Cheques – not quite as you know them.
You know – I haven’t actually written a cheque in over 5 years. I just don’t use them here. With most people taking Eftpos, or direct credit via Internet banking – its actually quite rare for most people to need to do it. On the odd occasion that cheques are needed – I get cash instead (I don’t even know where my chequebook is!)
However, there is something you need to bear in mind if you do choose to use them here. Apart from for some really bizarre reason there’s a tax applied to their use, and you have to pay the bank for the privilege of getting a chequebook. Ok, that last bit’s probably not a huge shock.
Cheques in the UK are automatically “crossed” by the bank. That’s those 2 lines that you find with the words “AC Payee” or “Account Payee”. In New Zealand, they don’t have that. Now this is a basic security detail. As basic as it gets. That note on the cheque means that it can only be paid in to the account of the person you wrote the cheque to. It can be paid into someone else’s account.
The Banking Ombudsman has just highlighted this issue in an article in the Dom Post. It seems that people are crossing their cheques “Not Negotiable” which does not offer the same protection “Account Payee Only”.
The ombudsman notes that Banks could just sort this out by pre-printing the phrase, but stops short of telling them to get a grip and actually do it.
So be aware: NZ banks are failing to operate one of the easiest security measures they could use, and they charge you for the chequebook. If you do use them when you get here, make sure you cross them properly, because apparently the banks aren’t refunding funds that go missing.
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In need of a humour break.
Filed under: NZIS & Immigration issues, The Book and Website
I couldn’t sleep last night, after a day of having to deal with a rather disgruntled and aggressive immigration agent telling me what I should and should not write on my blog. I know its silly, but these things really do get to me and affect me quite badly. I can handle people disagreeing with me, and having a sensible conversation, but I just don’t see why people need to try and bully me into saying what they want. It’s my blog – I’ll say what I want to say and I will not be bullied or browbeaten, nor will I allow this blog to be used for someone else’s agenda. What I say on here is my opinion, and my experience, and will remain that way.
Anyhow – as I couldn’t sleep, i spent some time browsing the Internet, and found a site of hilarious demotivational poster.
Some of these highlight my unashamed Geekiness. More can be found at Very Demotivational.
see more
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Contracting Vs Employment.
The great thing about redundancy is that you get to look with fresh eyes at your options. This is a big mind set change though, and a lot easier said than done.
While I’ve toyed with the idea of becoming a licensed immigration adviser (!), doing some barrista training, or just bumming on the beach for a few months working to improve my currently non-existent surfing skills, a gainful occupation is called for.
So becoming an MP is out too.
Three years ago when I was out of Unisys, the focus was very much on ‘finding a job’. Salaried employment with a company. We’d started looking at property investment at the time, so were fixed on needing a salary in order to get a mortgage. While having read through the Robert Kiyosaki Rich Dad series (highly recommended), I wasn’t convinced starting a company was for me. I’d also never been out of work – apart from a couple of months directly after graduating, and the month moving from the UK to NZ. In the latter case, I had a job to come to. Being ‘out of work’ was an unsettling experience for me.
Avalon was used to being self-employed as a locum pharmacist, and used to setting her own hours, working where and when she wanted. But we always felt that one of had to have a “steady paycheque”.
This time round looking at the wider options, rather than just looking at a job, is different. How you may ask?
Three years ago;
There was the allure of a role at IBM to go to. A bit like returning to a childhood home, somewhere I felt was just right. A company I knew well, believed would not have a glass ceiling to potential achievement, where I’d be working with other ‘top talent’ that I could look up to and learn from. It started out like that, unfortunately with a few key people leaving, it changed a lot.
I didn’t know many people in Wellington. Not many people knew me. Or at least it seemed like that.
Plus there was all the stuff about needing a regular income to get a mortgage etc. and feeling that we needed the “security” of knowing how much was coming in each month.
Now;
We’ve got the companies already set up to handle contracting and consulting work, with some good advice from lawyers about ensuring they were flexible. Although they were set up for property investing, one of our companies is set up specifically for trading activites – including selling the book and contracting work.
With five years NZ experience under my belt, I’m more confident about my skills in the market place. To the point where my UK experience is relegated somewhat on the CV.
The networking helps a lot, feedback from people at this point is that senior managers in companies elsewhere in NZ & Australia have heard of the good work I do, (even though I’ve not necessarily heard of them by name) and want me to come in for an interview. So that’s all good. There are options on the table.
