General Chat

Concerning the readies, do you have enough ? Or do you use plastic or a cheque ?

Never enough David ;-)

That's what your back pocket's for <3

Plastic or bank transfer.
The last time we wrote a cheque was about 2 years ago.

A certain amount of cash is always welcome, but for payment of bills and taxes
cheque or plastic makes sense. Payments can then be traced to and from. Cash ?
how do you trace cash ? :-S :-|

Cash is always good, just in case! I was buying fuel at a garage recently when a car caught fire. Everything went into lock down and only cash could be used to pay. I was the only one who had enough on me to pay for my fuel. The others were all delayed having to queue to complete lengthy forms before they could go.

Cash is still needed for most car park machines, to pay the window cleaner etc, although our boiler service man now carries a portable card reader for payment

I use a credit card where possible as there is buyer protection on purchases over £100 up to a quite high limit.

I expect use of cash will become less and less as time goes by...............then once the option goes I expect card charges will increase or be brought in where there aren't any yet! :-S

Cash can only be traced if there are receipts given David.

Thank you Annx. I'm agreeing with you. I'm a kind of eejit. I'm living in

the best bungalow I've ever owned or am like to own, slowly going broke.

I have I confess hired a succession of cowboys to work on my home, at enormous

expense, for bog standard work. All paid CASH up front. Shows the truth in the saying

FOOLS NEVER LEARN. The current self titled !clerk of of works" took two years to


install a flat pack kitchen !! My SIL had a 4 bedroom bungalow built for $A 270.000

in 10 days nearly 3 years ago. Cowboy and SIL communicate by phone and e-mail.

Every picture tells a story don't it ? :-(

Few of us haven't been an eejit at some time in our lives David so don't get stuck in that deep rut of self blame. As they say 'don't look back as you aren't going that way'.

I think we all slowly get financially poorer after we retire. New things appear we couldn't dream of like fantastic tvs, mobile phones, tablets, cordless appliances to make life easier. Then new expenses like extra trips to the GP, needing glasses and most car parks now having a charge, especially at hospitals.

At least being retired and 'having time' is a priceless thing! Time to see the flowers and nature, time to read, time to do FH. :-)

This is one reason I don't want to own a house and consider my rent to be good value.

It is in the interests of the housing association to keep their housing stock in good condition and they know who they are employing. Even when the cowboy heating engineers they contracted left a plug off the water pipe and saturated my wall all the way through it was their problem to sue them if they wished.

I never could understand why people rushed to buy up their social housing.

As for cash, it is in the big Rolo!

OH took a friend to Bingo and while he was there he won an Easter egg with tiny Rolos in a tin shaped like a Rolo and that is where we always kept the float for the quiz.

Annx, Sharron, I am approaching the age of 73 crippled. My folly plus a disease caught in hospital.I'm now wary of the Doctor as I sued the NHS and lost. The NHS
includes my GP. I fear she could write me off as not a full shilling. So I don't bother the
NHS as a whole. Sad innit ? I've been posting on GR long enough now for you all to
know me by now. :-| :-P

Apart from myself, who else has left their account in the same bank branch since 1968? ;-)

David, your GP isn't allowed to write you off as not being the full shilling! To make that assessment GP's have to do umpteen tests, consult another GP and, get a Psychiatrist report. I'm sure others on this forum have discussed this with you and pointed out the same thing. It's a long thorough, painstaking procedure not something a GP is allowed to assess without additional professional input. So not to consult your GP when you feel it its necessary is just not sensible. If you feel uncomfortable, then change your GP or find another Practice

I started a TSB savings account when I started High School in 1964 because they had a scheme where you put your book and money in an envelope which was posted into a box in the hall and they did whatever they did and returned the book in time for next week with an envelope.

I just kept the account hen I left school and used it in town, especially through the years when there was a teller there with a wonderful wig which kind of migrated. I probably saved more when he was in there!

Somehow they became Lloyds but I still have the same account.

