UTILITIES - Lifes little luxuries

During April I had connected the water from the meter into the farmhouse to give us a basic supply. The water board had laid on the supply prior to us moving in, at a cost of around £200. We also had a telephone by this point. France Telecom are amazingly fast at installing - in our case only two days after ordering the line, and very cheap. Note though that they normally assume that an electricity supply will be available so they can drill through the walls for the cable - just as well we had a generator.

EDF, on the other hand, are incredibly slow, and usually expensive. It comes as no surprise that FT are privatised and EDF are not, although that is set to change soon. We had our first visit from EDF in late April to survey the site. The engineer arrived at 8am whilst we were still in bed. It was pouring with rain when he arrived at the property, and I well remember him standing in the mud at the front of the property looking around for anything that might be habitable!

I had gone to the trouble of mounting a large board in the adjoining barn for the supply termination eqpt. Alas it was not to be, they wouldn't mount the equipment on timber. (Despite the fact that a friend in the neighbouring Haute Vienne had his electricity installed by EDF on a timber panel that THEY supplied!) They sometimes make the rules up as they go along - as I later found out this can sometimes work to your advantage.

The next problem was the supply itself. In France the tariffs are based on set Kw levels. In my case I wanted to start off with the basic 6Kw but because the farmhouse had not had electricity for 50 years the original wiring had rotted, and they wouldn't provide anything other than an emergency supply which consists of two sockets and 3 Kw - not a lot of use for renovating. It was explained to me that the new cabling and consumer unit I had installed would need a certificate from a French Electrician (CONSUEL) before they would consider a permanent supply, It was fast going from bad to worse. That, and a wait of another month before the installation team would arrive did nothing to improve my mood. It was a night for an additional bottle of wine.

Things were no better on the septic tank front either. The first potential installer (a short, stocky French guy in a bobble hat who looked remarkably like Roy Kinnear) drew a sharp intake of breath when asked when he could start the work - "je suis tres presse monsieur - pas cette annee!" We waved him goodbye in short time but at least he was honest. The second, an Englishman, was full of promises but little else. It was my first experience of an English builder in France, and it would also prove to be my last. Never take an English builder on trust here, always ensure you have a rock solid and trustworthy reference - preferably from someone you know. The good ones are booked up months (sometimes years) in advance but won't always admit it, beware of the rest!