter from Ms McGuire was a little more illuminating. Sort of. I'm not going to reproduce any of it here as it's full of management gibberish and unashamed weasel-speak, but ten years as a fan of Dilbert has enabled me to boil it down and so I present the basic content in English.
1. Contacting me: Oops.
2. Only sending the signature pages: Oops.
3. Wrong dates: Oops.
4. Telephone call: Oops.
It seems Remploy contacted a whole list of clients to try and get them onto the Workstep programme. The list contained the details of 16 people, myself included, who should not have been on the list. No one noticed until I spoke up. The other 15 are being 'reviewed'.
For each point there's a lot of meaningless flannel about "ongoing continuous improvement programme" and references to undefined "additional measures" which will be put in place. Oops is about the size of it, though.
As for the '£50 for returning some forms' business: apparently £50 is considered a perfectly reasonable "incentive" for people to return information. Neither Remploy, nor the DWP, nor the wider government see anything dodgy about that at all. My apologies to Wat Tyler and Dr Crippen.
Wednesday, October 08, 2008
DLA Appeal
Appeal was today. It went well.
It was a bit daunting, but the panel made an effort to put me at my ease, asked sensible questions, and paid attention to my answers. I was able to answer all of the questions that were put to me, clearly and consistently. I also introduced the panel to Spoon Theory.
I got awarded High Rate Mobility and Low Rate Care, which is about right. We had thought I might get Middle Rate Care, but frankly I'm not going to argue about it. The award is backdated to February 2008 (which was when I applied) and is for two years from that date, until February 2010.
Absolutely knackered now.
It was a bit daunting, but the panel made an effort to put me at my ease, asked sensible questions, and paid attention to my answers. I was able to answer all of the questions that were put to me, clearly and consistently. I also introduced the panel to Spoon Theory.
I got awarded High Rate Mobility and Low Rate Care, which is about right. We had thought I might get Middle Rate Care, but frankly I'm not going to argue about it. The award is backdated to February 2008 (which was when I applied) and is for two years from that date, until February 2010.
Absolutely knackered now.
Friday, October 03, 2008
The Wibble
My Disability Living Allowance (DLA) appeal is next week.
In an organisational sense, I'm well prepared for it. Steve has managed to get a day off work in order to take me to and from the building where the appeal is being held. A person from the local Welfare Rights Advice Service is going to be there to represent me. The evidence I submitted is pretty substantial. I've reserved an accessible parking space at the venue, I've even decided roughly what I'm going to wear.
In a more personal sense, I'm not doing so badly either. I mean, I know my claim is genuine. I know that everything I have said on my forms is accurate. The absolute worst possible case scenario is that they turn me down and I have to continue living on exactly the same amount of money I am living on at the moment. Okay, it's not ideal, as it means I'm dependent on Steve's goodwill to continue to make up the shortfall between my wages and "survival" due to my disability-related expenses (which is what DLA is meant to cover and is why it is not means-tested), but at least I'm not currently likely to end up in a situation where I can't afford to eat because of benefit difficulties. This DLA appeal is not the end of the world.
But then there's the wibble. You know. The bit in each and every one of us that nags away at confidence, that says your date will be put off by that horrendous spot on your nose, or that reminds you in the night of that stupid thing you said at the interview...
The wibble, for me, is bypassing everything I academically know and understand about models of disability, everything I believe about how I am a useful member of society, doing a job, paying tax, helping and supporting my friends and loved ones and generally being just fine as a person. To prepare for the appeal I have to spend a lot of time concentrating on all the things I can't do, and this feeds the wibble.
The Wibble says to me,
"You're useless, you can't even walk around the block or work full-time or manage this or that or the other on your own.
If you win, well done! You've proved that you're useless! What a thing to prove! Wow, I bet you're proud.
But if you lose, you're still useless, in fact you're so useless, you've failed to prove you're useless! And you're going to have to carry on struggling without financial support to cover the additional expenses caused by your inability to do things..."
Yeah, I know, emo crap, call the waaaahmbulance, etc. I'm just stressed out to hell and can't wait for this to just be over, one way or the other.
In an organisational sense, I'm well prepared for it. Steve has managed to get a day off work in order to take me to and from the building where the appeal is being held. A person from the local Welfare Rights Advice Service is going to be there to represent me. The evidence I submitted is pretty substantial. I've reserved an accessible parking space at the venue, I've even decided roughly what I'm going to wear.
In a more personal sense, I'm not doing so badly either. I mean, I know my claim is genuine. I know that everything I have said on my forms is accurate. The absolute worst possible case scenario is that they turn me down and I have to continue living on exactly the same amount of money I am living on at the moment. Okay, it's not ideal, as it means I'm dependent on Steve's goodwill to continue to make up the shortfall between my wages and "survival" due to my disability-related expenses (which is what DLA is meant to cover and is why it is not means-tested), but at least I'm not currently likely to end up in a situation where I can't afford to eat because of benefit difficulties. This DLA appeal is not the end of the world.
But then there's the wibble. You know. The bit in each and every one of us that nags away at confidence, that says your date will be put off by that horrendous spot on your nose, or that reminds you in the night of that stupid thing you said at the interview...
The wibble, for me, is bypassing everything I academically know and understand about models of disability, everything I believe about how I am a useful member of society, doing a job, paying tax, helping and supporting my friends and loved ones and generally being just fine as a person. To prepare for the appeal I have to spend a lot of time concentrating on all the things I can't do, and this feeds the wibble.
The Wibble says to me,
"You're useless, you can't even walk around the block or work full-time or manage this or that or the other on your own.
If you win, well done! You've proved that you're useless! What a thing to prove! Wow, I bet you're proud.
But if you lose, you're still useless, in fact you're so useless, you've failed to prove you're useless! And you're going to have to carry on struggling without financial support to cover the additional expenses caused by your inability to do things..."
Yeah, I know, emo crap, call the waaaahmbulance, etc. I'm just stressed out to hell and can't wait for this to just be over, one way or the other.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
St Ebeneezer II
A few generic requests and pointers for online shoppers, on behalf of all those dispatchers out there who remember last Christmas and are fearing this one.
Part Two: Costs and Charges.
The postage and packaging charge
The cost of postage is set by Royal Mail (more on Royal Mail another day) and varies according to the exact size, shape and weight of your package. The pricing structure is complex to say the least, so many shops charge a flat rate for P&P, or link it to the value of the order, to keep things simple. This means that yes, one or two people pay a few pence more than the exact cost of their package, and others pay a few pence less. A few pence either way is all it will be. This is not rampant profiteering. Do not write angry letters of complaint because you paid 15p more P&P than Royal Mail charged.
There's also a clue in the name of the charge. Postage and packaging. We recycle where possible, but stock which arrives in no more than a dozen large boxes, goes out in hundreds of small boxes, envelopes, corrugated wrap, etc. Then there's things like bubble-wrap, sellotape, parcel tape, 'Documents Enclosed' packets, 'Do Not Bend' stickers, replacing worn-out tape dispensers, all sorts of silly things. Where I am, it averages out at around 25p per package.
You could argue a case for the dispatcher's wages to be part of P&P, too. I'm not part of the regular shop staff, I'm employed solely for postage and packaging purposes. It's a low-waged job role, but it's still about 10p per minute. So even if it only takes me two minutes to wrap up and sort out postage for one package, that's still 20p extra per package over and above the regular shop staff overhead.
Basically if your P&P is within £1 of the Royal Mail postage charge, you are not being ripped off.
Customs Charges
We are obliged to put Customs stickers on every package we send to a non-EU country. We are obliged to fill them in accurately. It's not that we don't like you. We just don't want to be investigated and shut down for dodgy business practices. The money you pay for Customs does not come to us, it does not increase our profit at all. We are not squeezing it out of you. It is not our choice. It is also not a new thing. If you are old enough to have a credit card and order things online then you are old enough to understand the basics of VAT and import/export. In most cases, if you get charged for Customs and look carefully at your receipt you will see that you have not been charged VAT. That's why you have to pay the customs charge.
Dodging VAT
Some people try to dodge VAT by using the following address:
Mr Very English Name
27 Very English Street
Well-Known English Town
Definitely an English County
English Postcode
Country Outside The EU That Doesn't Get Charged VAT.
Well done. The website has deducted the VAT, you are paying a quid or so less for your goods, although you're also paying a quid or so more for your postage and packing charges, so you're probably not saving much money. However, your credit card has been flagged - country not matched - so if you do it too often, someone will probably start to take an interest. It's not worth it to save 50p. Oh, and everyone is laughing at you for being so cheap.
We are not trying to rip you off.
We've been in business for quite a while. We want to stay in business. Ripping customers off is not a viable long-term business plan. Well, except for companies selling an absolutely essential commodity like water or fuel, where the consumer has little choice but to hand over whatever is demanded. But we don't sell that kind of product and we're not that kind of company. We want you to choose to shop with us, and part of that is not upsetting you by 'inventing' charges or charging an unreasonable rate. Certainly we want your money, but there's no need to assume we'll invent reasons to swipe it.
Short commercial break: Today it's for Sweet As, who not only do incredible bespoke chocolate cakes for special occasions, but also do mail-order chocolate brownies - including a gluten-free version if you like - in a package that fits through a letterbox. I had some of these brownies for my birthday. They are perhaps a little bit expensive but Worth. Every. Penny.
Part One: Placing Your Order.
Still to come: Royal Mail, and Other Issues.
Part Two: Costs and Charges.
The postage and packaging charge
The cost of postage is set by Royal Mail (more on Royal Mail another day) and varies according to the exact size, shape and weight of your package. The pricing structure is complex to say the least, so many shops charge a flat rate for P&P, or link it to the value of the order, to keep things simple. This means that yes, one or two people pay a few pence more than the exact cost of their package, and others pay a few pence less. A few pence either way is all it will be. This is not rampant profiteering. Do not write angry letters of complaint because you paid 15p more P&P than Royal Mail charged.
There's also a clue in the name of the charge. Postage and packaging. We recycle where possible, but stock which arrives in no more than a dozen large boxes, goes out in hundreds of small boxes, envelopes, corrugated wrap, etc. Then there's things like bubble-wrap, sellotape, parcel tape, 'Documents Enclosed' packets, 'Do Not Bend' stickers, replacing worn-out tape dispensers, all sorts of silly things. Where I am, it averages out at around 25p per package.
You could argue a case for the dispatcher's wages to be part of P&P, too. I'm not part of the regular shop staff, I'm employed solely for postage and packaging purposes. It's a low-waged job role, but it's still about 10p per minute. So even if it only takes me two minutes to wrap up and sort out postage for one package, that's still 20p extra per package over and above the regular shop staff overhead.
Basically if your P&P is within £1 of the Royal Mail postage charge, you are not being ripped off.
Customs Charges
We are obliged to put Customs stickers on every package we send to a non-EU country. We are obliged to fill them in accurately. It's not that we don't like you. We just don't want to be investigated and shut down for dodgy business practices. The money you pay for Customs does not come to us, it does not increase our profit at all. We are not squeezing it out of you. It is not our choice. It is also not a new thing. If you are old enough to have a credit card and order things online then you are old enough to understand the basics of VAT and import/export. In most cases, if you get charged for Customs and look carefully at your receipt you will see that you have not been charged VAT. That's why you have to pay the customs charge.
Dodging VAT
Some people try to dodge VAT by using the following address:
Mr Very English Name
27 Very English Street
Well-Known English Town
Definitely an English County
English Postcode
Country Outside The EU That Doesn't Get Charged VAT.
Well done. The website has deducted the VAT, you are paying a quid or so less for your goods, although you're also paying a quid or so more for your postage and packing charges, so you're probably not saving much money. However, your credit card has been flagged - country not matched - so if you do it too often, someone will probably start to take an interest. It's not worth it to save 50p. Oh, and everyone is laughing at you for being so cheap.
We are not trying to rip you off.
We've been in business for quite a while. We want to stay in business. Ripping customers off is not a viable long-term business plan. Well, except for companies selling an absolutely essential commodity like water or fuel, where the consumer has little choice but to hand over whatever is demanded. But we don't sell that kind of product and we're not that kind of company. We want you to choose to shop with us, and part of that is not upsetting you by 'inventing' charges or charging an unreasonable rate. Certainly we want your money, but there's no need to assume we'll invent reasons to swipe it.
Short commercial break: Today it's for Sweet As, who not only do incredible bespoke chocolate cakes for special occasions, but also do mail-order chocolate brownies - including a gluten-free version if you like - in a package that fits through a letterbox. I had some of these brownies for my birthday. They are perhaps a little bit expensive but Worth. Every. Penny.
