A small courtesy

We were planning to go to Limoges yesterday (Decathlon and Grand Frais)  but when morning came, we found ourselves heading the other way along the Route Nationale, towards Poitiers.

We decided to go back to Naintré to find out the registration plate number of the new van (rather than to phone - our phone French is worse than our face to face French). This gave us an opportunity to lunch at the Table de Bellefois again (always a treat) and there were branches of both shops not too far away so we could still do our shopping.

Lunch was good, as always. We left Bellefois and went to Grand Frais, then headed off to the dealer, in time for 2pm re-opening. Our transaction did not go well. No, we could not be given the number, which we needed in order to arrange the insurance, they would register the vehicle on Friday afternoon and give us the number then and we could telephone to arrange the insurance....

"Mais, c'est difficile!" we uttered in unison. Our insurance agent's office is only open in the mornings so we wanted to arrange insurance before leaving home to collect the van.

Much French was forthcoming, and very fast French at that, Mr L looked blank but I caught the word "avant" and suggested that we were being asked if we could do the exchange of vehicle before the original appointment time of 2pm. Brilliant! Of course we could....

But, no. it transpired (eventually) that the suggestion was that we brought the old van along to conclude our deal before Friday's appointment and then they would do the registration, issue the Carte Grise and we would be able to secure our insurance. 09:00 hrs today was their suggestion. We were delighted to find that we would have the van a day earlier than expected. But noooo...

That was another misunderstanding. We still couldn't have our new van until tomorrow at the scheduled time.

We were puzzled by the whole thing but it seems that, although we have paid a shedload of money out, they do not consider that the deal is concluded until they have the old van and her keys in their hand. At that point, and only at that point, would they register the new one and give us the number.

C'est complique!!!


There was of course an issue, which we carefully pointed out - we would need to get home again and home is the best part of a two hour drive away, with public transport being an unrealistic option...

That apparently was not a problem at all, they would lend us a car.! How jolly nice of them. (And here it is, parked behind our Batmobile.)

We were a bit shattered, between the heat, the worry and the hassle but we did go on to Decathlon afterwards. 

There was, of course, no time for photographs yesterday (other than of my lunch and I plan to spare us yet another food photo, so no backblip)

Mr L toddled off very early this morning, long before we are usually out of bed. I stayed home to tend to animals and Nell and I had a lovely long walk to fill in the time until her dad came home. The transaction went smoothly and he called at the insurance office on his way back, so we are now ready to go and collect our new toy tomorrow.

We were planning to pack the new van on Saturday and perhaps go off for a night or two on Sunday afternoon but the weather forecast is promising another heatwave and I am not entirely sure that I want to be sleeping in a very hot tin can! We may defer until the thermometer drops to  a more tolerable level.