I’ve got it clear in my head that people are going to have a bee in their bonnet about high salaries. And while we’ve joked about doing three days work for the laughable salaries on offer, it was always a bit of a joke. Working part time is an entirely viable option. After all, if I only need to work an average of three days a week at a decent contract rate to maintain my current income level, why would I work five days a week to take home 30% less??? Just to be in a ‘secure’ job, with a ‘good’ company.
Now I should say, I don’t think that a salary of $100k is laughable in itself. Yes I know a number of people who would jump at any job paying that money. However, it’s laughable when you look at the experience, skills & qualifications that companies are asking for. The level of job they are expecting you to do, the amount of work ($$$) they want you to bring in for the company, for which your ‘compensation’ will be a pittance.
You wouldn’t expect any decent brain surgeon to only work for $60k a year. They’re going to have your life in their hands, and you want them highly skilled, with up to date training. To have lots of experience. Not just read a book on the topic, sat an NCEA in anatomy and be pretty handy at sharpening a meat cleaver. If you want that experience, you have to pay for it. Simple really. I may not always like paying money for a plumber, electrician, solicitor, mechanic etc., their skills are just as valuable to them as mine are to me, they’ve invested in training, have experience and fundamentally can do a professional job that I’m not trained to. So I pay. Lots.
Contracting allows me to invest properly in advancing my skills. Now of course, I’m paying for the training, plus travel costs and I don’t earn money while I’m being trained. So you’d think that a big draw back – except it isn’t. While an employer will cover all those costs, and pay you while you’re on the training – that assumes that they understand the need to invest in you, your skills and your career. Which is worth precisely $0 to you if they wont pony up the money.
Contracting allows me to pick and choose a little more what I want to work on, and if I want to work on it. While I had the flexibility originally with IBM, identifying opportunities, working with the client to close them, and then deliver them myself or hand on to a colleague – that was another thing that changed. I’m sure there probably won’t be a constant stream of interesting things to work on when I’m contracting. If I judge things well, keep money aside for any dry work periods, I wont have to accept the first piece of work which comes along when I’ve got nothing on the radar for a couple of months. Which gives me the time to identify something better, discover new clients, or invest in my education a bit more.
Interestingly, while it is the fact that we have come to New Zealand that has screwed up my career from a training and advancement point of view – it is also the fact that we came here that has allowed the huge shift in thinking that means I will now look at freelance work. We have met so many people with what can only be called “entrepreneurial spirit” and a willingness to work outside the box. We know so many more people who are their own bosses, who spend thousands of dollars a year training themselves. It a very odd parallel world sometimes.
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Discussions on LinkedIn
I was recently invited to put forward some blogs to BusinessBlogs and PropertyBlogs, both owned by Marc and Donna who also run the PropertyTalk Forum. As I am a huge fan of PropertyTalk, I was chuffed to bits.
Besides – its always nice to know when someone thinks you are actually worth reading.
Like many Kiwis, Marc and Donna are huge believers and users of social media and networking (and I’m slowly but surely becoming used to it myself – though I still can’t stand Twitter). Marc published my blog about the CV differences and the affect on Hubbies Career, to a LinkedIn group:
New Zealand Business and Professional Network
As a result of that, theres quite and interesting discussion going on about what I said, and one of the posters has formed a sub-discussion about how to try and improve things.
While one or two comments are of the “well if you don’t like it go home” variety, most tend to agree that this is indeed happening, and is a problem we need to solve. I wish I knew how to.
Immigration procedures are something that can be fixed, with enough will and someone in charge who is prepared to make some tough changes. While getting INZ to publish their complaints procedure was in itself a very small change – it was something that got done – and it will make a difference.
Unfortunately – Tall Poppy Syndrome is there because of human nature and personal attitudes, and that’s a lot harder to change.
If you are on LinkedIn, I encourage you to join the group and have a look at the discussion. If you are not on LinkedIn, I encourage you to consider it. I really do feel that willingness to network is one of the things that sets Kiwis apart in a very positive way. It can certainly seem a bit “ott” for us reserved Brits – but it has been hugely beneficial to us since we came here. At the very least – Hubby is getting some interesting options to think about because he takes time to Network.
You can find me on LinkedIn at
http://nz.linkedin.com/in/avalonsguide
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Balloons over Wairarapa
The Wairarapa is apparently an excellent place for hot air ballooning – because of our weather and good roading to landing spots. Its also pretty stunning countryside to fly over in a peaceful balloon. Last weekend was the Balloon Festival – 3 days of events and fly-bys, dawn assents, splashdowns in the lake at Masterton, Night Glows and the burner parade.