Part One: Placing Your Order.
Still to come: Royal Mail, and Other Issues.
Sunday, September 07, 2008
St Ebeneezer
As the esteemed blogger Scaryduck (I am not worthy, etc) recently observed, St Ebeneezer's Day - "the first day that Christmas displays appear in shops and public houses" - has well and truly occurred.
Speaking from the trenches of mail-order dispatch of classical music, I can confirm that the rush has started. The volume of orders is increasing, and the orders being placed have more than a sprinkling of titles like "Concertos and Cantatas for Christmas", not to mention Bach's Christmas Oratorio (available on CD, SACD and DVD from just about any record label you care to name).
I'm guessing that quite a few of the people who read this blog are likely to do at least part of their shopping online, so I figured it wouldn't hurt to make a few generic requests and give a few pointers, on behalf of all those dispatchers for small businesses out there who remember last Christmas and are fearing this one.
... actually, thinking about it, this may work better as a series. Other readers on the frontline should feel free to make additions in the comments.
So onwards, with Part One - Placing Your Order.
Fill out the form properly.
It's not really a difficult form. Put your postcode in the postcode box and your address in the address boxes. If you don't know your address and postcode, go and ask a responsible adult.
For each new line, use a new line of the address box - don't just type in twenty spaces, or half a dozen full stops. You can click in each box, or you can use the TAB key to scroll through them. While you're at it, why not let the shift key enter your life? It's not just there to make the keyboard look nice.
"As Above" is not an address. Nor is "as previous order," as I can't actually see your previous orders unless I stop everything and start rootling around in the database. And please, for pity's sake, don't think you're being clever by asterisking out the first few letters of each line of your name and address "for security". We need your proper address in order to send you the things you have ordered. The postman will not take packages to "** ***ley Road", okay?
You should also know that it's not "the computer" that fixes these things so that you get your goods. It's me, putting my Stalker hat on with the help of Google in a way that would probably have you feeling quite uncomfortable if you knew about it. You may also like to remember that all the time I spend correcting your address, I'm not shipping orders - you're holding up the queue!
Contact details
We're not asking for the fun of it, nor are we likely to sell your data. If we've said that we won't pass your details on, then we really won't. It's one of those big business/small business things. A big business is only ever about the money. A small business, on the other hand, is personal, and all of its employees are going to be trying to provide the sort of service we would like to recieve from others. So we won't pass your phone number to other companies owned by the same multinational conglomerate, or "relevant third parties", and we won't flood your inbox with spam. We're asking for fast contact details because if there's a problem with your order, we'd prefer to be able to let you know as soon as possible, and give you a chance to change your order, rather than waiting for you to contact us several weeks later because your goods have not arrived.
Your credit card 'security code' is NOT your PIN.
Your security code is the last three digits of the little number on the back of your card, where you put your signature. It's not a difficult thing to find. You never type your PIN online. If you type in your PIN where you should have put your security code, all that happens is that your credit card gets flagged - security code not matched - and you may have to wait longer while we check to find out whether you're (a) incapable of reading simple instructions or (b) a fraudster trying to use a dodgy credit card, and let's be honest, neither of those are good really, are they?
Reasonable Requests
Most small businesses will do their best to meet any requests you make, it's part of what makes us different to Amazon and Tesco. Perhaps something is a gift and you want to be sure it's sent to the recipient without the price on it - no problem. Maybe you are on holiday and want to delay posting to make sure your package won't arrive while you're away - easy. Maybe you want your order shipped in as many lots as it takes to make sure that each parcel is no bigger than the pannier on your bike - we can do that. But please, please, let us know early on. Preferably before you place your order. If we know your requests before the order comes in, then we can do our best to meet them. We won't be able to get the package back off the Post Office if you only put in your request after the order is dispatched.
Still to come: Costs and charges, Royal Mail, and Other Issues.
And now, by request of a friend of mine, a short commercial break for a friendly online mail order business. Adults only, I cannot stress this strongly enough, adults only may wish to look at Temptations for all their adult toy needs. Temptations is run by a couple of entrepreneurs with a long-standing interest in adult toys, aiming to provide the sort of service levels they would prefer to recieve when shopping online for such items. Please don't click that link if you're under 16 or easily offended.
Under-16s, and those who are not in the market for the kind of wares Temptations stock, may prefer to visit the 100% family-friendly appropriate-for-everyone Web Of Wool to spend their money.
Edit 20:17 07/09/08 broken link fixed.
Speaking from the trenches of mail-order dispatch of classical music, I can confirm that the rush has started. The volume of orders is increasing, and the orders being placed have more than a sprinkling of titles like "Concertos and Cantatas for Christmas", not to mention Bach's Christmas Oratorio (available on CD, SACD and DVD from just about any record label you care to name).
I'm guessing that quite a few of the people who read this blog are likely to do at least part of their shopping online, so I figured it wouldn't hurt to make a few generic requests and give a few pointers, on behalf of all those dispatchers for small businesses out there who remember last Christmas and are fearing this one.
... actually, thinking about it, this may work better as a series. Other readers on the frontline should feel free to make additions in the comments.
So onwards, with Part One - Placing Your Order.
Fill out the form properly.
It's not really a difficult form. Put your postcode in the postcode box and your address in the address boxes. If you don't know your address and postcode, go and ask a responsible adult.
For each new line, use a new line of the address box - don't just type in twenty spaces, or half a dozen full stops. You can click in each box, or you can use the TAB key to scroll through them. While you're at it, why not let the shift key enter your life? It's not just there to make the keyboard look nice.
"As Above" is not an address. Nor is "as previous order," as I can't actually see your previous orders unless I stop everything and start rootling around in the database. And please, for pity's sake, don't think you're being clever by asterisking out the first few letters of each line of your name and address "for security". We need your proper address in order to send you the things you have ordered. The postman will not take packages to "** ***ley Road", okay?
You should also know that it's not "the computer" that fixes these things so that you get your goods. It's me, putting my Stalker hat on with the help of Google in a way that would probably have you feeling quite uncomfortable if you knew about it. You may also like to remember that all the time I spend correcting your address, I'm not shipping orders - you're holding up the queue!
Contact details
We're not asking for the fun of it, nor are we likely to sell your data. If we've said that we won't pass your details on, then we really won't. It's one of those big business/small business things. A big business is only ever about the money. A small business, on the other hand, is personal, and all of its employees are going to be trying to provide the sort of service we would like to recieve from others. So we won't pass your phone number to other companies owned by the same multinational conglomerate, or "relevant third parties", and we won't flood your inbox with spam. We're asking for fast contact details because if there's a problem with your order, we'd prefer to be able to let you know as soon as possible, and give you a chance to change your order, rather than waiting for you to contact us several weeks later because your goods have not arrived.
Your credit card 'security code' is NOT your PIN.
Your security code is the last three digits of the little number on the back of your card, where you put your signature. It's not a difficult thing to find. You never type your PIN online. If you type in your PIN where you should have put your security code, all that happens is that your credit card gets flagged - security code not matched - and you may have to wait longer while we check to find out whether you're (a) incapable of reading simple instructions or (b) a fraudster trying to use a dodgy credit card, and let's be honest, neither of those are good really, are they?
Reasonable Requests
Most small businesses will do their best to meet any requests you make, it's part of what makes us different to Amazon and Tesco. Perhaps something is a gift and you want to be sure it's sent to the recipient without the price on it - no problem. Maybe you are on holiday and want to delay posting to make sure your package won't arrive while you're away - easy. Maybe you want your order shipped in as many lots as it takes to make sure that each parcel is no bigger than the pannier on your bike - we can do that. But please, please, let us know early on. Preferably before you place your order. If we know your requests before the order comes in, then we can do our best to meet them. We won't be able to get the package back off the Post Office if you only put in your request after the order is dispatched.
Still to come: Costs and charges, Royal Mail, and Other Issues.
And now, by request of a friend of mine, a short commercial break for a friendly online mail order business. Adults only, I cannot stress this strongly enough, adults only may wish to look at Temptations for all their adult toy needs. Temptations is run by a couple of entrepreneurs with a long-standing interest in adult toys, aiming to provide the sort of service levels they would prefer to recieve when shopping online for such items. Please don't click that link if you're under 16 or easily offended.
Under-16s, and those who are not in the market for the kind of wares Temptations stock, may prefer to visit the 100% family-friendly appropriate-for-everyone Web Of Wool to spend their money.
Edit 20:17 07/09/08 broken link fixed.
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
We Apologise For The Break In Transmission
Wow, no blogposts for a month. Not quite sure how that happened. My apologies to anyone who got concerned. I am okay.
On with the excuses, well, I had a week or so at the beginning of August where I couldn't seem to phrase anything right. After that, I kept telling myself I would blog later, which never came.
Two things are notable for having NOT occurred. First, I still haven't heard anything more on the Remploy problems. They were going to investigate it internally, but then my MP stepped in via the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) and now contact is supposed to flow via the MP and the DWP. Which it isn't. In mitigation, my MP is the "anti-fraud" minister (see "we are determined to catch those taking money that does not belong to them") which probably makes it difficult to suddenly reverse mindset to a non-claimant whose problem is that they are being offered and declining to accept money.
Second, I haven't organised that proper week away at the coast and I'm no longer convinced that I want to. There seems to be an awful lot going on at the moment and I get the strong impression that my presence would only exacerbate matters.
However, I HAVE been doing lots of things.
I've applied to Social Services for help and they have done really well - preliminary assessment over the phone same-day, a home visit from a social worker to do a full assessment the following week, a home visit for a financial assessment the week after that, then it was a home visit from somebody from the Rowan Organisation to talk me through the options for Direct Payments and whatnot, and finally a visit for assessment by an Occupational Therapist.
This level and speed of response would be pretty good even if they'd just turned around and said "no, you're not eligible for any help, care, equipment or services, and even if you were, you'd have to pay the full cost." But amazingly, and despite all the horror stories I've heard from both service users and providers, they've really come through.
The social worker has assessed me as needing 7 hours of personal care and 3 hours of social care per week. The financial assessment means this will be funded by social services. The Rowan will help me use Direct Payments to hire a PA to help me. They will help me find a suitable Personal Assistant (PA), do criminal records checks, assist me with holding interviews, and help with the paperwork (eg taxes and NI for my PA). It's all ready to go and there is just one problem - while Steve agrees with the idea of me getting the help I need, faced with the reality of it he found that he has difficulty with the idea of someone coming into his house. I don't have the balls to just go ahead with it without his consent but hopefully we'll work something out soon, as it's really quite upsetting to be struggling and going without while knowing that I don't have to.
The social worker also said we could have an emergency plan, in case Steve is hospitalised or has a family emergency or something. The "In Your Place" scheme means that if something like that happened, a temporary carer would be sent to the house to stay with me and fulfil Steve's role - not just the active personal/social care things, but also supervision, and doing the things that I can't do but am assessed as not needing help with because I live with someone who can be reasonably expected to do them, like cooking or going to the supermarket or changing the sheets on the bed (the idea is that these things aren't "care" as he would have to do them anyway if he lived alone). The temporary carer would stay with me for up to 72 hours, until either Steve was back at home, or a longer-term solution could be put in place.
The Occupational Therapist has done well for me too. A lot of the simpler bits and bobs I need, Steve or I have already purchased, but she's got me things like a swivel bath seat that helps me get into the tub safely to have my shower. She'll come back for another visit next month to see how I'm getting on and think about what else I might need. Most of the things she wanted to prescribe, I can't have, because it's a privately rented house and the landlord might object to permanent objects like grab rails and level access and a stairlift being installed. But, she's writing down officially that she thinks I should have them, which might help with the DLA appeal and will be a head-start if we ever get our own place.
On a different level, I applied for an admin job. I made it to interview entirely on merit (I made it clear that I was NOT applying under the "two ticks" scheme) and from there got onto the shortlist, but didn't get the job in the end. I'm a bit disappointed. It would have been nice, it would have suited my skills more, and I'm keen to get out from where I am at the moment. However, my current job isn't unbearable, and it's not like there'll never be another part-time admin job advertised ever again. The feedback was positive but not in a vastly useful way - apparently my application, qualifications, experience and interview was all fine, there wasn't anything that they felt I should improve upon, and I'm the second choice, so they'll call me if the first choice passes it up or can't provide references.
