It seems a lot of us have been duped by a company called 'Click Management' who purport to give a one-month no obligation trial to have your details appear at the top of Google when specified keywords are entered in the browser. They then send you by email a one-year contract and charge your credit card. They fail to deliver the service. All attempts to cancel fail, and they threaten legal action if you manage to stop them debiting your card (and this isn't straightforward - see below).
The key element of the scam is that they get you to give them your credit card or, worse still, your debit card number. They accept no other method of payment. Herein lies the moral of the story. Never give your debit or credit card number as a means of payment to a telephone caller. And don't believe the old saw that if you pay by credit card for anything that you are protected. Try getting the credit card company to stop them continuing to debit your card, let alone refunding monies. They can't or won't. Appalling. Insist on a standing order, or credit invoice. Then you remain in control.
Monday, 26 April 2010
Wednesday, 7 April 2010
Miracle at Westminster - FHL Rules Repeal Abandoned
After my blog entitled "Commercial Racism" lambasted the Labour government, they were last night forced to drop these plans along with two other measures as the price for opposition support for the Finance Bill. Lobbying does work, it seems, and a lot of praise needs to go to those who campaigned relentlessly on behalf of self caterers and the Tourism industry generally, including our friends at Visit Scotland, Visit Britain and the ASSC.
But we must not relax. Labour have pledged to re-introduce it if they are re-elected. Everyone in the Tourism sector should avoid voting Labour. Not just self caterers. The disgraceful conduct of this government in attempting to repeal the Furnished Holiday Lettings (FHL) Rules without any consultation is indicative of a wholesale disregard and contempt for this industry and the many small businesses that underpin it.
In making the re-introduction pledge they have made a major political blunder in my opinion. Better to have said nothing and accepted the defeat with good grace. They may then have hoped that some otherwise Labour supporters might have short memories and retained their votes - and not just from Tourism professionals, but from cider drinkers, too! As it is, we must be ever more determined to keep out those who have shown no compunction in betraying the trust of a whole industry to safeguard it for the nation.
But we must not relax. Labour have pledged to re-introduce it if they are re-elected. Everyone in the Tourism sector should avoid voting Labour. Not just self caterers. The disgraceful conduct of this government in attempting to repeal the Furnished Holiday Lettings (FHL) Rules without any consultation is indicative of a wholesale disregard and contempt for this industry and the many small businesses that underpin it.
In making the re-introduction pledge they have made a major political blunder in my opinion. Better to have said nothing and accepted the defeat with good grace. They may then have hoped that some otherwise Labour supporters might have short memories and retained their votes - and not just from Tourism professionals, but from cider drinkers, too! As it is, we must be ever more determined to keep out those who have shown no compunction in betraying the trust of a whole industry to safeguard it for the nation.
Tuesday, 6 April 2010
Missing a Trick - Using a Database to Improve Service
Kenny Harris is President of the Scottish Chapter of the Professional Speakers Association and my sponsor in the PSA. Reading one of his highly entertaining blogs (http://www.kennyharrisblog.blogspot.com/) about the ‘database trick’ pressed my Victor Meldrew button.
The ‘database trick’ is the use of a database to record information about people – guests, customers, whoever – and using it to ‘remember’ them when they come again or call you so that you can appear omniscient about them and make them feel special. The point here is that it is not ‘cheating’. Well, it is really. But there is no need to pretend you really remembered them. It is still good customer service in that you bothered to do it at all.
Anyway, my ‘gromp’ (grumpy old man rant) on this topic is about buying items in certain (electrical) retail stores, in particular one (or two) I am going to call ‘Dixies’. They have to take your name and address every time you buy. I’ve lost count of the times I have lost my rag with the poor old assistant and lambasted him/her with my “haven’t you heard of databases” speech. “I’m an existing customer. Why don’t you know my address? Why don’t you know everything I’ve ever bought from you? Why don’t you know I give this bloody speech every time I come in to your stores and have security stop me at the door!?”