This year we missed the early morning assent, but here are some photos we took last year:
We did manage to catch a view of the balloons from our house this year:
And we got to see the Burner Parade through Carterton Town. It was a bit odd to say the least to see the town full of people at night. It’s normally so quiet and sleepy.
One day I really must take a ride. We actually did go up in a balloon when we first came to New Zealand on our honeymoon, but that was in ChristChurch with Up Up and Away. Highly recommended.
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Cluster Flies – the new bane of my life.
If you don’t have cluster flies invading your house – please take a moment to be exceeding grateful. Im gonna pin myself down and say that as far as I am concerned they are the most disgusting household pest you can get.
This is the second year we have had an infestation, and apparently they are now all over our part of the Wairarapa. The other side of Carterton is fine, but they are now reaching Featherston and South Wairarapa.
So if you are unlucky enough to have them – what do you need to know?
- These are not common house flies, but Pollenia rudis, known as a cluster fly or attic fly.
- They enter into the home during late summer, early autumn to hibernate.
- They like warm dark spaces and corners, particularly attics.
- The flies leave the house in spring, and lay eggs on the soil.
- The larvae hatch and live in Earthworms as a parasite.
- The Flies hatch from the earthworm in Late summer – which is when they enter the house.
- They can get in through closed windows by getting round the small gaps in the frame. (you would not believe how small a gap they can squeeze through).
- You probably cant close the gaps enough to stop them without making your house airtight and suffocating to death.
- They secrete a pheromone that attracts other Cluster flies, which makes controlling them immensely difficult.
- This carries on even when you kill them
- You can spray your house and loft with long lasting surface sprays, which will kill any flies that contact it.
- Long lasting sprays will work for over a year inside the house, but only about 3 months on the outside, because rain and sun degrades it.
- You can use “bug bombs” for spaces you can’t access.
- You need to hoover up as many of the dead flies as you can to stop them attracting more. This is a revolting job when you get to the attic and is making my life a living hell right now.
- You can get Lawngard from Kiwicare for the garden part of the lifecycle – sprinkle on the lawn and then either let rain activate it or hose it in to kill the worms and larvae.
- Unfortunately it kills all sorts of other bugs, but at this point I personally don’t care.
- Our major problem at the moment is that we have Pink Batts (Rockwool Fiberglass insulation) in the loft, and dead cluster flies stick to it, and its really difficult to hoover them up.
- You need to lift the insulation to clear up underneath it, and clean as much of the pink batts as possible.
- You need to dispose of the hoover bags or empty the canister often and get rid of the bin bags you dump them in.
That’s about as much as I know or can find out. We have a very complicated roof design, and it is making clean-up exceedingly difficult. I have a builder who is looking at alternative insulation products for us to replace the Pink Batts to make maintenance easier, and I’ve let him have a copy of the information that I found out above for his other clients. Hopefully people can start pulling information together to try and control the problem in our area. We are looking for some insulation that is basically solid, so that it can easily be lifted and we can clear up underneath it. It the moment, we have to lift the Pink Batts, shake it, hoover it without pulling it to pieces, hoover underneath it and then eventually put it back once the whole attic is clear.
Its gonna take weeks if not months because I can only bear to be up there for about half and hour at a time with thousands of corpses.
If anyone reading this knows anything else – please do let me know. It seems a really effective method of control is not yet known, so any help would be greatly appreciated. Because I really don’t want to have to hoover my loft every autumn, or I’m gonna puke.
Useful Links:
Kiwicare - makers of Lawnguard, and DIY home sprays and bug bombs.
Manawatu Standard article from last year with icky picture.
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Is this why so many people leave New Zealand?
You know – despite all the ups and downs of the past few years – we still really love living here, but lately I have had cause to realise just what it has cost us to do so. Not just in terms of damage to our health and sanity dealing with Immigration New Zealand, but in a direct cost to Hubby’s career.
As part of being made redundant from IBM, Hubby of course has to review and update his CV. At IBM you have to do this regularly anyway –it’s one of those “mandatory time wasting exercises” they make the staff do regularly. It’s just a pity no one at IBM NZ actually bothered to read his. Hubby has had to make some fairly major changes to it this time: partly because much of his UK work history is basically irrelevant now as it was over 5 years ago, but mainly because he is looking to move from being an employee to be a contractor.
Our opinion is that if as an employee he has to deal with tossers who resent his salary, managers who lie ever 5 minutes and want him to take the blame for their ineptitude, and he’s going to get scammed out of bonuses and benefits – what’s the point? You may as well contract, be in control, get paid more, and have more flexibility.
But that means a different kind of CV, hence the re-write.
