further bit about wills

21/01/2008 by paul.

Having thought, earlier in the month,  about the fees that professional executors charge, I decided to re-write my will. The previous version appointed a firm of professions administrators to act on my behalf. 
This I have now done and the administrators are now in the family. Whilst re-writing the will, it occurred to me that there existed an opportunity to save further monies, by expressing the wish that ( in due course) no undue costs should be occurred in the purchase of an elaborate coffin etc. It seems absolutely crazy that such sums are spent on a bit of wood that will lie rotting in the ground.  I thought about the provision for a highly ecco-friendly cardboard coffin. Then Mary e-mailed me a link to a site that advertises a much more obscure means of disposal……http://www.heavenlystarsfireworks.com/…….  it is so “bad taste” that it is almost demands consideration.
I guess that cremation is a pre-requisite…..the mind boggles, otherwise  

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Global warming

09/01/2008 by paul.

Am currently reading “A short history of everything” by Bill Bryson.  I first saw the book on Nina’s bookshelf in Bermuda and started reading it, did not want to nick her copy, so bought a copy when I got back home and continued reading. Have to recommend it….tried Stephen Hawkins history of….. once, but had to give up (just after the first chapter).     In a section about Ice Ages, it is written that a guy by the name of Alexander von Humboldt, once observed that there are 3 stages to any scientific discovery
1. denial
2. denial of any importance
3. acceptance and give credit for the discovery to the wrong person
I was reminded of this whilst I driving up the motorway, listening to a discussion on Global Warming
 The ”leader” of the free world..JWB (him who seems to have trouble talking in joined up words), views on Global warming seem to confirm this theory
1. There is no global warming
2. Well ! Ok but it’s not that important anyway
3. We will lead the world in the fight against it

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A building society

09/01/2008 by paul.

Many years ago, mum & dad had their mortgage with a certain building society….for the sake of arguement, lets call it the Halifax.  When the mortgage was paid off, the account was left open in order that the halifax could provide storage for the deeds. This service was free of charge. The halifax also provided the house, buildings insurance policy and automatically renewed it every year. Every year, even after the mortgage was paid off, the halifax automatically added the cost of the insurance policy to the mortgage account. This meant that the mortgage account immediately acquired a debt, onto which the halifax applied an interest charge. This in turn, meant that the total payment for the simple insurance policy increased from a position of “uncompetitiveness” to even greater “uncompetitiveness”. 
Last year, upon discovey of this, Mary visited the local branch of the b/society to
(1) pay off the accumulated debt and
(2) instructed the b/society to cease with this proceedure. 
That was early last year, so a few months ago, aware that the policy was due for renewal at the end of the year and that most financial institution’s track record for remembering instructions given to one of their branches, was not particularly good, I wrote on behalf of mum, confirming that they should “on no account” add the insurance premium to the mortgage account.   But, to send a new quote and if they were competitive, mum would send a cheque to cover the premium  (the letter was signed by mum). 
Guess what ? early Dec. the halifax  wrote to say that they could not comply with mum’s instructions and it was their policy to continue to automatically debit the mortgage account. They further added that, if mum wished otherwise, she should contact them to instruct as such   ????!!!!####
What the bl##dy hell did they [Ms Gemma Sharpe, Customer Service representative] think the original letter was for in the first place ?  
I felt the urge to contact their help desk and ask why such an obvious, “job experience” girl was allowed to answer correspondence from clients, but have long realised that, if you get shirty with help desks, you get nowhere. So I rang them and although they agreed that mum’s letter was clearly an instrution to change their method of charging for the insurance, they further wished mum to ring them direct.  Luckily martin was visiting mum at the time and he rang them, with mum present, and cancelled the policy.  
Paddy, has since renewed the policy, online with another company, at a fraction of the halifax price

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Solicitors and family wills - a lesson

08/01/2008 by paul.

Am currently working my way through a load of old papers that are in mum’s correpondence folders. Amongst them are a number of copies of old wills, together with letters and accounts from the respective administrators of those wills (mainly solicitors).
Grandad mathews and great aunt mathews, being a couple of them. One in particular (Miss T. Mathews) makes interesting reading.
Total assets =£489.87, left in equal shares amongst 5 beneficiaries. The final account received fom the solicitors shows the following - 
Solicitors costs for administration of the will - £270.75
Balance, divided by number of beneficiaries = £123.75
Sum for each beneficiary = £24.75
So, the solicitor received £270.75  from the will and the beneficiaries received £24.75  each.
Hmmm ! There is a clear lesson here. If the will is a simple one (and I guess that most are), appoint a couple of the beneficiaries as administrators and keep well away from the professionals.

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Hello family, world, or whoever !

08/01/2008 by admin.

 
Welcome to the nash family blog.
It is early January, the post-holiday blues have set in. It is cold, wet and summer holidays are a long way away. I have just paid £1.11/litre for my fuel and I am not happy.  Hence the creation of this blog.

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