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Another Surprise Utility Bill This morning I was given a utility bill for the Durban house which we rent out and this is absolutely absurd. The balance bought forward is what is being questioned as our normal monthly utility bill is between R6 and R9K. The R76 K bill ($4.5K) is due to 2 water leaks we experienced over the last 6 weeks which is kind of scary that the tenants who are clueless which is being kind never pricked this up immediately. When i lived there I monitored the meters daily just having a quick look that nothing was out of the ordinary. The problem with an underground leak is you may not notice this immediately and takes time for the water to be visible on the surface. This property can expect at least one leak per year and it is not the plumbing fault, but the water pressure not being stable in the area. When the water pressure spikes it will find the weakest point to break through which is normally a join or a bend and there is nothing that can be done about this. I have lost count of how many water leaks we have had over the years and the average is one per year so that would place the number at over 20. Compare that to where I live now being 7 years and we have not had one underground leak so this is not normal for most households. If I had known this 20 years ago I would have had all the underground piping replaced so there is no point now as I would like to get this house on the market and sold. Having had this property for close to 22 years it is long overdue to be sold yet I have a sick family member staying in the granny flat. There is not much I can do right now as to selling the property and I am stuck as I would be a proper bastard to kick the family member out. Timelines they do not give her that long to live as she is well into her nineties now and one cannot think like that as it is morally wrong. The one big plus is the property is fully paid off and over the last 20 odd years has risen in value by roughly 300%. Not great considering this was paid with GBP and the local Rand currency has depreciated by 100% since that date of purchase. There is a small profit to be had and a good lesson learned that never buy a property using a foreign stable currency in a country that has a depreciating currency. I am not sure how we are going to resolve this utility bill as normally the municipality expects you to pay the bill and then use their water insurance claim. This insurance they offer is not ideal as you are lucky to see a 25% return so in this case I will be out of pocket no matter what and this was not my fault. The other costs not thrown into this calculation was the call out of emergency plumbers which repaired the broken pipes on two separate occasions. I honestly need these bills like a hole in my head right now and knowing this will not be resolved quickly. I have been wanting to put this property on the market for a number of years now as these water leaks have been ongoing and you just know there will be more.

Tue, 24 Feb 2026 02:49:13 +0000

Another Surprise Utility Bill

This morning I was given a utility bill for the Durban house which we rent out and this is absolutely absurd. The balance bought forward is what is being questioned as our normal monthly utility bill is between R6 and R9K.

The R76 K bill ($4.5K) is due to 2 water leaks we experienced over the last 6 weeks…Read More

A Game Of High Risks cryptoandcoffee (82)in LeoFinance • 11 hours ago source This has to be bluffing as surely the EU is not that stupid as this would see the closure of all legacy car makers in the West. We know the EU car manufacturers cannot compete on price with the Chinese and if this was true having zero tariffs on electric vehicles then the likes of Mercedes, VW, BMW, Renault and Ferrari will be shut down very quickly. This has to be a bluff trying to scare the US showing they have other options, but we all know this is realistically a non starter. The car manufacturers in the EU account for 7% of the entire GDP and employ close to 14 million people. This would not end well and I would say most definitely would end the EU very quickly. The Chinese would love nothing more that to get their paws on the EU car manufacturing industry. This has to be protected at all costs and has to be a non starter. I see no negotiations and one has to also consider the carbon taxes. CBAM was introduced to make a level playing field which it certainly is not currently as the likes of Mercedes had to partner with Tesla in January and buy their carbon credits. China is not using green energy for manufacturing at present and is still building coal fired power stations at a rate of 4 new ones per year. Personally I have never trusted the EU and would hate to have them looking over my countries shoulder telling them what to do. I don't see them being this stupid as the risks are far too high and not worth even considering. Yes they are crazy on their green stances and are very far left ,but not suicidal to the pint of risking it all. They know they do not have the cards to play this game and this as to be seen as a way of trying to bargain with the US on lower tariffs. I would say that this is not the way to negotiate a deal and I insulting everyone's intelligence. If I was in the EU this would not fill me with confidence and would only underline how moronic the EU leadership is believing they could try and bluff their way to a better deal by using China. China cannot be that stupid either and will use it for another angle as they know the EU cannot afford to relinquish tariffs on any vehicle. Apparently the EU and China are meeting in June which you would have thought the EU would have already negotiated out a deal with the US. China is not your trading friend and the sooner everyone realizes this the better and they can move forward. The greedy corporations are to blame for the mess we see today as they were the ones who allowed manufacturing to move to China all in the name of making bigger profits. What the Chinese have done over the years is copied those products and is now their competitor so that was not exactly a Hollywood ending. Countries have no choice but to manufacture themselves and stop relying on others to do it for you. We saw during Covid how reliant everyone country is on China and this is a big worry. Posted Using INLEO #EU#tariffs#trade#consequences#china#chess#pob#waiv#vyb 11 hours ago in LeoFinance by cryptoandcoffee (82)$8.91 146 votes Reply 3 Sort: Trending [-]darknightlive (56) 10 hours ago It's quite the chess game, isn't it? The EU's potential move seems more like a high-stakes bluff in a poker match rather than a solid strategy. I agree, the risks are sky-high, and the EU leadership must know they're playing with fire. It's a classic case of "don't bite the hand that feeds you," especially when that hand is holding 7% of your GDP. Let's hope cooler heads prevail and this bluff doesn't turn into a self-inflicted wound. Cheers to smarter negotiations! 🤔🚗🇪🇺 $0.00Reply [-]thehivetuber (61) 7 hours ago Facts, EU car companies will really struggle if Chinese EVs flood the market. This could hurt a lot of jobs there. Not a smart move and it's almost inevitable at this point $0.00Reply [-]redditposh (78) 6 hours ago (edited) https://www.reddit.com/r/news/comments/1jwybw4/a_game_of_high_risks/from r/news https://www.reddit.com/r/NoFilterNews/comments/1jwykrk/rnews/from r/NoFilterNews The rewards earned on this comment will go directly to the people( @uwelang ) sharing the post on Reddit as long as they are registered with @poshtoken. Sign up at https://hiveposh.com. Otherwise, rewards go to the author of the blog post. $0.00Reply