The fact their notes didn't have any mention of what they told you at the time means just that David. That things couldn't be proved one way or the other doesn't mean you lost......more a checkmate really as nothing could be concluded. Do you not think your GP would have done the same in your shoes? For all you know she may secretly sympathise.

Dermot I'm afraid I have been guilty of the same since 1974! Yet I persuaded OH to change his bank account a few years ago. My excuse is that it is a free one and has free travel insurance, but I'm probably past the upper age limit for that now! Mental note to check it out.

David we use a certain amount of cash drawn each week to fund visits to coffee shops, papers, the window cleaner other small buys.. I write a cheque ever 8 weeks for my chiropodist who doesn't take credit cards. We also, at the moment pay one of the seldom used credit cards by cheque, this card only used abroad as no extra payment to put payments into GBP we can't pay this one on line as we don't belong to their bank. Other than that we use mainly credit cards for everything.

Dermot We opened our bank accounts (joint and personal) with National Provincial in 1958/9, they were taken over by Nat West and we are still with them. In that time we have been overdrawn twice. Once their fault when they took a payment before the salary went in. The other time in the 60s when I had a lovely letter from the manager suggesting gently that the idea was for me to bank with them not vice versa. (can't imagine them doing that now).

I question my own ability for A) losing losing so much CASH to cowboys

and B) allowing my wife to lose a whole lot more.

When there are so many skilled, competent trades people looking for work

it is bad judgement to hire and trust the "black economy" :-S

David, you took your eye off the ball as you were not yourself having had that very nasty accident and all the problems that followed. It must have been a very worrying time for you. See it as a lesson learned.

Indeed David, look on the whole episode as a lesson learnt! We've all made mistakes in our lives, we hopefully learn by them and put them behind us. You can't change the past, what's done is done, but we can all learn by the past and make different choices in the future. Your GP may well view your situation with sympathy, but unless you chat to him/her you'll simply never find out!

We use cash a lot .................. we refuse to use debit cards as there have been so many frauds involving the readers. I even refuse to tap or touch the screen with a credit card for the same reason.

We pay cash at the grocery store even for a large weekly shop, at the liquor store, coffee shop, butcher, for my physiotherapist, etc etc.

We use credit cards at the pharmacy for prescription drugs, for big buys, and when shopping online.

I pay all credit card bills, and other bills by online transfer. We used to pay them by transfer at the bank.

I use cheques now mainly to send birthday and Christmas presents to our 5 great-nieces and 1 gt-nephew. Plus there are a couple of subscriptions that we pay that are easier to do by cheque than credit card because of various problems we've had with them ............. National Georgraphic being one, for some unknown reason!

We have had the same joint chequing and saving accounts since we arrived here in 1968, and I have had the same individual account since the mid-1980s. I don't think that is particularly unusual .............. people just don't shop around for better deals in banking and as long as there are no problems then you don't change banks. That's what happened to me ........... I opened my separate account at one bank back in 1970 but had a major argument with the manager about 15 years later, walked up the street to the bank where we had our other accounts and opened new accounts there. I still kept the credit card with the other bank though as it was a No Fee one, and I still use it. ;-)


You are wasting a lot of time of your valuable life pondering on what happened and your grievances. It can't be helping your mental or physical health.

With your problems, you need to be seeing a doctor regularly.

If your GP doesn't want to see you, she will tell you, but I'm sure that she is professional enough to ignore your complaint ............... after all, it was really the specialists your were angry at, wasn't it and not her????

Remember, she is IN the NHS, but she is not on the Board or the Grievance investigators. She may well have known sweet fanny adam about what went on, what you were told or not told.

She is a SE GP and senior partner. A good Doctor and the only connection between her and my leg was the correspondence sent to her by the orthopaedic surgeon.

Ten minutes is all you get in her presence. Would take that long to get past the preamble. Prognosis is still the same. Last time I saw her was over 6 years ago in Tesco ;-)