P
Plouasne
I'm a new member, first posting, but an old (very old) hand, started plumbing in '58, after the tech school (remember them), worked with some of the big boys, like Taylor Woodrow, Mathew Hall, etc, also worked for myself, before I saw the light, and upped sticks, and moved to France, best move I ever made
The pace of life is slower, 35 or 40 hour week, at least an hour for mid-day meal, if not an hour and a half, and the patron (the boss) pays for the meal if the job is out of the commune where the office is situated, there are workers restaurants come bars all over France which do a mid-day meal for around £8.50, you pay for it put the receipts in with the time sheet at the end of the month, and get repaid with your wages, also you are covered by the firms assurance whilst traveling to and from home to site/yard
The standard of work is miles higher than in the UK (sorry lads, I know having seen both sides), copper pipe is all hard soldered, gas is silver soldered, all water is mains pressure 3 bar minimum (not like the poxy 1 bar minimum in the UK), all buried pipe work whether floor or walls has to be run in a protective "Gaine" 'a corrugated plastic sleeve
All work estimated to be over 150€ MUST HAVE a written estimate, which is signed by the client as good for work, before work starts, any addition or deletion must be agreed in writing, work costing over 3000€ must be paid by cheque, new work or major renovations must be covered by the mandatory 10 year assurance
Nobody can pick up a set of tools and start work as self employed, they must do a weeks training in book-keeping, law, tax returns, etc, and for the first few years have an accountant check their books every month
Black work is frowned on, if you get caught working on the black, the fines can be 35000€ and or 5 years inside, plus repaying the state, what they the tax people, estimate you have fiddled them out of tax, and it can be 5 times the estimated loss just to teach you a lesson, also the client can be found guilty of employing you on the black with equal fines etc
I could go on, and describe the tools needed to do the job in France, they are a bit different from the UK, but will leave it here, apart from describing a normal restaurant meal, its normally a serve yourself starter, cold meats, hard boiled eggs, potato salad, small fish etc, then a hot meal choice of 3 different types of meat, cheese, then the dessert or fresh fruit, ice cream, then coffee, it goes without saying that there is a bottle of red wine 1/4 ltr per person (but who counts the amount ?, just hold out the empty bottle for a refill) water, bread and butter
Normal working hours are 08.00 to 12.30 hrs with no break, then 14.00 to either 17.30 or 18.00 hrs again no break as such, maybe a bottle of beer or two drunk whilst working
The pace of life is slower, 35 or 40 hour week, at least an hour for mid-day meal, if not an hour and a half, and the patron (the boss) pays for the meal if the job is out of the commune where the office is situated, there are workers restaurants come bars all over France which do a mid-day meal for around £8.50, you pay for it put the receipts in with the time sheet at the end of the month, and get repaid with your wages, also you are covered by the firms assurance whilst traveling to and from home to site/yard
The standard of work is miles higher than in the UK (sorry lads, I know having seen both sides), copper pipe is all hard soldered, gas is silver soldered, all water is mains pressure 3 bar minimum (not like the poxy 1 bar minimum in the UK), all buried pipe work whether floor or walls has to be run in a protective "Gaine" 'a corrugated plastic sleeve
All work estimated to be over 150€ MUST HAVE a written estimate, which is signed by the client as good for work, before work starts, any addition or deletion must be agreed in writing, work costing over 3000€ must be paid by cheque, new work or major renovations must be covered by the mandatory 10 year assurance
Nobody can pick up a set of tools and start work as self employed, they must do a weeks training in book-keeping, law, tax returns, etc, and for the first few years have an accountant check their books every month
Black work is frowned on, if you get caught working on the black, the fines can be 35000€ and or 5 years inside, plus repaying the state, what they the tax people, estimate you have fiddled them out of tax, and it can be 5 times the estimated loss just to teach you a lesson, also the client can be found guilty of employing you on the black with equal fines etc
I could go on, and describe the tools needed to do the job in France, they are a bit different from the UK, but will leave it here, apart from describing a normal restaurant meal, its normally a serve yourself starter, cold meats, hard boiled eggs, potato salad, small fish etc, then a hot meal choice of 3 different types of meat, cheese, then the dessert or fresh fruit, ice cream, then coffee, it goes without saying that there is a bottle of red wine 1/4 ltr per person (but who counts the amount ?, just hold out the empty bottle for a refill) water, bread and butter
Normal working hours are 08.00 to 12.30 hrs with no break, then 14.00 to either 17.30 or 18.00 hrs again no break as such, maybe a bottle of beer or two drunk whilst working
