Okay, a ‘little’ more spring-ish today, just a little. Didn’t actually shiver as i ran to the car and good lord, i’ve just felt the radiators and they aren’t on!
Most of today has been taken up with education cunningly fitted in around an MOT debacle. We left for the 2pm appointment, arrived 5 minutes early, deposited car and made our way to the convenient soft play centre next door. We rarely go to this one anymore as it only caters for those up to and including 6 year old so Fran has been too old. However, she and i took games and a workbook (history cgp book) and spent some time doing the Ancient Greek barely surface scraping depth and playing at making words out of letter tiles. Felt rather odd as i’ve been gonig there since she was 2 or so and often mused about how eventually she would be too old and today she was. Everyone had a lovely time though actually and Maddy rose to the role of biggest playing sister magnificently. Fran and i got some nice time together, so we might do it more often.
Car failed, as it habitually does, on onew tyre and one headlamp bulb (i don’t know why but i ALWAYS have to go and get a tyre and buy a bulb regardless of what car it is) so we hurried up the road for the tyre. After it was fitted i realised i only had card that i didn’t know the PIN for (why?) and they didn’t take cheques. Offered to leave the children as surety while i went off for alternative payment methods but they looked slightly pained by the idea and allowed me to leave without paying or abandoning offspring. So legged it back to the harrassed looking MOT man (it all has to be done in time slots on a computer now or something?), realised at that point they only took cheques but i had the wrong guarantee card, looked winsome, legged it home, found cards and all but one ballet shoes (as per usual) of ballet outfits, rushed back to pay for tyre, rushed back to ballet. All of which meant i went back and forward over the width of the city 6 times today. 🙄
However, it passed and only cost £100 for the tyre and test (which is good as now would be a bad time for it to need anything expensive!) and i shall now randomly mention the word ocean, which for some reason was the only word in last years MOT test post that would bring up the test date on my blog. Which i’ll need, because i habitually lose the certificate immediately after taxing the car. Though you can do that online now apparently, so maybe i won’t. (How do they check your insurance if you do it online? And if they can because they have it on a cross linked database, WHY THE FUCK can’t they have a similar database for Child Tax Credits, the ongoing saga of which is slowly driving me to a state of raving mania???? “Oh no Mrs Puddle, we aren’t allowed to know your income details… it’s the Data Protection Act…FFS…)
Anyway.
Aside from all that we did lots more Studydog, EC, Maddy did maths and endless sign writing, Fran is deeply into The Twits and a set of books on the lives of Famous Artists, made it to dancing and Auntie Kate came round for a good natter.
Now i just need spring and i’m away. Spring in a new house will be nice. I got a call today to say that we were invited to have our New Home Initiation Test (no that can’t be right, it must be something else… ah, New Home Familiarisation Visit, that was it) to learn where our stop cocks are. 😆 I quite like this new house buying thing; this visit feels a bit like going for a 20 week scan, everyone fussing, making you feel important and special and generally fawning over you. In fact, perhaps if i just moved to a brand new house every 3 years from now on, i’lll manage to never feel broody again. 😆
“(How do they check your insurance if you do it online? And if they can because they have it on a cross linked database, WHY THE FUCK can’t they have a similar database for Child Tax Credits, the ongoing saga of which is slowly driving me to a state of raving mania???? “Oh no Mrs Puddle, we aren’t allowed to know your income details… it’s the Data Protection Act…FFS…)”
I don’t know – but they can. Because I got my tax online this time. Presumably they passed a law we didn’t notice. Hey, if they abolish parliament and bring in id cards, we probably won’t ever need to cross reference anythign ever again :/
Oh hurrah – i hope they deliver that if they’ve paid all your legals!!!!
Hah, they couldn’t find *my* insurance when i tried to renew the tax for the van online today. I was annoyed and pleased all at the same time 😕
So where are you moving to Merry? xx
Same town, little development of new houses. Quite excited again, now i’ve overcome my “WTF are we doing!!!!!????!?!?!?” moment!
So they do have it all accessible to them then? I’m not at all happy about that in one way, it feels slightly freaky, though it might save that 4.55pm 31st of the month dash to the PO i suppose.
Given that if you have a car on the road you are required by law to have it insured (I think), it seems perfectly reasonable for the tax people (and for that matter the police) to have access to this information……I think.
Well yes, it does. But then, i’m required b y law to let them know what we earn and yet oddly, despite them having on one database the amounts we earn, they aren’t allowed to circumnavigate a whole lot of stress to LOOK at what we earn in order to work out the correct amount of tax credits we are entitled to. I mean, is there a person in the land who would rather wrestle with them about it, than have them marry up two National Insurance Databases?
