I just spent an hour and a half futile hours trying to fill out several pages of insurance forms pertaining to my upcoming move to Oxford.
As stated explicitly in the insurance forms, spontaneous combustion is not covered by this insurance. It was listed among several things known collectively as "inherent vices", which means "the inherent nature of the goods to become easily destroyed". (What they're really getting at here is death by natural causes --- such as battery decay in old iPods, rust, and so on --- as opposed to their breaking something, but I find their phrasing to be pretty curious, and I find the explicit statement about spontaneous combustion to be particularly odd.) My goods must repent their sins! Now, damnit! No more spontaneous combustion! I won't stand for it!
Another weird thing is that cordless phones are apparently considered restricted/prohibited goods in the UK. I'm going to have to ask (Mike)^2 about that one. I was hoping to continue using one, because I really like those. Maybe they can only be in certain frequency ranges?
Anyway, I want to insure my stuff by filling out this shit. (OK, that joke didn't work, but there really has to be a way to properly allude to George Carlin's "A Place for my Stuff" with this shit.) I filled this out to the best of my ability (which isn't actually saying much), but when it asks for the quantity of various shit, my case of OCD is no even close to extreme enough to count my books one by one. That's just way too much of a pain in the ass. (I basically did separate estimates for textbooks and other books.) Moreover, prices for a lot of this stuff is different in the UK, and I am not going to spend tons of hours investigating the precise differences. Doing my best to approximate things makes the most sense to me.
The customs part of the form wants you to write down everything bought in the 6 months prior to the move. For me, this would include a bunch of books, and I can't even nail down the precise number of them I'm taking with me that I've purchased in this time frame.
Well, I'll fax this to the people at the UK insurance company and we'll see if I need to be more specific about anything.
1 day ago
5 comments:
You can certainly buy cordless phones here. I have one--it came with my flat.
I can't imagine that it's worth bringing one from the States, since you'd have to get a converter for the plug at a minimum. (The BT phone jack is a different shape, too.)
"My goods must repent their sins! Now, damnit! No more spontaneous combustion! I won't stand for it!"
Thanks for my first belly laugh of the day! I can just see you, with a very stern frown on your face, instructing your goods as to their behavior (or should I say "behaviour"?)
I expect I'll end up using the phone that comes with my "set". (I have an apartment inside a College. I am told it's called a "set", but I can't say that I know what that really means.) I've kind of PS12ed the whole thing about bring stuff from the US. (I am reimbursed for what I bring but not for what I buy. I could try to go through the Eurocracy to negotiate on that, but I really don't want to spend that kind of time on something that's likely to be futile anyway when I have other things I am spending time on that I'd already rather use for other things.
The 'repent' comment is in large part a nod to a D & D incident by this group that has been described to me. (I wasn't actually there for it.) Though that one had nothing to do with the nasty behavior of inanimate objects. I don't think there was any spontaneous combustion involved, but I must admit I'm not completely sure about that.
Do you know what you'll be required to hand in for your removals reimbursement? I was surprised to discover that for the moving costs, they wanted, in addition to the many receipts, two quotes for the shipment from companies other than the one I used. Luckily I had some, but...
Wren: I shouldn't have used the word "reimbursed". That was misleading. Oxford hired the company directly and they're the ones paying for this in the first place, which makes my life much easier. They have a company (Robinson's) on the UK end that always handles their stuff, and Robinson's has some sort of agreement with a company (Graebel) on the US end. Anyway, the issue you're mentioning is not one I've had to deal with at all.
In terms of what you were required to hand in, that sounds like the Eurocracy in action...
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