From time to time though it is worth expressing frustration just to make sure that it is known that we are not happy with it
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@JohnBoy …fair point, its been a double whammy for us all.
And I don’t think anybody could have foreseen the minutiae of Brexit…like EU changing their VAT lookalike minimum threshold to zero and because UK had left all items being subject to lots
more administration and huge costs on relatively small value items. The law of unintended consequences!
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I often have this thought John. We blame brexiters for not understanding the effects of their vote - but honestly, who really knew? I certainly had no idea about much of the detail of the possible effects.
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Neither did Boris, all he wanted was a deal at any cost, now he is finding out the detail is going to cost us all a great deal unfortunately.
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I remember seeing a thread on having to get a letter from the mairie for visiting family, I’ve looked but can’t find it. Could someone enlighten me on the situation.
thanks in advance.
was it this one?
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You’re right of course Colin - Johnson and other brexiters in power had a responsibility to understand the implications, and they had the means, via the civil service, etc, to find out the truth - they don’t escape blame.
You can argue that we all have a similar responsibility to educate ourselves before voting - or not to vote - so anyone that voted for brexit - or for Johnson - is at fault. But harder for remainers to sustain this argument because most of us didn’t find out all the facts either.
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No , because normal voters don’t have access to all the information held via the civil service. which the government should have paid attention to.
There was no full analysis of the financial benefits and drawbacks published, so all one could do was listen to or research the snippets that were available.
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I suspect most/many Remainers found enough facts to persuade them to vote Remain… and even more facts to support that decision are coming out of the woodwork…
Leavers will presumably have found enough facts to support their choice… but, sadly, more and more facts are coming out of the woodwork which don’t support their choice… ooops.
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But it doesn’t really matter because they"have taken back control " - exactly of what still remains to be seen 
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generally massaged to fit the “Leave.eu” bandwagon 
well, there’s sparkling water (all the water in this establishment has been passed by Doris, Liz and useless Eustace…
sorry, its behind a Torygraph paywall
I imagine it will just mean that Postal Services will be reduced even further as people are deployed to handling the admin for this rather than doing other stuff. Villages around me have either lost their Post Offices or the Mairie has had to step in and take over the role and provide the premises and staff.
My local PO wasn’t aware of the change the other day but she did look it up and told me yesterday that it was in my interest to pay the fees online as that would be cheaper for me. Will see what happens when my first non-EU parcel (from Hong Kong) arrives next week.
Not ideal I agree but most things are available in Europe surely? The post situation is not good but we are now fortunate to have many types of free technology for communication. Covid issues are politicised but that was going to happen .
Re presents etc many companies will wrap and send gifts if you have online facilities . 
I’d have a go with WD40 or similar. If that doesn’t work - petrol. Tho’ try a teeeny drop on the corner, to check if it doesn’t dissolve the iPad.
And don’t smoke the while. 
Without AMZ or Ebay I’d hardly buy anything that I couldn’t eat or drink. Have done for years.
Two cars, 16 prs Y-fronts for £1 [“slightly stained…” - actually new but dusty] spices, camera equipment, guitars, a c/h gas boiler [‘new other’ - saved £500] …
The 3rd country import change - as has been said, this is not just UK, it’s worldwide - has now been reluctantly taken on board but with diligence and patience, the sort of reduced prices one could reliably expect from a UK purchase can be found within the EU somewhere.
Previously it would have been inevitable that the lens I bought on Friday would have been from a UK seller. All sorts of hardware are generally cheaper in UK. But I found one from a seller in Portugal. Brand new, UK-level price, p n p gratis …
And today, a 10-pack of Fruit of the Loom T-shirts from a seller in FR.
I think the Chinese are going to set up ‘distribution bases’ in the EU to get round some of the import costs. I bought a camera body for €650 [usual EU price €850-€900] that purported to be supplied from a seller in FR. But the time it took to arrive - about a month - and stickers on the package indicated that it had started out in China. I didn’t have to pay a cent over the original price. I have no idea how that works but I suspect that the Chinese are finding ways to reduce costs to EU buyers.
That’s how the Japanese got round the ‘gentleman’s agreement’ to keep imports to UK at <10%, back when Nissan was Datsun. They set up shop in UK.
Yes, we bought our Calor Gaz barbecue from a chandler’s in Spain, 100 euros less even after shipping.
We got a pump for our well from Italy at less than half of the price quoted in Macon and Jim installed it himself.
I bought jelly babies for our grandsons from Amazon.de (English) thinking that they would have already been in Germany, but they were sent from England and there was nothing to say that was the case, so beware, it might be that the goods advertised on a national Amazon site will come from outside the EU and you may have to pay taxes etc.
I wouldn’t say that living here is being tarnished by that. Also, there are no roaming charges if you have a French contract. Hell, France has far better medical care (no waiting lists for operations), better pensions, better housing, roads, rail network, less crime, better food standards, better weather (not at the moment though!).
This is checkable because all sellers have a location noted - this
is supplied by: adresse commerciale: C/ Pau Casals, Olesa de Montserrat Barcelona ES
However, as I have been speculating, the Chinese are setting up some kind of distribution system in the EU. For example I bought
Although the company is based at Adresse commerciale: Honghui Industrial Park. Building 2 Rooms 718 Xin’an Street Baoan District LiuXian 3 Road. Shenzhen . Guangdong. CN
I paid no more than the price on the AMZ.fr product page
Amazon notes: C’est AutelDirect-FR d’Amazon.fr. Nous sommes l’un des distributeurs oneline agréés d’AUTEL. And they have Numéro TVA: FR92881253207
@Geof_Cox
The big unexpected was that prior to the vote most Leave politicians indicated UK would stay in the SM and Customs Union but in January 2017 Theresa May said this would not be the case. A great many of the big disruptions flow from this, I suspect if this had been said prior to the vote then Remain would have carried the day.
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