I spend a lot of time advising small businesses of ways that they can use the same methods and techniques that larger businesses use but spend millions on. Here’s one that a small business can do but a large respected national retailer seems unable. No doubt they have a reason. But they’ve lost me – in more ways than one. I’ve stopped buying there.
And yes, I’ve written and told them.
The ‘database trick’ is the use of a database to record information about people – guests, customers, whoever – and using it to ‘remember’ them when they come again or call you so that you can appear omniscient about them and make them feel special. The point here is that it is not ‘cheating’. Well, it is really. But there is no need to pretend you really remembered them. It is still good customer service in that you bothered to do it at all.
Anyway, my ‘gromp’ (grumpy old man rant) on this topic is about buying items in certain (electrical) retail stores, in particular one (or two) I am going to call ‘Dixies’. They have to take your name and address every time you buy. I’ve lost count of the times I have lost my rag with the poor old assistant and lambasted him/her with my “haven’t you heard of databases” speech. “I’m an existing customer. Why don’t you know my address? Why don’t you know everything I’ve ever bought from you? Why don’t you know I give this bloody speech every time I come in to your stores and have security stop me at the door!?”
I spend a lot of time advising small businesses of ways that they can use the same methods and techniques that larger businesses use but spend millions on. Here’s one that a small business can do but a large respected national retailer seems unable. No doubt they have a reason. But they’ve lost me – in more ways than one. I’ve stopped buying there.
And yes, I’ve written and told them.
Thursday, 1 April 2010
The Rates of Change - Rateable Value Assessments
Businesses all over the country are at this time receiving Revaluation notices in respect of business properties from their regional assessor.
The evidence is that, as widely predicted and feared, the new rateable values assessed are orders of magnitude higher than the old ones. The increase in costs that this will trigger is potentially crippling. The Scottish parliament has helpfully introduced Small Business Relief (SBR), which in recent years has reduced the burden of business rates substantially, in some cases completely. But the effect of this increase in rateable value will be to push most businesses beyond historical SBR thresholds. Even those maintaining current levels of entitlement will be vulnerable to any changes in policy on this relief in the future such that the impact of the rateable value reassessments would only be delayed.
Even if SBR remains untouched, this increase in rateable value will be the basis for assessment by Scottish Water for businesses for whom the installation of water meters is impractical, and for all businesses for the next few years during the transitional charging period where water rates are assessed on a combination of actual metered use and rateable values. The increases in recent years by the water companies alone have been nothing short of obscene. A potential further doubling of these costs overnight is taking obscenity beyond pornography in its distastefulness. And this at a time when property-based businesses are badly affected by other Machiavellian instruments of torture, such as the current government’s repeal of the Furnished Holiday Lettings (FHL) Rules that mean many self catering holiday businesses will seriously have to consider ceasing trading.
In fact, the rateable values being assessed on self catering properties will be particularly unreasonable. Many of these “cottages” are not previous domestic dwellings being re-used, but are purpose-built conversions of old outbuildings as holiday lets, which by design are not intended for permanent occupation. In particular, the living space is often very small relative to the number of beds and only works acceptably for short occupancy in the knowledge that guests, as holiday-makers, will spend most of their stay away from the accommodation. Yet the rateable values now being placed on them will result in charges sometimes greater than those of domestic rates paid on family homes many times their physical size.
Of course, such assessments should be appealed. In this case, though, I am strangely hopeful that many deserving cases will be heeded.
The evidence is that, as widely predicted and feared, the new rateable values assessed are orders of magnitude higher than the old ones. The increase in costs that this will trigger is potentially crippling. The Scottish parliament has helpfully introduced Small Business Relief (SBR), which in recent years has reduced the burden of business rates substantially, in some cases completely. But the effect of this increase in rateable value will be to push most businesses beyond historical SBR thresholds. Even those maintaining current levels of entitlement will be vulnerable to any changes in policy on this relief in the future such that the impact of the rateable value reassessments would only be delayed.