Of course they might have just said all that to make me feel better. Who knows. For now, it suits me to take it at face value and think yes, I was good, someone else was better, never mind.
We went to the wedding as planned, which was a total success in every sense. We caught up with a few familiar faces from the darker corners of the internet, as well as meeting a few new ones, and had an absolutely lovely time. The weather behaved itself, so the ceremony took place with gorgeous sunlight shining through the windows and making the bride look even more beautiful. It was very relaxed, and everybody was happy. Technically I caught the bouquet, but we should probably bear in mind that I was the only one trying and it was tossed directly to me from a distance of about two feet, very theatrically, for Steve's benefit. Steve, for his part, pointedly ignored the whole thing. Bah.
I got to see Pip and the Littlun, who is now The Boy as he is more than waist-high. I can't believe how much he's grown! He'll be four soon. We played with his trains and read a story, and spent a lot of time doing a sort of counting/sorting game of his own invention with little ludo pieces. Seeing Pip was good. I have missed him an awful lot since moving away. We really could have done with an hour to chat like grownups, maybe next time.
There's been other stuff too - going places, seeing people. I can't remember it all and this post already has too much variety in it. It was a good summer. Hopefully there is still a little bit more to come.
On with the excuses, well, I had a week or so at the beginning of August where I couldn't seem to phrase anything right. After that, I kept telling myself I would blog later, which never came.
Two things are notable for having NOT occurred. First, I still haven't heard anything more on the Remploy problems. They were going to investigate it internally, but then my MP stepped in via the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) and now contact is supposed to flow via the MP and the DWP. Which it isn't. In mitigation, my MP is the "anti-fraud" minister (see "we are determined to catch those taking money that does not belong to them") which probably makes it difficult to suddenly reverse mindset to a non-claimant whose problem is that they are being offered and declining to accept money.
Second, I haven't organised that proper week away at the coast and I'm no longer convinced that I want to. There seems to be an awful lot going on at the moment and I get the strong impression that my presence would only exacerbate matters.
However, I HAVE been doing lots of things.
I've applied to Social Services for help and they have done really well - preliminary assessment over the phone same-day, a home visit from a social worker to do a full assessment the following week, a home visit for a financial assessment the week after that, then it was a home visit from somebody from the Rowan Organisation to talk me through the options for Direct Payments and whatnot, and finally a visit for assessment by an Occupational Therapist.
This level and speed of response would be pretty good even if they'd just turned around and said "no, you're not eligible for any help, care, equipment or services, and even if you were, you'd have to pay the full cost." But amazingly, and despite all the horror stories I've heard from both service users and providers, they've really come through.
The social worker has assessed me as needing 7 hours of personal care and 3 hours of social care per week. The financial assessment means this will be funded by social services. The Rowan will help me use Direct Payments to hire a PA to help me. They will help me find a suitable Personal Assistant (PA), do criminal records checks, assist me with holding interviews, and help with the paperwork (eg taxes and NI for my PA). It's all ready to go and there is just one problem - while Steve agrees with the idea of me getting the help I need, faced with the reality of it he found that he has difficulty with the idea of someone coming into his house. I don't have the balls to just go ahead with it without his consent but hopefully we'll work something out soon, as it's really quite upsetting to be struggling and going without while knowing that I don't have to.
The social worker also said we could have an emergency plan, in case Steve is hospitalised or has a family emergency or something. The "In Your Place" scheme means that if something like that happened, a temporary carer would be sent to the house to stay with me and fulfil Steve's role - not just the active personal/social care things, but also supervision, and doing the things that I can't do but am assessed as not needing help with because I live with someone who can be reasonably expected to do them, like cooking or going to the supermarket or changing the sheets on the bed (the idea is that these things aren't "care" as he would have to do them anyway if he lived alone). The temporary carer would stay with me for up to 72 hours, until either Steve was back at home, or a longer-term solution could be put in place.
The Occupational Therapist has done well for me too. A lot of the simpler bits and bobs I need, Steve or I have already purchased, but she's got me things like a swivel bath seat that helps me get into the tub safely to have my shower. She'll come back for another visit next month to see how I'm getting on and think about what else I might need. Most of the things she wanted to prescribe, I can't have, because it's a privately rented house and the landlord might object to permanent objects like grab rails and level access and a stairlift being installed. But, she's writing down officially that she thinks I should have them, which might help with the DLA appeal and will be a head-start if we ever get our own place.
On a different level, I applied for an admin job. I made it to interview entirely on merit (I made it clear that I was NOT applying under the "two ticks" scheme) and from there got onto the shortlist, but didn't get the job in the end. I'm a bit disappointed. It would have been nice, it would have suited my skills more, and I'm keen to get out from where I am at the moment. However, my current job isn't unbearable, and it's not like there'll never be another part-time admin job advertised ever again. The feedback was positive but not in a vastly useful way - apparently my application, qualifications, experience and interview was all fine, there wasn't anything that they felt I should improve upon, and I'm the second choice, so they'll call me if the first choice passes it up or can't provide references.
Of course they might have just said all that to make me feel better. Who knows. For now, it suits me to take it at face value and think yes, I was good, someone else was better, never mind.
We went to the wedding as planned, which was a total success in every sense. We caught up with a few familiar faces from the darker corners of the internet, as well as meeting a few new ones, and had an absolutely lovely time. The weather behaved itself, so the ceremony took place with gorgeous sunlight shining through the windows and making the bride look even more beautiful. It was very relaxed, and everybody was happy. Technically I caught the bouquet, but we should probably bear in mind that I was the only one trying and it was tossed directly to me from a distance of about two feet, very theatrically, for Steve's benefit. Steve, for his part, pointedly ignored the whole thing. Bah.
I got to see Pip and the Littlun, who is now The Boy as he is more than waist-high. I can't believe how much he's grown! He'll be four soon. We played with his trains and read a story, and spent a lot of time doing a sort of counting/sorting game of his own invention with little ludo pieces. Seeing Pip was good. I have missed him an awful lot since moving away. We really could have done with an hour to chat like grownups, maybe next time.
There's been other stuff too - going places, seeing people. I can't remember it all and this post already has too much variety in it. It was a good summer. Hopefully there is still a little bit more to come.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Summer
This is definitely summer. It is scorching hot out there. I have never missed the sea breeze so much.
Going to get a little bit of sea breeze when Steve and I head for the coast at the end of August for Jiva and Munkt0n's wedding. We're really looking forward to that, with extra added squee because the first time we met in real life was when we went to their engagement bash.
That'll just be a weekender though, as Steve can't book any time off work at present. But, Pip and I have been looking into the idea of car hire (Pip took his car off the road after I left town) to enable me to have a proper week's holiday and see everyone. The idea is that Steve could take me part of the way, and hand me and my suitcase over to Pip at a halfway services station. We're thinking probably September would be best, once the kids are back at school. Littlun will be doing half-days, so we'll be able to Do Stuff for half a day without all the local facilities being overrun by Bigger Kids, and then I can rest properly while he's at school.
Until I get some seafront, though, my life has been made that bit more comfortable by work having invested in an air-conditioning unit. The room was getting really quite unbearably hot, what with the combination of (1) thousands of CD cases, flat-pack corrugated cardboard boxes, and other packing materials, also known as insulation; (2) a single barred window which only opens a few inches; (3) a computer on the go the whole time; and (4) up to three adults constantly moving around the room doing work which, while it could not be described as physically demanding, works up considerably more of a sweat than sitting around typing. I don't care that my carbon footprint probably makes the baby Jesus cry. It was getting hard to breathe in there!
And now, I think, I will get my eye-mask out of the fridge, and go upstairs to lie very very still in the hope that sleep will come.
Going to get a little bit of sea breeze when Steve and I head for the coast at the end of August for Jiva and Munkt0n's wedding. We're really looking forward to that, with extra added squee because the first time we met in real life was when we went to their engagement bash.
That'll just be a weekender though, as Steve can't book any time off work at present. But, Pip and I have been looking into the idea of car hire (Pip took his car off the road after I left town) to enable me to have a proper week's holiday and see everyone. The idea is that Steve could take me part of the way, and hand me and my suitcase over to Pip at a halfway services station. We're thinking probably September would be best, once the kids are back at school. Littlun will be doing half-days, so we'll be able to Do Stuff for half a day without all the local facilities being overrun by Bigger Kids, and then I can rest properly while he's at school.
Until I get some seafront, though, my life has been made that bit more comfortable by work having invested in an air-conditioning unit. The room was getting really quite unbearably hot, what with the combination of (1) thousands of CD cases, flat-pack corrugated cardboard boxes, and other packing materials, also known as insulation; (2) a single barred window which only opens a few inches; (3) a computer on the go the whole time; and (4) up to three adults constantly moving around the room doing work which, while it could not be described as physically demanding, works up considerably more of a sweat than sitting around typing. I don't care that my carbon footprint probably makes the baby Jesus cry. It was getting hard to breathe in there!
And now, I think, I will get my eye-mask out of the fridge, and go upstairs to lie very very still in the hope that sleep will come.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Things are going well
It's been a great week.
First of all, those persistent Unbloggables that have been filling up large parts of my headspace are now mostly resolved, and I wish I could explain better, but it's Someone Else's Business really.
Secondly, Steve's been paid, and while we're not buying a house/going on holiday/planning a wedding/bathing in Cristal just yet, the light at the end of the tunnel has proved to be sunshine rather than the oncoming train we feared. We have finally been able to make some headway on long-overdue essential expenses as well as a couple of little treats.
So thirdly, I finally have the Panda Silk I have been lusting after since Christmas. I wasn't going to get it yet - at £6.45 per 50g ball it's expensive and technically there are more important things we should be spending money on - but Steve knew I was after it, so when he knew he'd been paid, he got on the phone to Anna at Web of Wool and arranged with her that he would pay for four balls of Panda Silk, for me to choose the colours I wanted when I came in for knitting group. And lo, for Mary did SQUEEE quite a lot before choosing two balls of blue-ey "denim tones" which I think will become socks, and two balls of green-ey "fern tones" which might become a shawl - I'm feeling brave enough to make a careful attempt at lace knitting and I've found an allegedly simple pattern.
Fourthly, and still in the knitting theme, I have finished the knitting for my jumper. I plan to start sewing it up as soon as I've been able to run Bloop around a bit, which I can't do just yet because it's still a bit antisocially early for a Sunday morning.
Fifthly, although you just know I'm going to lose count soon... Remember Georgette the Courgette? Well, she grew and grew and grew some more until she was festooned with very definitely identifiable yellow courgette fruits. And at this point things went runny, because although 101 people have offered 101 recipes for courgette, my kitchen skills for things like safely peeling and chopping and dealing with hot pans and so on are HIGHLY limited, and Steve is suspicious of vegetables in general, and in particular, vegetables that don't even have the courtesy to be green (tomatoes are apparently excused on the basis of being a core component of ketchup).
Not wanting the courgettes to go to waste, I asked our next-door neighbour if she wanted them and invited her to help herself at any time. She seemed very pleased about this, and I was happy too because I like it when I feel like I live in a community, next thing I knew, she offered to put some into a lasagne for us! Which she did, and Steve and I ate it last night with some nice ciabatta bread, and it was delicious and we ate every bit.
uh...
Nextly, I've had the paperwork for my DLA appeal through. This means I've seen the GP's report (short but supportive) and feel confident that yes, the DWP have ignored vast chunks of evidence and the appeal has a good chance.
There is a slight question-mark over getting to the appeal though. It's in a large building (too large for walking, I'd need to be pushed in the wheelchair) in Birmingham (which is too far away for a taxi and community transport has to be pre-booked which wouldn't work for the way home as I don't know how long it will take). I'm not sure, but I really doubt that my representative from the Welfare Rights place is also going to be able to drive me there and back, not to mention sit with me, push the wheelchair, and be a shoulder to cry on if it all goes horribly wrong. Even if she could, it's not her job. Steve should be able to take me and if he can, it's all good, but we have this horror that he might not be able to - you only get 14 days notice of the Appeal date which might not be enough for him to get a day off work - and we don't know if we could find anyone else to help. So on Monday I'm calling the Welfare Rights organisation to see if they have any ideas. They must have experienced this before. Still, at least that'll be an end of it one way or another. Which is a Good Thing.
And Finally, it looks like we might be getting some help from Social Services. No word yet on what you might call Daily help, but apparently as Steve is my sole carer, we're eligible for an emergency scheme whereby if he's suddenly hospitalised or something, an emergency carer will come and "live-in" with me to fulfil his role for up to 72 hours until something more sustainable, such as a short stay in a residential home or additional visiting care, can be arranged. Certain amount of paperwork, but isn't there always.
