Thankyou Ryanair

I bet that caught your attention - two words you would not normally expect to find in the same sentence! Ryanair gets a lot of bad press (not least from me) but they surprised me so much in December that I wanted to publicly thank them!

I was in the UK when the blizzards hit. I had a flight booked to Girona on the Tuesday and despite the fact that that no cars had been in or out of our hilly cul-de-sac for 3 days, I optimistically packed my case. (Which only involves transferring files from my computer onto a digi-stick and making sure I have my inflatable pillow and i-pod headphones to make the flight bearable but it makes the story sound more dramatic!).

On Tuesday morning things were looking even worse – there had been even more snow overnight, the AA were warning that journeys should only be made in an emergency and the airport was only managing 50% of scheduled flights. I decided to abandon the idea (it was one of my ‘bargain’ £5 all-in flights so I wasn’t losing much) and, having found another flight for £29 on the Saturday, decided to rebook.

Saturday just happened to be the day that the Spanish Air Traffic Controllers decided to walk out on an unofficial strike. Thwarted again!

The only positive part of this sorry tale is that when I went back on the Ryanair site, there was a very easy to use link to click on for a refund. I filled in the very brief details and sure enough, a couple of weeks later, the money was refunded onto my card. Fantastic service and it is good to know that they look after their clients so well – apart from when they are flying them somewhere!

My first 'Present' from an agent!

Many people who call themselves Property Finders actually work in partnership with estate agencies and take a share of their commission – which naturally means they are drawn to certain agencies which, in my opinion, narrows down the search options for their clients. I don’t do this. When I first started doing this job and explained to estate agents that I was part of a national network of fully licenced Property Finders and that essentially I could be introducing new clients to them and not expecting anything in return (apart from a good working relationship) I was greeted with great suspicion. Even now some of them can’t quite believe their luck, but it makes total sense to me as it means I can be totally independent and provide a much better service for my clients.

I must admit that I harboured hopes of receiving the odd bottle of wine (or case, even!) when a sale goes through, but sadly, apart from occasional coffees or lunches I have received no' bribes' or thank you presents! I was therefore ridiculously pleased to open an email from an agent I spent quite some time with last week which appeared to be ‘offering’ me a client!

This particular agency proudly advertises the fact that they speak English & German – but this is also the agent who advertises properties with ‘a toilet not to miss’. In his email he explains that he has had an enquiry from an English lady who is interested in one of the properties on his website but that this particular property is for sale in 3 different ways and that it is beyond his language skills to explain this to her so would I like to contact her. It is one of those ‘En Viager’ situations which I won’t explain here as I feel a whole magazine article coming on, but I can imagine how hard it must be to explain it in a different language. Sadly I have not yet had a response from the client but I feel that the gesture is a small step towards entente cordiale – although I would have preferred wine!