Sat, 12 Apr 2025 01:39:56 +0000

A Game Of High Risks
cryptoandcoffee (82)in LeoFinance • 11 hours ago

source

This has to be bluffing as surely the EU is not that stupid as this would see the closure of all legacy car makers in the West. We know the EU car manufacturers cannot compete on price with the Chinese and if this was true having zero tariffs on electric v…Read More

What Service? cryptoandcoffee (82)in LeoFinance • 12 hours ago source Yesterday my daughter asked me to tag along whilst she went to the bank to draw money to pay casual salaries. I thought this could take an hour maybe two being Friday, but I had no idea what lay ahead. The first branch we visited had only 1 teller and we were told she had gone out for lunch and would be back after 2 pm. There was no point waiting as it was only mid day. I think I was taken back by this as what bank has only 1 teller and has no teller when they go on a break for 2 hours? The next branch we visited which was only 10 minute drive away and we took a number and waited in the queue. Again it looked as though they only had one teller and I joked to my daughter that guaranteed they will shut down for lunch. This is exactly what happened as 1pm hit and they said we can wait until 2pm along with 2 other clients ahead of us. This was absurd as the money was required to pay casual wages for staff that are unbanked. The ATM could have been used but the limit on the account would have left us short. I knew banking had changed since I used to use them but this was seriously poor service as it was non existent. This is as bad as a government department as who shuts down for lunch if you have clients waiting? Again we climbed into the car and headed off to a bigger branch which was another 10 minutes away. Granted the bigger branch was busier and we were served and sorted within 30 minutes so you do wonder what is the point of all the other branches if they are not geared to service their clients? The attitude was one of they do not care which was rather obvious when the second branch teller shut down whilst looking at the clients waiting to be served. I personally hate banks and for one would love to see the masses move away from using their "services" by moving into crypto. The idea that one day banks become irrelevant in the future is something I really hope happens. Unfortunately we are all very reliant on them for the payment services they provide ad this will take some time to change. Retailers and banks would like to see everyone stop using cash as it is clear when you see retailers having only 1 till that accepts cash. Cash is no longer seen as king and now it is treated as a nuisance yet there is still a high percentage of people only dealing in cash. Reports suggest that roughly 30-35% of the countries population in South Africa are unbanked so retailers and banks turning their back on cash is very premature. You kind of get the feeling that they are doing this on purpose trying to force everyone to stop using cash making their lives easier not caring about those that only use cash. Posted Using InLeo Alpha #banking#cash#client#service#unbanked#trend#crypto#pob#waiv 12 hours ago in LeoFinance by cryptoandcoffee (82)$15.98 170 votes Reply 0 Sort: Trending

Sun, 20 Oct 2024 06:54:05 +0000

What Service?
cryptoandcoffee (82)in LeoFinance • 12 hours ago

source

Yesterday my daughter asked me to tag along whilst she went to the bank to draw money to pay casual salaries. I thought this could take an hour maybe two being Friday, but I had no idea what lay ahead.

The first branch we visited had only 1 teller and we were told s…Read More