First of all, those persistent Unbloggables that have been filling up large parts of my headspace are now mostly resolved, and I wish I could explain better, but it's Someone Else's Business really.
Secondly, Steve's been paid, and while we're not buying a house/going on holiday/planning a wedding/bathing in Cristal just yet, the light at the end of the tunnel has proved to be sunshine rather than the oncoming train we feared. We have finally been able to make some headway on long-overdue essential expenses as well as a couple of little treats.
So thirdly, I finally have the Panda Silk I have been lusting after since Christmas. I wasn't going to get it yet - at £6.45 per 50g ball it's expensive and technically there are more important things we should be spending money on - but Steve knew I was after it, so when he knew he'd been paid, he got on the phone to Anna at Web of Wool and arranged with her that he would pay for four balls of Panda Silk, for me to choose the colours I wanted when I came in for knitting group. And lo, for Mary did SQUEEE quite a lot before choosing two balls of blue-ey "denim tones" which I think will become socks, and two balls of green-ey "fern tones" which might become a shawl - I'm feeling brave enough to make a careful attempt at lace knitting and I've found an allegedly simple pattern.
Fourthly, and still in the knitting theme, I have finished the knitting for my jumper. I plan to start sewing it up as soon as I've been able to run Bloop around a bit, which I can't do just yet because it's still a bit antisocially early for a Sunday morning.
Fifthly, although you just know I'm going to lose count soon... Remember Georgette the Courgette? Well, she grew and grew and grew some more until she was festooned with very definitely identifiable yellow courgette fruits. And at this point things went runny, because although 101 people have offered 101 recipes for courgette, my kitchen skills for things like safely peeling and chopping and dealing with hot pans and so on are HIGHLY limited, and Steve is suspicious of vegetables in general, and in particular, vegetables that don't even have the courtesy to be green (tomatoes are apparently excused on the basis of being a core component of ketchup).
Not wanting the courgettes to go to waste, I asked our next-door neighbour if she wanted them and invited her to help herself at any time. She seemed very pleased about this, and I was happy too because I like it when I feel like I live in a community, next thing I knew, she offered to put some into a lasagne for us! Which she did, and Steve and I ate it last night with some nice ciabatta bread, and it was delicious and we ate every bit.
uh...
Nextly, I've had the paperwork for my DLA appeal through. This means I've seen the GP's report (short but supportive) and feel confident that yes, the DWP have ignored vast chunks of evidence and the appeal has a good chance.
There is a slight question-mark over getting to the appeal though. It's in a large building (too large for walking, I'd need to be pushed in the wheelchair) in Birmingham (which is too far away for a taxi and community transport has to be pre-booked which wouldn't work for the way home as I don't know how long it will take). I'm not sure, but I really doubt that my representative from the Welfare Rights place is also going to be able to drive me there and back, not to mention sit with me, push the wheelchair, and be a shoulder to cry on if it all goes horribly wrong. Even if she could, it's not her job. Steve should be able to take me and if he can, it's all good, but we have this horror that he might not be able to - you only get 14 days notice of the Appeal date which might not be enough for him to get a day off work - and we don't know if we could find anyone else to help. So on Monday I'm calling the Welfare Rights organisation to see if they have any ideas. They must have experienced this before. Still, at least that'll be an end of it one way or another. Which is a Good Thing.
And Finally, it looks like we might be getting some help from Social Services. No word yet on what you might call Daily help, but apparently as Steve is my sole carer, we're eligible for an emergency scheme whereby if he's suddenly hospitalised or something, an emergency carer will come and "live-in" with me to fulfil his role for up to 72 hours until something more sustainable, such as a short stay in a residential home or additional visiting care, can be arranged. Certain amount of paperwork, but isn't there always.
Tuesday, July 08, 2008
Bloggers 1, MP 0
Two weeks on from the latest episode of the Remploy saga. Several thousand people have read that post, mostly thanks to links from prominent bloggers including Wat Tyler and NHS Blog Doctor.
As well as writing about the issue on my blog, I contacted my MP via the incredibly useful and informative They Work For You website. And the ball rolled...
The result of writing to my MP so far has been a pale yellow letter which arrived this morning, three lines thanking me for my correspondence and telling me that the matter is being raised with a "ministerial colleague" at DWP.
The result of blogging, however... the "Quality Matters" team at Remploy have seen my blog. They then did enough detective work to find my email address (not difficult given the amount of information they hold about me, but slightly more complicated than just clicking an 'email me' link) and sent me a nice email telling me that they are taking it seriously and starting an investigation. The investigation will be led by "a senior manager" from outside the department with whom the issues originated. They've given a timescale and provided me with a Service Level Agreement. They also replied immediately to my request that I be contacted by letter or email rather than by telephone. Even despite my usually high levels of cynicism, I'm feeling quite hopeful that the issue will be noted and taken seriously and maybe even avoided in future.
I also found out this morning that my MP is actually (sort of) connected to the DWP. He's one of the MPs who appears in this BBC News story which does a sterling job of confusing suspected or "potential" fraud, and overpayments due to cockups by the DWP, with actual Criminal Benefit Fraud as wilfully and successfully perpetrated by Very Bad People. Sigh.
As well as writing about the issue on my blog, I contacted my MP via the incredibly useful and informative They Work For You website. And the ball rolled...
The result of writing to my MP so far has been a pale yellow letter which arrived this morning, three lines thanking me for my correspondence and telling me that the matter is being raised with a "ministerial colleague" at DWP.
The result of blogging, however... the "Quality Matters" team at Remploy have seen my blog. They then did enough detective work to find my email address (not difficult given the amount of information they hold about me, but slightly more complicated than just clicking an 'email me' link) and sent me a nice email telling me that they are taking it seriously and starting an investigation. The investigation will be led by "a senior manager" from outside the department with whom the issues originated. They've given a timescale and provided me with a Service Level Agreement. They also replied immediately to my request that I be contacted by letter or email rather than by telephone. Even despite my usually high levels of cynicism, I'm feeling quite hopeful that the issue will be noted and taken seriously and maybe even avoided in future.
I also found out this morning that my MP is actually (sort of) connected to the DWP. He's one of the MPs who appears in this BBC News story which does a sterling job of confusing suspected or "potential" fraud, and overpayments due to cockups by the DWP, with actual Criminal Benefit Fraud as wilfully and successfully perpetrated by Very Bad People. Sigh.
Thursday, June 26, 2008
The Top Seekrit Project
It being several days since the recipient of the Top Seekrit Project recipificated it, I can now reveal that the Project was, in fact, this hairband.
The "pattern", such as it is, was very simple (Anna at Web Of Wool helped me figure it out).
Cast on 130 sts of 4ply yarn on 3.25mm needles.
6 rows stockinette, ending with a purl row.
Work fold line: (k2tog, yfwd) to end of row.
13 rows stockinette, ending with a purl row.
Work another fold line, (k2tog, yfwd) to end of row.
6 rows stockinette, ending with a knit row.
Cast off, embroider flowers, fold the fold lines, press, then sew the long seam along the underside of the hairband, and join the ends together.
Does anyone else find it kind of... deflating, when a month's work is condensed into seven short sentences?
I wrapped it up and sent it to my mother to look after until my sister's birthday last week. On the day itself, I phoned my sister and sung Happy Birthday at her. But she hadn't opened her presents yet (in fact I don't think she was out of bed) so I don't know if she liked it or not. Certainly she hasn't phoned, emailed, written or even texted to say thank-you... although she did text Steve to thank him for the happy-birthday text message he sent her... but then, some of you know her in Real Life. It could be that she didn't like the hairband, it could just be her being forgetful/thoughtless/rude, or it could be that I've managed to somehow upset her even from 200 miles away. Who knows.
This morning we had the first Jehovah's Witnesses since I've lived here. I opened the door and there were two women saying "hello, lovely to meet you!" and then actually trying to step up into the house. When I physically blocked them and asked who they were, they spotted that I was leaning on a walking stick. I've never seen such a look of... well, I don't know what it was. Pity? Revulsion? All remarks from that point on were addressed to the stick. Maybe they thought I was going to hit them with it. Maybe I should have done. Still, it does feel a lot more like I live here every time something like this happens. And that's nice.
Life is very steady at the moment. After the turbulence of the last twelve months or so (the benefit crap, the moving house, the new job, Christmas, the financial crisis, the further benefit crap, and any amount of nonblog Aaarg) we seem to have entered this nice, calm bay of serenity. Things are still far from perfect - money is still tight, I'm having a rough time with the illness and there's a list of things which need doing as long as my arm - but that's life. At least at the moment, everything critical is taken care of. I feel happier, more relaxed, and more fulfilled than I have done in quite some time. I think living with Steve has the curious dual benefit of being very sensible, but also very enjoyable. There are so many elements of our life together that make me disproportionately happy. One thing that gives me particular pleasure is making his lunches for him to take to work. Haute cuisine, it is not. It's basically a sandwich and a bit of fruit and some biscuits or similar. But it enables me to repay a little bit of 'looking after', and it's a simple thing, within my capabilities, that I know is appreciated, and that makes me feel good. I know it's a silly thing to blog about, but at the moment, I'm so contented, possibly more than I ever have been, and I want to kind of put that in my mental photo album to remember in the future.
The "pattern", such as it is, was very simple (Anna at Web Of Wool helped me figure it out).
Cast on 130 sts of 4ply yarn on 3.25mm needles.
6 rows stockinette, ending with a purl row.
Work fold line: (k2tog, yfwd) to end of row.
13 rows stockinette, ending with a purl row.
Work another fold line, (k2tog, yfwd) to end of row.
6 rows stockinette, ending with a knit row.
Cast off, embroider flowers, fold the fold lines, press, then sew the long seam along the underside of the hairband, and join the ends together.
Does anyone else find it kind of... deflating, when a month's work is condensed into seven short sentences?
I wrapped it up and sent it to my mother to look after until my sister's birthday last week. On the day itself, I phoned my sister and sung Happy Birthday at her. But she hadn't opened her presents yet (in fact I don't think she was out of bed) so I don't know if she liked it or not. Certainly she hasn't phoned, emailed, written or even texted to say thank-you... although she did text Steve to thank him for the happy-birthday text message he sent her... but then, some of you know her in Real Life. It could be that she didn't like the hairband, it could just be her being forgetful/thoughtless/rude, or it could be that I've managed to somehow upset her even from 200 miles away. Who knows.
This morning we had the first Jehovah's Witnesses since I've lived here. I opened the door and there were two women saying "hello, lovely to meet you!" and then actually trying to step up into the house. When I physically blocked them and asked who they were, they spotted that I was leaning on a walking stick. I've never seen such a look of... well, I don't know what it was. Pity? Revulsion? All remarks from that point on were addressed to the stick. Maybe they thought I was going to hit them with it. Maybe I should have done. Still, it does feel a lot more like I live here every time something like this happens. And that's nice.
Life is very steady at the moment. After the turbulence of the last twelve months or so (the benefit crap, the moving house, the new job, Christmas, the financial crisis, the further benefit crap, and any amount of nonblog Aaarg) we seem to have entered this nice, calm bay of serenity. Things are still far from perfect - money is still tight, I'm having a rough time with the illness and there's a list of things which need doing as long as my arm - but that's life. At least at the moment, everything critical is taken care of. I feel happier, more relaxed, and more fulfilled than I have done in quite some time. I think living with Steve has the curious dual benefit of being very sensible, but also very enjoyable. There are so many elements of our life together that make me disproportionately happy. One thing that gives me particular pleasure is making his lunches for him to take to work. Haute cuisine, it is not. It's basically a sandwich and a bit of fruit and some biscuits or similar. But it enables me to repay a little bit of 'looking after', and it's a simple thing, within my capabilities, that I know is appreciated, and that makes me feel good. I know it's a silly thing to blog about, but at the moment, I'm so contented, possibly more than I ever have been, and I want to kind of put that in my mental photo album to remember in the future.
Saturday, June 21, 2008
Naughty Remploy
The other day, I got a letter from Remploy. Here's a direct quote, with my flags in brackets:
"To enable us to validate your employment status (1) we require further evidence of your registration and job start. Therefore, we are writing to ask you to sign the enclosed documentation (2)(3) and provide us with a copy of [list of documents such as my work contract, payslips, etc]....