Even if SBR remains untouched, this increase in rateable value will be the basis for assessment by Scottish Water for businesses for whom the installation of water meters is impractical, and for all businesses for the next few years during the transitional charging period where water rates are assessed on a combination of actual metered use and rateable values. The increases in recent years by the water companies alone have been nothing short of obscene. A potential further doubling of these costs overnight is taking obscenity beyond pornography in its distastefulness. And this at a time when property-based businesses are badly affected by other Machiavellian instruments of torture, such as the current government’s repeal of the Furnished Holiday Lettings (FHL) Rules that mean many self catering holiday businesses will seriously have to consider ceasing trading.
In fact, the rateable values being assessed on self catering properties will be particularly unreasonable. Many of these “cottages” are not previous domestic dwellings being re-used, but are purpose-built conversions of old outbuildings as holiday lets, which by design are not intended for permanent occupation. In particular, the living space is often very small relative to the number of beds and only works acceptably for short occupancy in the knowledge that guests, as holiday-makers, will spend most of their stay away from the accommodation. Yet the rateable values now being placed on them will result in charges sometimes greater than those of domestic rates paid on family homes many times their physical size.
Of course, such assessments should be appealed. In this case, though, I am strangely hopeful that many deserving cases will be heeded.
Wednesday, 31 March 2010
Commercial Racism - Repeal of the FHL Rules
This legislation is an appalling abuse of trust by the government. I am referring to the Repeal of the Furnished Holiday Lettings Rules announced in the Budget of 2009 and confirmed in the recent 2010 Budget despite widespread condemnation from the Tourism Industry. The rules currently allow owners of self-catering cottages in the UK, as long as they satisfy certain tests, to be automatically treated as trading businesses for tax purposes rather than have to justify this status to HMRC under general principles. From the new 2010/11 tax year, all self-catering businesses will be treated as property landlords for tax purposes.
The labour government’s motives for introducing this are entirely political, as evidenced by the lack of any formal consultation process that all precedent suggests is all but mandatory, and the response to industry objections has been glib. It would be very easy to extend qualification criteria to differentiate genuine self catering businesses serving the tourism market from second home owners, buy-to-let and other property landlords. But the absence of constructive proposals and responses along these lines seems purely vindictive at worst, and ignorant (of the value and place of self-catering in British tourism) and irresponsible at best. Using EU legislation non-conformity as the reason for introduction is completely disingenuous.
The loss of this status and of benefits that will continue to be available to hotels and B&Bs is wholly unfair. The removal of the ability to offset losses against other income or, if profitable, to use income earned as qualifying income for pensionable purposes, is a major blow, as is loss of capital allowances and Capital Gains tax (CGT) reliefs. Essential annual repair & maintenance costs will be now disallowed. The alternative 10% Wear & Tear allowance available to property landlords will not cover what for most of these businesses is their largest single annual expense. Many of these businesses, especially in rural communities such as the Scottish Borders, represent the only source of income for their owners. For others, the investment in their business is far in excess of the financial reward. Farmers, struggling to survive on the reducing returns from their primary business, have invested in the conversion of outbuildings and renovation of neglected dwellings on their property, to the lasting benefit of or our national heritage and the Tourism Industry, only to be threatened by the loss of their ability to pool profits and losses on both activities The impact on the self-catering sector specifically and Scottish and British tourism in general will be significant and negative. The only question is the scale and timing of an inevitable loss of self catering beds (the largest source of tourism beds, exceeding both B&Bs and Hotels) in the coming years. If this was a decision taken by a manager in UK plc, and I was the CEO, heads would roll. Not so much for the decision itself, but for the lack of proper impact review or consideration and understanding before taking it.