And if they can’t do that “due to the DPA” then how come they can have a database that connects our car, our insurance and our MOT? What about the DPA there? And how come no one MENTIONED that it was going to happen?
I’m no Jax… i don’t get easily distressed about these things ;)… but this one strikes me as a tad big brotherish, even if it is helpful. I don’t want car crime, document crime or indeed unroadworthy vehicles on the road but well… well… hm.
I think it smacks of deeply unfair that they have a database that will be SO completely cohesive, when the other is so completely incohesive/incorherent etc etc etc.
You know, my mum got a full caution the other day for an out of date tax disk?!?!??!!
Sounds a bit of a manic day Merry! Ours is a new house too – so we had that familiarisation visit thingy too – very bizarre. But hey, you have the best bit of new house buying to come yet – the moving in gift they give you – nice bottle of champers , a big fruit bowl and chocolate!
I am so disorganised with this every year, I *always* loose my M.O.T/Insurance certificates and have to get replacements. I always leave the car tax until the last day too (hangs head in shame).
Oi, I’m not easily distressed!
I’d far rather tbh that they sorted out the tax databases (for pity’s sake, it’s all tax!) than did this with company databases for car tax. None of it is being done for our convenience after all – and it doesn’t even look like it is.
You are so 😉
I don’t think you are in a minority. 🙂
I’m so glad it’s not just me that loses all the bits of paper, leaves it till the last minute, etc. I feel so much better now 😉
I dunno….
Do I feel comfortable with all sorts of agencies knowing my income?
Do I feel comfortable with all sorts of agencies knowing whether I own a car?
Not bovvered on either front to be honest.
Been thinking about this…
this is basically stupid. In the case of tax credits and income tax, surely we aren’t talking about separate agencies. We’re talking about tax. It goes to the government (um, hmrc I believe they are calling themselves now, but I stand ready to be corrected) and tax credits come back from the government. Different depts, possibly, but not separate agencies, and if they *are* separate agencies, well that’s just inefficient, and probably goes a long way towards explaining why they stuff it up so often.
Oh yes.
But in the car tax question, you aren’t talking about different depts. You are talking about separate organisations – a govn dept, insurance companies and garages all combining information.
It’s not that it bothers me that they are doing it as such – I think that cars should be insured and moted before they go anywhere near the road – it bothers me that it appears to be easy to set up information sharing to suit the government (easier to fine ppl for not paying car tax) but not when it doesn’t suit them – ie actually paying tax credits in a sensible and efficient way.
What am I talking about? Anyone would think that I thought govn was supposed to be there to serve the ppl.
I’ll get my coat.
I absolutely agree with you Jax.
The tax thing does my nut. I currently owe them £600 of money i was actually entitled to because we were told we had done everything we needed to but in fact hadn’t, regarding figures they were more able to get information about than we were! I’ve wasted countless hours, brain cells and health points on it and have now given up claiming for it, even thoguh i think we are actually still entitled to it.
*rolls eyes*
The car thing; it’s fine in every way and will be endlessly more convenient for me, except, like you say, that it is a bit unnerving to know they’ve just gone and done it. By the time they add in knowing every journety we’ve made and combining that with insurance companies to check we don’t pay a policy for 5000 miles per year when we do 8000, well…
I’ll get mine too.
I would like to know how many ppl have stopped giving up claiming tax credits although they should get them because the hassle is too great – I gave up. We were entitled up til September but I missed a date because the dates for the returns of tax credit are different to those for tax returns overall, and the aggravation since then…
Jax,
I agree with your point, in both cases the information that is being shared (insurance/MOT/road tax) and could be shared (income/tax credit) does not cause me a problem, but it does piss me off to see a multiple agency information sharing system set up for the purpose of increasing government revenue but a single agency information sharing system NOT set up for the purpose of reducing government revenue (revenue they are not entitle to). Of course they could argue that it is for our own protenction they are holding on to our money… or maybe it is a cunning advertisement for ID cards… “Look how much easier it will be when we have a national database to sort all this out; you can claim your tax credits…. and we can trace all that undeclared income you’ve been hiding, trace your movements, bring up your children etc etc.”
Hang on, wasn’t it my point first?
I know i don’t say anything worthwhile often, but i did say that one!!!!!
it was yours – I just ranted about it in more detail 🙂
simon, I’ve wondered that too.