... We understand the inconvenience this gives you and to address this, we will give you with a £50.00 giro (sic) on receipt of this pack/evidence." (4)
To take these flags one at a time:
(1) Validate my employment status? Why? With whom? What for? The only people who need to know about my employment status are the DWP (who know), the Inland Revenue (who know), and me and my employer (who definitely know). My work is valid, my tax is valid, my NI is valid, what other validation could I possibly need? And why have they dressed it up in officialspeak to make it sound like it's something important and necessary while conveying no useful information?
(2) The "enclosed documentation" consists only of the signature pages of several forms. I have the parts of the forms which say "I confirm the above information is correct" (a couple also specify that I understand that the information I give may be checked by the DWP) but I have no idea what the above information may or may not consist of. In other words, there is no opportunity for me to actually read what they are telling me to sign. What?!? How can a company whose raison d'etre is dealing with "vulnerable adults" possibly get away with encouraging people to sign things they have not read?
(3) The dates which have already been written into these signature pages are all "27/10/07". The Jobcentre DEA didn't even begin to refer me to Remploy until our sole meeting which was 3 days after that date - and Remploy didn't contact me until early December, by which time I was happily employed. In other words, they are encouraging me to falsify evidence which, if it is checked with the DWP, will be proven false. With my signature on it.
(4) Is it just me who thinks that £50 is rather a lot of recompense for the "inconvenience" of four signatures and a few bits of paper? Even if I had to hire someone to do it for me and sent it by courier, it wouldn't cost me anything like that. Given the extreme dodginess of the false dates and the not-enclosed documentation, one might even go so far as to consider the possibility (*avoids lawsuit*) that this may, by some people, be considered tantamount to a bribe for falsifying documentation...
With all this in mind, I decided to call Remploy to find out what the hell they thought they were playing at. After a short time, the woman whose name was on the letter phoned me back (woman? Yes. I should probably point out that to the best of my knowledge the male Remploy employee who was trying to help me find a way around the hours/NI problem a few weeks ago was not involved in this at all).
First she told me to just sign the boxes indicated and pop it all in the prepaid envelope and she'd take care of the rest, nothing to worry about, and then I'd get my £50.
I told her I understood that much, but before I started signing things, I wanted to know what it was that I was actually signing. She said they were just doing some admin for their own purposes, it's nothing I need to worry about, I just need to sign the forms, and they'll give me £50.
I asked why I was being asked to sign documents I had not been given to read, she said she was just trying to save on postage costs (they're offering £50 per person and they're worried about an extra 50p postage?!). By this time she was getting really annoyed with how awkward I was being and told me that if I was going to insist on being sent the full documents then she could do that, but really, there's no need, it's nothing I need to worry about, I just have to sign the forms and then they'll give me £50.
I told her that the dates were false. She tried to explain that they had to backdate things. I told her that her false dates could be easily proven false by the DWPs own records as they predated my original referral, and that I wasn't going to sign false documentation. At this point she changed tack to "okay, fine, don't sign the forms then. Just put them through a shredder and forget about it." I find it interesting that she specified that if I wasn't going to return the paperwork, I should destroy it. Maybe, despite her incredible lack of understanding of acceptable (never mind best) practice, she's really hot on data protection... or maybe she doesn't want me to show it to anyone. Oops.
She didn't seem to get that this sort of thing just wasn't on, or why I didn't want to participate, or why I felt organisations like Remploy should really know better.
£50 is a LOT of money to me (half a week's wages! more than a week's food!) and it really is quite difficult to effectively turn down free money. I suspect there will be others who have been sent this kind of letter who've decided that £50 is £50, and cheerfully signed away.
I don't want to have missed out for nothing. I have to do something with this, "alert the proper authorities" or similar, but I don't know where to start or who the proper authorities might be. Remploy, so far as I can ascertain, is government-owned and government-funded, and I don't know who they answer to or how to complain. I did ask about their internal complaints procedure and was told that a complaint would come straight back to that department to resolve - in other words, it wouldn't go any higher up the ladder and no one would be held accountable for bad practice.
I know I'm asking this a lot lately, but what would YOU do?
"To enable us to validate your employment status (1) we require further evidence of your registration and job start. Therefore, we are writing to ask you to sign the enclosed documentation (2)(3) and provide us with a copy of [list of documents such as my work contract, payslips, etc]....
... We understand the inconvenience this gives you and to address this, we will give you with a £50.00 giro (sic) on receipt of this pack/evidence." (4)
To take these flags one at a time:
(1) Validate my employment status? Why? With whom? What for? The only people who need to know about my employment status are the DWP (who know), the Inland Revenue (who know), and me and my employer (who definitely know). My work is valid, my tax is valid, my NI is valid, what other validation could I possibly need? And why have they dressed it up in officialspeak to make it sound like it's something important and necessary while conveying no useful information?
(2) The "enclosed documentation" consists only of the signature pages of several forms. I have the parts of the forms which say "I confirm the above information is correct" (a couple also specify that I understand that the information I give may be checked by the DWP) but I have no idea what the above information may or may not consist of. In other words, there is no opportunity for me to actually read what they are telling me to sign. What?!? How can a company whose raison d'etre is dealing with "vulnerable adults" possibly get away with encouraging people to sign things they have not read?
(3) The dates which have already been written into these signature pages are all "27/10/07". The Jobcentre DEA didn't even begin to refer me to Remploy until our sole meeting which was 3 days after that date - and Remploy didn't contact me until early December, by which time I was happily employed. In other words, they are encouraging me to falsify evidence which, if it is checked with the DWP, will be proven false. With my signature on it.
(4) Is it just me who thinks that £50 is rather a lot of recompense for the "inconvenience" of four signatures and a few bits of paper? Even if I had to hire someone to do it for me and sent it by courier, it wouldn't cost me anything like that. Given the extreme dodginess of the false dates and the not-enclosed documentation, one might even go so far as to consider the possibility (*avoids lawsuit*) that this may, by some people, be considered tantamount to a bribe for falsifying documentation...
With all this in mind, I decided to call Remploy to find out what the hell they thought they were playing at. After a short time, the woman whose name was on the letter phoned me back (woman? Yes. I should probably point out that to the best of my knowledge the male Remploy employee who was trying to help me find a way around the hours/NI problem a few weeks ago was not involved in this at all).
First she told me to just sign the boxes indicated and pop it all in the prepaid envelope and she'd take care of the rest, nothing to worry about, and then I'd get my £50.
I told her I understood that much, but before I started signing things, I wanted to know what it was that I was actually signing. She said they were just doing some admin for their own purposes, it's nothing I need to worry about, I just need to sign the forms, and they'll give me £50.
I asked why I was being asked to sign documents I had not been given to read, she said she was just trying to save on postage costs (they're offering £50 per person and they're worried about an extra 50p postage?!). By this time she was getting really annoyed with how awkward I was being and told me that if I was going to insist on being sent the full documents then she could do that, but really, there's no need, it's nothing I need to worry about, I just have to sign the forms and then they'll give me £50.
I told her that the dates were false. She tried to explain that they had to backdate things. I told her that her false dates could be easily proven false by the DWPs own records as they predated my original referral, and that I wasn't going to sign false documentation. At this point she changed tack to "okay, fine, don't sign the forms then. Just put them through a shredder and forget about it." I find it interesting that she specified that if I wasn't going to return the paperwork, I should destroy it. Maybe, despite her incredible lack of understanding of acceptable (never mind best) practice, she's really hot on data protection... or maybe she doesn't want me to show it to anyone. Oops.
She didn't seem to get that this sort of thing just wasn't on, or why I didn't want to participate, or why I felt organisations like Remploy should really know better.
£50 is a LOT of money to me (half a week's wages! more than a week's food!) and it really is quite difficult to effectively turn down free money. I suspect there will be others who have been sent this kind of letter who've decided that £50 is £50, and cheerfully signed away.
I don't want to have missed out for nothing. I have to do something with this, "alert the proper authorities" or similar, but I don't know where to start or who the proper authorities might be. Remploy, so far as I can ascertain, is government-owned and government-funded, and I don't know who they answer to or how to complain. I did ask about their internal complaints procedure and was told that a complaint would come straight back to that department to resolve - in other words, it wouldn't go any higher up the ladder and no one would be held accountable for bad practice.
I know I'm asking this a lot lately, but what would YOU do?
Friday, June 20, 2008
Wahoo!
Remember the ongoing saga of the Tax Credits problems?
Today I checked my bank statement, as you do, and saw that on 9th June, a payment of just under £20 was made straight into my account with the reference "Working Tax Credit".
PANIC! I don't want Tax Credits! I don't want to be entangled with them at all! I have an ongoing dispute with them! Why are they putting money into my account with no explanation?!?
Straight on the phone to a chap called Bob, who had a dig through my file and found a letter, dated 3rd June, which has been sent to me, but hasn't arrived here yet. So he read out the relevant bits to me.
An overpayment was made to me in the tax year April 2004 to April 2005.
This Inland Revenue intended to recover this overpayment by reducing my Tax Credits payments during the tax year April 2005 to April 2006.
I spoilt this plan by getting sick and eventually losing my job in June 2005. So that is why, in July 2005, I got a bill for over £500, consisting of the original overpayment, minus the £20 they had already recovered by reducing the payments I'd received between April 2005 and June 2005.
Communications since then have been variations on a rather repetitive theme of:
"Give us money!"
"I don't have that much money. And even if I did, I'm not convinced I owe it to you."
"Oh. Okay. (pause) Give us money!"
However, the letter I haven't received yet apparently says that the Appeals and Complaints bunch have reviewed my case and decided that the overpayment was due to "official error" and as such has been written off. This means that the money they "recovered" between April and June 2005 was in fact my money, so I can have it back. That's what the mystery payment into my bank account was about.
I'm so relieved. I was going to blog about something very very naughty which Remploy have done, but this is so much better. I hated the idea of being in debt, I hated the idea that I had somehow incurred debt without knowing I was doing it, and the letters demanding repayment and threatening legal action were really, really upsetting. But it's all over now, and I don't have to deal with them again.
I would say I'll try not to spend all of my almost-£20 at once, but thinking about it, I've probably spent more than that in phone calls and postage and photocopying and so on during the three-year course of this dispute. Definitely worth it to not have a £500 debt over my head, though.
Today I checked my bank statement, as you do, and saw that on 9th June, a payment of just under £20 was made straight into my account with the reference "Working Tax Credit".
PANIC! I don't want Tax Credits! I don't want to be entangled with them at all! I have an ongoing dispute with them! Why are they putting money into my account with no explanation?!?
Straight on the phone to a chap called Bob, who had a dig through my file and found a letter, dated 3rd June, which has been sent to me, but hasn't arrived here yet. So he read out the relevant bits to me.
An overpayment was made to me in the tax year April 2004 to April 2005.
This Inland Revenue intended to recover this overpayment by reducing my Tax Credits payments during the tax year April 2005 to April 2006.
I spoilt this plan by getting sick and eventually losing my job in June 2005. So that is why, in July 2005, I got a bill for over £500, consisting of the original overpayment, minus the £20 they had already recovered by reducing the payments I'd received between April 2005 and June 2005.
Communications since then have been variations on a rather repetitive theme of:
"Give us money!"
"I don't have that much money. And even if I did, I'm not convinced I owe it to you."
"Oh. Okay. (pause) Give us money!"
However, the letter I haven't received yet apparently says that the Appeals and Complaints bunch have reviewed my case and decided that the overpayment was due to "official error" and as such has been written off. This means that the money they "recovered" between April and June 2005 was in fact my money, so I can have it back. That's what the mystery payment into my bank account was about.
I'm so relieved. I was going to blog about something very very naughty which Remploy have done, but this is so much better. I hated the idea of being in debt, I hated the idea that I had somehow incurred debt without knowing I was doing it, and the letters demanding repayment and threatening legal action were really, really upsetting. But it's all over now, and I don't have to deal with them again.
I would say I'll try not to spend all of my almost-£20 at once, but thinking about it, I've probably spent more than that in phone calls and postage and photocopying and so on during the three-year course of this dispute. Definitely worth it to not have a £500 debt over my head, though.
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Mind the gap
So, over the last few months there's been a bit of a dip in my health, and work isn't getting any easier. Okay, so work isn't meant to be easy - if it was, they wouldn't have to pay people to do it. But this isn't "work knackers me out so much I can't go clubbing," this is more "work knackers me out so much that half the time it's hit-and-miss whether I can manage to have a shower, even with assistance," and that's really taking things too far. Of my daily "spoons", I'm prepared to hand most of them over for work, but I do need a few left for attending to my essential personal care needs, my bits and bobs of housework, my relationship with Steve, my friends and family, and - dare I suggest it? - a little bit of leisure activity beyond lying in bed sporadically knitting or poking at a laptop computer in between waves of pain. And I really should keep a couple of spoons in reserve for emergencies (like unconscious boyfriends, or mornings at the CAB).