The HMRC statement in their technical paper that any attempt by an SC business to offset the effects of the repeal by providing additional services will result in them apportioning Revenue to isolate the rental portion is nothing more than vindictive and a clear acknowledgement that the primary motive is not one of fairness, but plain old short-sighted politically-motivated money-grabbing. The transparency would be laughable if it weren’t deadly serious. I would go so far as to describe it as Commercial Racism. There is no logical reason to suggest one form of the three primary accommodation service provisions are more of a business than the other. They are merely different shades of the same animal. The common customer base and the service they provide are the defining factors that set them all apart from mere property landlords.
The motive for the repeal was political so the solution will have to be political. Attempts to get the perpetrators to change their position are futile. The value of the efforts of Visit Scotland, the Association of Scottish Self Caterers (ASSC) and others is as ammunition for their opponents. Whilst the Labour dead horse we are flogging is hopefully on its way to the knackers yard, opposition parties are promising a reversal. Whether it is mere posturing, or a genuine promise that will be delivered swiftly after the election, remains to be seen.
See also article at http://www.thesouthernreporter.co.uk/news/Tourism-tax-on-holiday-letting.6177433.jp
The labour government’s motives for introducing this are entirely political, as evidenced by the lack of any formal consultation process that all precedent suggests is all but mandatory, and the response to industry objections has been glib. It would be very easy to extend qualification criteria to differentiate genuine self catering businesses serving the tourism market from second home owners, buy-to-let and other property landlords. But the absence of constructive proposals and responses along these lines seems purely vindictive at worst, and ignorant (of the value and place of self-catering in British tourism) and irresponsible at best. Using EU legislation non-conformity as the reason for introduction is completely disingenuous.
The loss of this status and of benefits that will continue to be available to hotels and B&Bs is wholly unfair. The removal of the ability to offset losses against other income or, if profitable, to use income earned as qualifying income for pensionable purposes, is a major blow, as is loss of capital allowances and Capital Gains tax (CGT) reliefs. Essential annual repair & maintenance costs will be now disallowed. The alternative 10% Wear & Tear allowance available to property landlords will not cover what for most of these businesses is their largest single annual expense. Many of these businesses, especially in rural communities such as the Scottish Borders, represent the only source of income for their owners. For others, the investment in their business is far in excess of the financial reward. Farmers, struggling to survive on the reducing returns from their primary business, have invested in the conversion of outbuildings and renovation of neglected dwellings on their property, to the lasting benefit of or our national heritage and the Tourism Industry, only to be threatened by the loss of their ability to pool profits and losses on both activities The impact on the self-catering sector specifically and Scottish and British tourism in general will be significant and negative. The only question is the scale and timing of an inevitable loss of self catering beds (the largest source of tourism beds, exceeding both B&Bs and Hotels) in the coming years. If this was a decision taken by a manager in UK plc, and I was the CEO, heads would roll. Not so much for the decision itself, but for the lack of proper impact review or consideration and understanding before taking it.
The HMRC statement in their technical paper that any attempt by an SC business to offset the effects of the repeal by providing additional services will result in them apportioning Revenue to isolate the rental portion is nothing more than vindictive and a clear acknowledgement that the primary motive is not one of fairness, but plain old short-sighted politically-motivated money-grabbing. The transparency would be laughable if it weren’t deadly serious. I would go so far as to describe it as Commercial Racism. There is no logical reason to suggest one form of the three primary accommodation service provisions are more of a business than the other. They are merely different shades of the same animal. The common customer base and the service they provide are the defining factors that set them all apart from mere property landlords.
The motive for the repeal was political so the solution will have to be political. Attempts to get the perpetrators to change their position are futile. The value of the efforts of Visit Scotland, the Association of Scottish Self Caterers (ASSC) and others is as ammunition for their opponents. Whilst the Labour dead horse we are flogging is hopefully on its way to the knackers yard, opposition parties are promising a reversal. Whether it is mere posturing, or a genuine promise that will be delivered swiftly after the election, remains to be seen.
See also article at http://www.thesouthernreporter.co.uk/news/Tourism-tax-on-holiday-letting.6177433.jp
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