For the last few months, I've been spending spoons I don't have, and reclaiming them by using my annual leave for days off work to recover. That's not sustainable. For starters, I don't have that many days of annual leave, and besides, that's not what annual leave is for. My boss, who is very nice, encourages me to take time off sick if I need it and I have taken some sick days, but I don't want to screw over him, the company, or my own sickness record, by taking a paid sick-day every week. But by pushing my limits like this, I am damaging my health in the long and short term. This cannot continue.
Solution: reduce my regular paid hours, for reasons of ill-health - work four short days a week rather than five. My boss is amenable to the idea; however, now there is a new issue. Since I am on a very low hourly rate, dropping this many hours will mean I no longer earn enough to be paying National Insurance.
National Insurance is very important. If you haven't paid enough National Insurance contributions ("the stamp"), you can't get benefits such as Incapacity Benefit or a state pension. When you have a long-term health condition, it's important to keep this safety net in place. If you are unable to work and claiming Incapacity Benefit, your stamp is paid. If I asked my doctor to sign me off as sick, and I stopped work altogether, I would automatically go back onto the rate of Incapacity Benefit which I was on before I started work. My stamp would then be paid and I would be financially "safe".
But I don't want to stop work altogether, and my doctor agrees that I don't need to stop work altogether. I just can't safely continue working this many hours without damaging my health. I fall into a kind of No-Man's-Land. I looked into voluntary National Insurance contributions, but at £8.10 a week that's out of the question - my earnings would be reduced to below-benefits-level because of working less hours, deducting another £8.10 a week on top of that just makes the whole thing silly. Who should I call to help figure this out? Roll call!
My boss continually assured me that as soon as I knew what I needed from them by way of adjustments, he would get it sorted out for me.
My doctor said she didn't know what the rules were - her specialist field is medicine, not employment, tax or welfare - but she assured me that she would support me with whatever I needed and offered that if necessary she would write me a very specific sicknote detailing that while I needed to work reduced hours, it would be detrimental for me to stop work entirely.
The Incapacity Benefit helpline took a while to understand that I didn't want to stop work completely and then told me they would get back to me with an answer (they never did). They also recommended I call the Disability Employment Adviser (DEA) at my local Jobcentre.
The local Jobcentre DEA, who we've met before, didn't even attempt to help me find a solution when she finally deigned to call me back, but gave me an earful about how "Incapacity Benefit is not a lifestyle choice just because you feel like working less." Happily this is the level of supportiveness and understanding that I have learned to expect from her, so after a few minutes I gave up on my efforts to explain that this wasn't about "choice" or about how many hours I "felt like doing", nor about an effort to "boost my income with benefits", and just let it go.
The local Jobcentre Incapacity advisor said much the same.
"You can work less hours and make voluntary NI contributions."
"But if I work less hours, I will have less money, and not be able to afford NI contributions."
"You can claim Tax Credits if you are poor."
"No, you can't claim Tax Credits if you work less than 16 hours a week."
"oh yes... well, your partner can claim Tax Credits on the basis that he has a low income and a dependent with a long-term health problem."
"My partner's a contractor, we'd have to fill in a new set of forms every week. Besides, it's not that we're poor as a household. It's that I want to pay my own way. I want independence, not to have to rely on him for handouts."
"Benefits isn't independence. Work is independence."
"But I'll be better off on Incapacity Benefit."
"I never said that..."
The CAB told me to contact the doctor, the IB helpline and the DEA at the local Jobcentre. When I said "done that" they were pretty much out of ideas and that I probably had no option but to give up work entirely. I told them I was waiting for a call back from Remploy. They said that was my best bet, then. Oh good.
The bloke from Remploy suggested that if I got back onto Incapacity Benefit, then I would be allowed to do Permitted Work. People doing Permitted Work keep their IB, and can work up to 16 hours and keep up to £88 of their earnings each week. But except in special cases, this is only for six months (after which you either go to full-time, or stop work completely).
I asked if there was a route that was more 'sustaining employment' than 'starting employment'. He told me that New Deal for Disabled People (NDDP) is being phased out and replaced by something called Pathways to Work. Pathways to Work have been active in my local area for about a month via a private company called Working Links. According to my Remploy chap, the staff at Working Links are fairly new to the game (obviously, since they've only been here for a month) and they took over a week to get an answer to him regarding my situation. The answer was that eligibility for help from Pathways to Work is dependent on having been on Incapacity Benefit for the previous 13 weeks. Which I haven't been. I've been working. So I can't have any help, unless I'm prepared to spend a quarter of a year being completely unemployed again and then hope that I can get my job back.
That's not helpful.
The biggest help so far has come from my boss and the company accountant. We've worked out the minimum number of hours I need to work to retain my NI contributions and that is how many hours I will be working as of this week. We've had to tweak a bit, basically from now on I will only be going in four days a week (giving me Wednesdays to recuperate as well as Saturdays and Sundays), but working an extra half-hour on those days. We'll have to see how well it goes. It's still more hours than my doctor and I think I really should be doing but at this stage it's better than completely giving up work.
Here's my options.
Option one: work 17.5 hours a week. National Insurance contributions paid. Take-home pay of about £88 a week, after tax, NI, transport costs etc. Working more hours than my doctor thinks I should. Precious few 'spoons' left.
Option two: work 12 hours a week. Take-home pay of about £57 a week after voluntary NI and transport costs. About the right number of hours work for my current state of health, and enough spoons left over to attend to basic daily needs (eg mountain-climbing: no, grocery shopping: yes).
Edit: I have been informed in the comments that voluntary NI counts towards one's pension, but is not counted for an Incapacity Benefit claim.
Option three: stop work and go back on IB. National Insurance contributions paid. Take-home pay of about £85 a week. All of my time and spoons to myself. However, no colleagues to chat to, no work goals to accomplish, no acceptable answer to the question "so, what do you do for a living?" and precious little self-respect.
What would you do?
For the last few months, I've been spending spoons I don't have, and reclaiming them by using my annual leave for days off work to recover. That's not sustainable. For starters, I don't have that many days of annual leave, and besides, that's not what annual leave is for. My boss, who is very nice, encourages me to take time off sick if I need it and I have taken some sick days, but I don't want to screw over him, the company, or my own sickness record, by taking a paid sick-day every week. But by pushing my limits like this, I am damaging my health in the long and short term. This cannot continue.
Solution: reduce my regular paid hours, for reasons of ill-health - work four short days a week rather than five. My boss is amenable to the idea; however, now there is a new issue. Since I am on a very low hourly rate, dropping this many hours will mean I no longer earn enough to be paying National Insurance.
National Insurance is very important. If you haven't paid enough National Insurance contributions ("the stamp"), you can't get benefits such as Incapacity Benefit or a state pension. When you have a long-term health condition, it's important to keep this safety net in place. If you are unable to work and claiming Incapacity Benefit, your stamp is paid. If I asked my doctor to sign me off as sick, and I stopped work altogether, I would automatically go back onto the rate of Incapacity Benefit which I was on before I started work. My stamp would then be paid and I would be financially "safe".
But I don't want to stop work altogether, and my doctor agrees that I don't need to stop work altogether. I just can't safely continue working this many hours without damaging my health. I fall into a kind of No-Man's-Land. I looked into voluntary National Insurance contributions, but at £8.10 a week that's out of the question - my earnings would be reduced to below-benefits-level because of working less hours, deducting another £8.10 a week on top of that just makes the whole thing silly. Who should I call to help figure this out? Roll call!
My boss continually assured me that as soon as I knew what I needed from them by way of adjustments, he would get it sorted out for me.
My doctor said she didn't know what the rules were - her specialist field is medicine, not employment, tax or welfare - but she assured me that she would support me with whatever I needed and offered that if necessary she would write me a very specific sicknote detailing that while I needed to work reduced hours, it would be detrimental for me to stop work entirely.
The Incapacity Benefit helpline took a while to understand that I didn't want to stop work completely and then told me they would get back to me with an answer (they never did). They also recommended I call the Disability Employment Adviser (DEA) at my local Jobcentre.
The local Jobcentre DEA, who we've met before, didn't even attempt to help me find a solution when she finally deigned to call me back, but gave me an earful about how "Incapacity Benefit is not a lifestyle choice just because you feel like working less." Happily this is the level of supportiveness and understanding that I have learned to expect from her, so after a few minutes I gave up on my efforts to explain that this wasn't about "choice" or about how many hours I "felt like doing", nor about an effort to "boost my income with benefits", and just let it go.
The local Jobcentre Incapacity advisor said much the same.
"You can work less hours and make voluntary NI contributions."
"But if I work less hours, I will have less money, and not be able to afford NI contributions."
"You can claim Tax Credits if you are poor."
"No, you can't claim Tax Credits if you work less than 16 hours a week."
"oh yes... well, your partner can claim Tax Credits on the basis that he has a low income and a dependent with a long-term health problem."
"My partner's a contractor, we'd have to fill in a new set of forms every week. Besides, it's not that we're poor as a household. It's that I want to pay my own way. I want independence, not to have to rely on him for handouts."
"Benefits isn't independence. Work is independence."
"But I'll be better off on Incapacity Benefit."
"I never said that..."
The CAB told me to contact the doctor, the IB helpline and the DEA at the local Jobcentre. When I said "done that" they were pretty much out of ideas and that I probably had no option but to give up work entirely. I told them I was waiting for a call back from Remploy. They said that was my best bet, then. Oh good.
The bloke from Remploy suggested that if I got back onto Incapacity Benefit, then I would be allowed to do Permitted Work. People doing Permitted Work keep their IB, and can work up to 16 hours and keep up to £88 of their earnings each week. But except in special cases, this is only for six months (after which you either go to full-time, or stop work completely).
I asked if there was a route that was more 'sustaining employment' than 'starting employment'. He told me that New Deal for Disabled People (NDDP) is being phased out and replaced by something called Pathways to Work. Pathways to Work have been active in my local area for about a month via a private company called Working Links. According to my Remploy chap, the staff at Working Links are fairly new to the game (obviously, since they've only been here for a month) and they took over a week to get an answer to him regarding my situation. The answer was that eligibility for help from Pathways to Work is dependent on having been on Incapacity Benefit for the previous 13 weeks. Which I haven't been. I've been working. So I can't have any help, unless I'm prepared to spend a quarter of a year being completely unemployed again and then hope that I can get my job back.
That's not helpful.
The biggest help so far has come from my boss and the company accountant. We've worked out the minimum number of hours I need to work to retain my NI contributions and that is how many hours I will be working as of this week. We've had to tweak a bit, basically from now on I will only be going in four days a week (giving me Wednesdays to recuperate as well as Saturdays and Sundays), but working an extra half-hour on those days. We'll have to see how well it goes. It's still more hours than my doctor and I think I really should be doing but at this stage it's better than completely giving up work.
Here's my options.
Option one: work 17.5 hours a week. National Insurance contributions paid. Take-home pay of about £88 a week, after tax, NI, transport costs etc. Working more hours than my doctor thinks I should. Precious few 'spoons' left.
Option two: work 12 hours a week. Take-home pay of about £57 a week after voluntary NI and transport costs. About the right number of hours work for my current state of health, and enough spoons left over to attend to basic daily needs (eg mountain-climbing: no, grocery shopping: yes).
Edit: I have been informed in the comments that voluntary NI counts towards one's pension, but is not counted for an Incapacity Benefit claim.
Option three: stop work and go back on IB. National Insurance contributions paid. Take-home pay of about £85 a week. All of my time and spoons to myself. However, no colleagues to chat to, no work goals to accomplish, no acceptable answer to the question "so, what do you do for a living?" and precious little self-respect.
What would you do?
Monday, June 09, 2008
Happy
If I said that, health-wise, I was feeling worse than usual, and the paperwork/benefits stuff was still a massive steaming pile of ongoing poo, but in terms of contentement with life, I was feeling really quite good... would you know what I meant?
So, I'm not too well, which is part of why I haven't been blogging. But it's been a gorgeous weekend. I've spent most of it in the living room with the patio door open, knitting and listening to the tweeting birdies and so on. Very relaxing.
Georgette the Courgette is doing well. If you clicky this linky you will see that she has been happily installed in a grow-bag of composty goodness, with two little strawberry plants (as yet un-named) to keep her company.
And on Sunday evening, Steve and I got in the car to meet Jiva and Munkt0n at some motorway services on their way back from Alton Towers. Which was nice... sitting outside on a bench with Steve, having a cuppa, and then friends turned up and we spent the evening chatting and relaxing. Jiva gave me some spare yarny from her stash which was unexpected and nice. It really is very tempting to spend a couple of hours on Ravelry trying to find some patterns for it, but I have promised myself that I will not fill up the house with half-finished items, so I will have to finish either the jumper or the socks first.
And finally, a quick mention for Tom Scott aka Mad Cap'n Tom, who has won his student union presidency as a pirate, upsetting any number of people in the process. Mwahahahaha.
So, I'm not too well, which is part of why I haven't been blogging. But it's been a gorgeous weekend. I've spent most of it in the living room with the patio door open, knitting and listening to the tweeting birdies and so on. Very relaxing.
Georgette the Courgette is doing well. If you clicky this linky you will see that she has been happily installed in a grow-bag of composty goodness, with two little strawberry plants (as yet un-named) to keep her company.
And on Sunday evening, Steve and I got in the car to meet Jiva and Munkt0n at some motorway services on their way back from Alton Towers. Which was nice... sitting outside on a bench with Steve, having a cuppa, and then friends turned up and we spent the evening chatting and relaxing. Jiva gave me some spare yarny from her stash which was unexpected and nice. It really is very tempting to spend a couple of hours on Ravelry trying to find some patterns for it, but I have promised myself that I will not fill up the house with half-finished items, so I will have to finish either the jumper or the socks first.
And finally, a quick mention for Tom Scott aka Mad Cap'n Tom, who has won his student union presidency as a pirate, upsetting any number of people in the process. Mwahahahaha.
Monday, June 02, 2008
Almost a jumper
Today is, I feel, a day for starting with the positive. So here is a picture of my work-in-progress jumper which, you will note, only needs Sleeve #2 and a little bit of sewing to make it an Actual Garment. I have made a start on Sleeve #2 and hopefully I will have it finished in a month or so. Definitely before the end of the year.
This morning we went to see a welfare advisor about the DLA appeal. I had to do a lot of signatures in the space of about ten minutes. Some were for paperwork to be sent to DWP and others were to confirm that I am allowing CAB to retain my information and whatnot. Serious hand-ache by the end of it - you could probably arrange the paperwork into the order I signed it just by how legible my autograph is on each piece. As I understand things, the advisor we saw today won't actually deal with my appeal. His role was more to advise us on whether we should appeal and how to go about it. But he's starting the appeal process for us and he's referring my case to another organisation, whose acronym I have forgotten, and someone from there will contact us to arrange to come to see us to go over things in depth. It all seems rather convoluted but at least the ball is rolling now.
Also on the positive, once that referral comes through we should be working with a named advisor on the basis of appointments. The CAB do their best, but they're over-stretched and under-staffed (almost entirely by volunteers) so you can't make an appointment - you have to turn up and wait, often several hours. If you're not prepared to wait, the theory goes, then your problems aren't that desperate. It's as fair as it can be, although I do feel sorry for people who wait patiently for a couple of hours but then leave before they get seen because they have to pick up their kids or get to work or whatnot. Today Steve and I were waiting just over two and a half hours, or, to put it another way, we'd arrived at the exact time the centre opened but we hadn't been queuing outside the door. Appointments will be much easier, not to mention less exhausting.
That said, despite the length of the wait, it wasn't so bad this time round. Rather than being held at the CAB proper in the town centre, it was a specific "Benefits and Debt Clinic" being held at a community centre which houses a hundred and one other things including a little subsidised cafe (you know the ones, lots of fruit and fairtrade stuff, no chocolate, crisps or fizzypop). So our two and a half hour wait took place while we were comfortably seated and enjoying a cuppa.
Georgette the Courgette is doing well. We have spent £1.49 on a bag of compost and now we're just wondering whether we have to find a container to put it in or if we can just use it like a grow-bag - to phrase it another way, will she need more depth or more width in her new home?
This morning we went to see a welfare advisor about the DLA appeal. I had to do a lot of signatures in the space of about ten minutes. Some were for paperwork to be sent to DWP and others were to confirm that I am allowing CAB to retain my information and whatnot. Serious hand-ache by the end of it - you could probably arrange the paperwork into the order I signed it just by how legible my autograph is on each piece. As I understand things, the advisor we saw today won't actually deal with my appeal. His role was more to advise us on whether we should appeal and how to go about it. But he's starting the appeal process for us and he's referring my case to another organisation, whose acronym I have forgotten, and someone from there will contact us to arrange to come to see us to go over things in depth. It all seems rather convoluted but at least the ball is rolling now.
Also on the positive, once that referral comes through we should be working with a named advisor on the basis of appointments. The CAB do their best, but they're over-stretched and under-staffed (almost entirely by volunteers) so you can't make an appointment - you have to turn up and wait, often several hours. If you're not prepared to wait, the theory goes, then your problems aren't that desperate. It's as fair as it can be, although I do feel sorry for people who wait patiently for a couple of hours but then leave before they get seen because they have to pick up their kids or get to work or whatnot. Today Steve and I were waiting just over two and a half hours, or, to put it another way, we'd arrived at the exact time the centre opened but we hadn't been queuing outside the door. Appointments will be much easier, not to mention less exhausting.
That said, despite the length of the wait, it wasn't so bad this time round. Rather than being held at the CAB proper in the town centre, it was a specific "Benefits and Debt Clinic" being held at a community centre which houses a hundred and one other things including a little subsidised cafe (you know the ones, lots of fruit and fairtrade stuff, no chocolate, crisps or fizzypop). So our two and a half hour wait took place while we were comfortably seated and enjoying a cuppa.
Georgette the Courgette is doing well. We have spent £1.49 on a bag of compost and now we're just wondering whether we have to find a container to put it in or if we can just use it like a grow-bag - to phrase it another way, will she need more depth or more width in her new home?
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Crudnuggets
Turned down for DLA again.
40-odd pages of my answers to their questions, plus "supporting evidence" in the form of a specialist's report, two pages of prescriptions, five statements from different people who know me in various capacities, contact details for the people I get practical help from, a statement from my last Incapacity review from one of the DWP's own 'healthcare professionals' agreeing that (to put it in layman's terms) I'm pretty disabled and not likely to improve in the forseeable future... on top of which, my GP is supporting my claim. How much more could they possibly want or need?
Co-worker#1 is convinced that it's an administrative error of some kind - that they've lost some of the paperwork, or that there was a big stack of applications in a tray marked 'for rejection' and mine went in there by mistake.
Suggestions from other people have included that the Decision Maker looked at my massive bundle'o'papers and said something along the lines of Stuff This For A Game Of Soldiers, I Want To Be Home By 5pm; or that the daunting-ness of an Appeal is being used to discourage claimants.
I have no idea, and neither does Steve. We are going to Appeal. If nothing else, the outline of reasons given is a complete contradiction of the evidence which I and everybody else signed off as being true. For example, the letter states I am "not at risk of falling". Almost every piece of evidence that was submitted explains in plain language that faints, falls and stumbles are a several-times-a-day feature of my condition and that I regularly injure myself in the process.
Then again, the comments relating to my condition weren't the only items of fiction in that letter. The very last sentence was a beautiful example. In serious, bold font, it told me "The enclosed leaflet contains important information you should read now." Was there an enclosed leaflet? No. Were the nice helpline people surprised when I phoned and said "I have no leaflet"? No. They're sending a copy of the leaflet out to me.
*sigh*
Steve and I have spent a while on the Benefits and Work website and have downloaded a wonderful 16-page pdf about DLA Appeals, full of simple step-by-step information about what happens at each stage. The Appeals process still looks daunting, but at least now it's a known quantity of daunt.
We phoned the CAB (the CAB here is only physically open three part-days a week) who have referred us to a drop-in 'Benefits and Debt Advice Clinic' at a local health centre on Monday.
***
In other, much much much more positive news - Steve has passed his final CCNP exam with flying colours (a perfect 100% in all but one section where he only got 87% which is still significantly above the pass-mark) so hopefully the general situation will improve soon.
40-odd pages of my answers to their questions, plus "supporting evidence" in the form of a specialist's report, two pages of prescriptions, five statements from different people who know me in various capacities, contact details for the people I get practical help from, a statement from my last Incapacity review from one of the DWP's own 'healthcare professionals' agreeing that (to put it in layman's terms) I'm pretty disabled and not likely to improve in the forseeable future... on top of which, my GP is supporting my claim. How much more could they possibly want or need?
Co-worker#1 is convinced that it's an administrative error of some kind - that they've lost some of the paperwork, or that there was a big stack of applications in a tray marked 'for rejection' and mine went in there by mistake.
Suggestions from other people have included that the Decision Maker looked at my massive bundle'o'papers and said something along the lines of Stuff This For A Game Of Soldiers, I Want To Be Home By 5pm; or that the daunting-ness of an Appeal is being used to discourage claimants.
I have no idea, and neither does Steve. We are going to Appeal. If nothing else, the outline of reasons given is a complete contradiction of the evidence which I and everybody else signed off as being true. For example, the letter states I am "not at risk of falling". Almost every piece of evidence that was submitted explains in plain language that faints, falls and stumbles are a several-times-a-day feature of my condition and that I regularly injure myself in the process.
Then again, the comments relating to my condition weren't the only items of fiction in that letter. The very last sentence was a beautiful example. In serious, bold font, it told me "The enclosed leaflet contains important information you should read now." Was there an enclosed leaflet? No. Were the nice helpline people surprised when I phoned and said "I have no leaflet"? No. They're sending a copy of the leaflet out to me.
*sigh*
Steve and I have spent a while on the Benefits and Work website and have downloaded a wonderful 16-page pdf about DLA Appeals, full of simple step-by-step information about what happens at each stage. The Appeals process still looks daunting, but at least now it's a known quantity of daunt.
We phoned the CAB (the CAB here is only physically open three part-days a week) who have referred us to a drop-in 'Benefits and Debt Advice Clinic' at a local health centre on Monday.
***
In other, much much much more positive news - Steve has passed his final CCNP exam with flying colours (a perfect 100% in all but one section where he only got 87% which is still significantly above the pass-mark) so hopefully the general situation will improve soon.
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
A green thing
Ladies and gentlemen, meet Georgette the Courgette. Georgette has been given to me by my lovely friend Mandy of the Tuesday knitters. As you will see from this post, Mandy is quite the gardener.
I am not.
I wasn't sure how to respond last night when I was offered a courgette plant. In retrospect, I should have come out with something slightly less blunt than my chosen "what am I supposed to do with this, apart from kill it?" Apparently it's really easy, all I have to do is "pot it on" (wtf?) and "feed it" (bbq?) and when it produces edible fruit, cook it and eat it (lol). The offer turned into insistence and next thing I knew, Steve was driving me home with this plant on my lap.
I really am more Margo than Barbara. Even if I had the physical capacity to dig a garden, I'd still be lacking the inclination. I will do my best with Georgette (the internet has already indicated that courgettes are also known as Zucchini, and that they are amongst the easiest vegetables to cultivate, which is promising) but I suggest that no one holds their breath for an invite to share home-grown dinner with me any time soon.
I am not.
I wasn't sure how to respond last night when I was offered a courgette plant. In retrospect, I should have come out with something slightly less blunt than my chosen "what am I supposed to do with this, apart from kill it?" Apparently it's really easy, all I have to do is "pot it on" (wtf?) and "feed it" (bbq?) and when it produces edible fruit, cook it and eat it (lol). The offer turned into insistence and next thing I knew, Steve was driving me home with this plant on my lap.
I really am more Margo than Barbara. Even if I had the physical capacity to dig a garden, I'd still be lacking the inclination. I will do my best with Georgette (the internet has already indicated that courgettes are also known as Zucchini, and that they are amongst the easiest vegetables to cultivate, which is promising) but I suggest that no one holds their breath for an invite to share home-grown dinner with me any time soon.
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Still preferable to Eurovision
Steve gave me a scare yesterday evening.
It started off gently, as these things do. Late in the afternoon, he got a headache, and decided that the sensible thing to do would be to scoff half a packet of biscuits and a paracetamol tablet. He hates taking any kind of medication and only does it when there's no alternative, but it seemed to help a bit, and after a while we started thinking about dinner. We decided that fishfingers held about the right level of challenge for the evening and turned on the oven to preheat.
Steve started on the washing-up, but then he started feeling worse again and went for a lie-down. No problem, I do that all the time. So I took over the washing up, a little bit at a time like I do. About half an hour later I had finished. The oven having preheated, I decided I was feeling well enough to manage to heat up some fishfingers without close supervision, so I called up the stairs to see how many he wanted.
No response.
So I clambered up a few stairs and shouted again. And again. No response. That's quite unusual. Certainly unusual enough for me to think it worthwhile crawling the rest of the way up the stairs to investigate. I found Steve in bed, sound asleep. Aww, bless. I sat on the bed next to him and tried to wake him up.
"Steeeeeeviiiieeee....."
No response.
"Steve, wake up, it's dinnertime."
No response.
"Steve?" gentle shaking "I just want to know how many fishfingers you want."
No response.
Rather more enthusiastic shaking "Steve, wake up, stop pissing about, this isn't funny."
No response.
So I tried a few more things. The only things that got any kind of physical or audible reaction were very loud noises, vigorous shaking, and pinching him - and even then, it wasn't words, his eyes flickered but didn't open, he didn't try to pull away, he just flinched and grunted. I could not wake him up.
Now don't get me wrong, Steve is the sort of man who has deep affection for his duvet. It's practically impossible to get him out of bed and up and dressed unless there's something concrete that he has to do, like go to work or catch a train. But it's fairly easy to wake him up and he goes from asleep to responsive and brain-functioning really quickly.
Knowing how much he detests doctors and hospitals, I tried another tactic. I shook his shoulder until I got another grunt out of him and then told him loud and clear "If you don't wake up, I'm going to call 999."
No response.
Crap. This really wasn't just a love of the duvet. Something was wrong, and to do nothing and assume he'd wake up in a little while would be tantamount to negligence. But, on the other hand, he was breathing quite normally and wasn't turning funny colours, no blood, no limbs missing, no trauma, and he wasn't totally out-cold-unconscious, so was 999 appropriate?
My first thought was to call the GP, but quite apart from the fact that it was Saturday evening, Steve doesn't have a GP. Heigh-ho, NHS Direct it would have to be.
After 15 minutes on the phone to NHS Direct, giving all relevant details, and prodding and shaking and shouting at Steve as instructed (and still getting no response), the nurse put it to me that this was not normal and that she would like to put me through to a 999 operator in order to send an ambulance so that Steve could be checked over.
I come out with some stupid comments sometimes. But, "I'm sure he'll come round in a minute," after trying to rouse him for close on half an hour, has to be in the top twenty at least. She put me through.
Ambulance Control already had a certain amount of information from NHS Direct, so I just had to confirm my address and stuff. At that point, apropos of nothing, Steve moved. I told the 999 guy this, but he said that even if Steve properly woke up, he needed to be checked out anyway, and that in the meantime, I should stay with Steve, make sure he kept breathing, help him if he vomited and so on.
"No problem," said Mary.
"OK," said 999 guy. "The ambulance is on the way (I'd heard they weren't allowed to say that). Shut away any pets, open the front door of the house, and wave down the ambulance when it gets to you."
"No problem," said Mary. "Thank you. Goodbye."
As I hung up, I realised that it was in fact physically impossible to stay with Steve, in the bedroom upstairs, and also open the front door, which (and I realise this is rather unoriginal) is downstairs. Added to which, it takes me over a minute to get myself up or down a flight of stairs at the best of times. And I hadn't thought to mention this to anyone.
Just to make things even better, at this point Steve stirred again, sat upright, went horribly pale, and fell back down onto the bed again. Well, mostly onto.
Swearing may have occurred. I got him settled, although still not awake, then slid down the stairs to unlock and prop open the door. Then I sat four steps up the stairs, so that I would be able to hear any movement from Steve upstairs or an ambulance outside.
The ambulance arrived a couple of minutes later. I lurched forwards to greet it... as Mr Dazed and Confused staggered out of the bedroom to find out what was going on (well, that's what he says he meant, this being the first part of the proceedings that he has any recollection of. At the time it came out as more "wstfgl?"). He reached the bottom of the stairs at about the same time as the ambulance people. Half an hour of no responses to anything I said or did and then seconds before help arrives, he's up and about. I though only toddlers were supposed to do that?
Poor Steve then got his finger stabbed and a light shone in his eyes and cold things stuck to his chest while he was still barely awake and wondering why there were loud people in green outfits in his house. I think he'd have preferred a cup of coffee. Still, he was steadily waking up more and more, so I was happy about that. I think given a choice between feeling like a wally, and rushing to A&E with an unconscious boyfriend, I'll opt for 'wally' every time.
Eventually, the ambulance people decided that he didn't need to go to hospital but that he should see his GP (ahem) and probably see about getting painkillers that aren't paracetamol-based. I don't believe Steve has any intention of doing anything so sensible, but it was a relief to be able to re-set the evening from 'hospital?' back to the original plan of 'fishfingers'.
He's fine, though. There are two ways of telling.
Firstly, he won't stop teasing me, big meanie that he is. :(
Secondly, the ambulance people left behind the finger-stabbity-clicky thing. It's meant to be single-use. It's not any more. Engineers...
It started off gently, as these things do. Late in the afternoon, he got a headache, and decided that the sensible thing to do would be to scoff half a packet of biscuits and a paracetamol tablet. He hates taking any kind of medication and only does it when there's no alternative, but it seemed to help a bit, and after a while we started thinking about dinner. We decided that fishfingers held about the right level of challenge for the evening and turned on the oven to preheat.
Steve started on the washing-up, but then he started feeling worse again and went for a lie-down. No problem, I do that all the time. So I took over the washing up, a little bit at a time like I do. About half an hour later I had finished. The oven having preheated, I decided I was feeling well enough to manage to heat up some fishfingers without close supervision, so I called up the stairs to see how many he wanted.
No response.
So I clambered up a few stairs and shouted again. And again. No response. That's quite unusual. Certainly unusual enough for me to think it worthwhile crawling the rest of the way up the stairs to investigate. I found Steve in bed, sound asleep. Aww, bless. I sat on the bed next to him and tried to wake him up.
"Steeeeeeviiiieeee....."
No response.
"Steve, wake up, it's dinnertime."
No response.
"Steve?" gentle shaking "I just want to know how many fishfingers you want."
No response.
Rather more enthusiastic shaking "Steve, wake up, stop pissing about, this isn't funny."
No response.
So I tried a few more things. The only things that got any kind of physical or audible reaction were very loud noises, vigorous shaking, and pinching him - and even then, it wasn't words, his eyes flickered but didn't open, he didn't try to pull away, he just flinched and grunted. I could not wake him up.
Now don't get me wrong, Steve is the sort of man who has deep affection for his duvet. It's practically impossible to get him out of bed and up and dressed unless there's something concrete that he has to do, like go to work or catch a train. But it's fairly easy to wake him up and he goes from asleep to responsive and brain-functioning really quickly.
Knowing how much he detests doctors and hospitals, I tried another tactic. I shook his shoulder until I got another grunt out of him and then told him loud and clear "If you don't wake up, I'm going to call 999."
No response.
Crap. This really wasn't just a love of the duvet. Something was wrong, and to do nothing and assume he'd wake up in a little while would be tantamount to negligence. But, on the other hand, he was breathing quite normally and wasn't turning funny colours, no blood, no limbs missing, no trauma, and he wasn't totally out-cold-unconscious, so was 999 appropriate?
My first thought was to call the GP, but quite apart from the fact that it was Saturday evening, Steve doesn't have a GP. Heigh-ho, NHS Direct it would have to be.
After 15 minutes on the phone to NHS Direct, giving all relevant details, and prodding and shaking and shouting at Steve as instructed (and still getting no response), the nurse put it to me that this was not normal and that she would like to put me through to a 999 operator in order to send an ambulance so that Steve could be checked over.
I come out with some stupid comments sometimes. But, "I'm sure he'll come round in a minute," after trying to rouse him for close on half an hour, has to be in the top twenty at least. She put me through.
Ambulance Control already had a certain amount of information from NHS Direct, so I just had to confirm my address and stuff. At that point, apropos of nothing, Steve moved. I told the 999 guy this, but he said that even if Steve properly woke up, he needed to be checked out anyway, and that in the meantime, I should stay with Steve, make sure he kept breathing, help him if he vomited and so on.
"No problem," said Mary.
"OK," said 999 guy. "The ambulance is on the way (I'd heard they weren't allowed to say that). Shut away any pets, open the front door of the house, and wave down the ambulance when it gets to you."
"No problem," said Mary. "Thank you. Goodbye."
As I hung up, I realised that it was in fact physically impossible to stay with Steve, in the bedroom upstairs, and also open the front door, which (and I realise this is rather unoriginal) is downstairs. Added to which, it takes me over a minute to get myself up or down a flight of stairs at the best of times. And I hadn't thought to mention this to anyone.
Just to make things even better, at this point Steve stirred again, sat upright, went horribly pale, and fell back down onto the bed again. Well, mostly onto.
Swearing may have occurred. I got him settled, although still not awake, then slid down the stairs to unlock and prop open the door. Then I sat four steps up the stairs, so that I would be able to hear any movement from Steve upstairs or an ambulance outside.
The ambulance arrived a couple of minutes later. I lurched forwards to greet it... as Mr Dazed and Confused staggered out of the bedroom to find out what was going on (well, that's what he says he meant, this being the first part of the proceedings that he has any recollection of. At the time it came out as more "wstfgl?"). He reached the bottom of the stairs at about the same time as the ambulance people. Half an hour of no responses to anything I said or did and then seconds before help arrives, he's up and about. I though only toddlers were supposed to do that?
Poor Steve then got his finger stabbed and a light shone in his eyes and cold things stuck to his chest while he was still barely awake and wondering why there were loud people in green outfits in his house. I think he'd have preferred a cup of coffee. Still, he was steadily waking up more and more, so I was happy about that. I think given a choice between feeling like a wally, and rushing to A&E with an unconscious boyfriend, I'll opt for 'wally' every time.
Eventually, the ambulance people decided that he didn't need to go to hospital but that he should see his GP (ahem) and probably see about getting painkillers that aren't paracetamol-based. I don't believe Steve has any intention of doing anything so sensible, but it was a relief to be able to re-set the evening from 'hospital?' back to the original plan of 'fishfingers'.
He's fine, though. There are two ways of telling.
Firstly, he won't stop teasing me, big meanie that he is. :(
Secondly, the ambulance people left behind the finger-stabbity-clicky thing. It's meant to be single-use. It's not any more. Engineers...
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Finished Object: Birthday socks
Hooray, hooray, what a wonderful day, for I have finished my Birthday Socks!
Actually I finished them a few days ago, but what with the miserable weather and everything going on, I didn't get round to photographing them. And what with the miserable Unbloggables going on, I didn't get round to blogging about socks, because really, I have too many things in my life to care about this month which is kind of making knitting accomplishments fade into the back files of my brain. And you can see how bright these socks are - that's some serious fading.
If there's something I'm supposed to be doing for you (writing or making or calling or fixing or whatever) and I haven't done it or I'm late with it, I'm honestly sorry. Odds are I haven't forgotten (Clare and Anne in particular, you are on the Whiteboard of Memory and I will get to it) but a reminder never hurts.
I have also finished and photographed the Top Seekrit Project. I will publish the pictures and the pattern (such as it is) in about a month, when the recipient has recipificated it. Suffice to say I am happy with it, and having a bit of an Umm-Ah about whether I should make another one for myself.
Actually I finished them a few days ago, but what with the miserable weather and everything going on, I didn't get round to photographing them. And what with the miserable Unbloggables going on, I didn't get round to blogging about socks, because really, I have too many things in my life to care about this month which is kind of making knitting accomplishments fade into the back files of my brain. And you can see how bright these socks are - that's some serious fading.
If there's something I'm supposed to be doing for you (writing or making or calling or fixing or whatever) and I haven't done it or I'm late with it, I'm honestly sorry. Odds are I haven't forgotten (Clare and Anne in particular, you are on the Whiteboard of Memory and I will get to it) but a reminder never hurts.
I have also finished and photographed the Top Seekrit Project. I will publish the pictures and the pattern (such as it is) in about a month, when the recipient has recipificated it. Suffice to say I am happy with it, and having a bit of an Umm-Ah about whether I should make another one for myself.
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