So, take a look at a section of his CV for the past 3 years
Client facing work has focussed on the Government and Finance sector recently, where he has lead the delivery of a number of key engagements. He has undertaken the assessment and development of enterprise wide information risk frameworks for multiple clients, including with one media organisation to develop their five year risk management strategy. Capability implementation engagements have included a major bank, where he led the delivery of a project to completely update and revamp their email security management systems. This success lead to follow on engagements to implement the same solution with another bank, a financial services organisation and a utility company.
(Okay – I know that’s complete gobbledygook for us non-techy peeps). But compare and contrast with working for the same company in the UK.
Customer projects included a University outsourcing and infrastructure migration program, BS7799 security assessments for financial and telecommunications clients, various Government projects and multiple MSS bids. These ranged from small (NZD) $50k consultancy engagements, $45m+ dedicated security infrastructure projects through to $250m+ outsourcing engagements. Hubby contributed to the CBI Business guide “Protecting your business,” published December 2001 and various IBM technical white papers on security.
Numerous presentations were made to customer audiences at conferences, breakfast briefings and focus groups. Presentations to IBM groups ranged from the annual UK Technical conference, to an elective presentation at the 2001 IBM Services Institute which had to be run three times and drew over 250 people. The presentation was so popular it was re-run the following year as a plenary session for 500+. Other presentations included IBM UK Technical Consultancy Group symposium, and security Special Interest Group meetings of the British Computing Society.
For three years Hubby was a member of the IBM UK Technical Council, a group of 60 technical leaders brought together to work in multidisciplinary teams solving business wide, customer and IBM technical challenges.From July 2003 Hubby was also the lead instructor for IBM world wide CISSP education, and tutored a total of 200 students through to the CISSP exam. By the end of 2004, 97% of students had passed the exam first time.
Bit of a difference huh?
And that ignores the fact that IBM have actually had him doing donkey work for the past few months anyway. Yes – the guy who managed to do that in the UK has been – wait for it – filling in spreadsheets for the past few months.
I think there are two warnings here; one for potential immigrants: you run the risk of trashing your career in order to get that “lifestyle”. On the face of it, from where you are now that may not matter to you – but be prepared to take an honest look at how you would feel. I, for example, walked away from my career as a Pharmacist quite happily when we emigrated, and don’t regret it for an instant. But Hubby has missed out on numerous opportunites for training, conferences and speaking engagements because IBM wouldn’t invest in it or him, and he’s not happy to do that. If he freelances – we can pay for the conferences and the training (one course booked already for November in Sydney that IBM wouldn’t pay for last year when it was run in Wellington, and a trip to AusCert on the Gold Cost in May all sorted). It’s a great feeling not having to be beholden to needing to get 20 signatures for flight approval. He now just needs mine.
The other warning is for New Zealand companies: there are two reasons New Zealand is losing skills – you pay crap salaries and your managers resent the few people who get paid decent salaries. Pack it in and get over it! It’s small minded and you are pushing out all the people that New Zealand needs – not just the immigrants who get sick of it and go home where they don’t have to put up with it, but born and bred kiwis. More of them leave New Zealand than Immigrants, so it’s not just a bad attitude towards immigrant salaries (though too many of you also con immigrants into taking artificially low salaries because they are immigrants).
There’s actually an article in the herald today that backs this up – 53% 0f employees here move on within 2 years, at huge cost to your company, because you will not allow them to progress their careers.
Until NZ companies get rid of this slack “Tall Poppy” syndrome, you will not keep your best employees. Those are the ones that make money for you – rather than those who “manage” the ones who make money for you right out of the company.
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Mixing investing and immigration – is it sensible?
Filed under: Economics, NZIS & Immigration issues, Property & General Investing, Retirement, Pensions and Kiwisaver
Well, if you are the government of New Zealand trying to wangle investment funds out of foreigners – hell yeah!
If you are a retirement-age person with a million or so in funds that survived the economic meltdown? Ummm- not so much.
The thing that concerns me about both these policies (Parent Retirement and Temporary Retirement Categories) is that they are basically Investor Policies under a different name. And people need to be crystal clear on something:
you could lose that money.
The New Zealand Government are NOT guaranteeing that the investment funds will not lose value.
Now the upside is that you could make money out of this: but the investments are share market based – and there is risk involved here. My concern is that in general people coming up to retirement age are advised to move funds from shares into less risky investments to avoid the peaks and troughs you get with the share market.
As far as I know – the only really “safe” option is the government bonds – and that really isn’t much more than a straight bribe to the government in my opinion.
So my advice is this: if you are looking in anyway at either of these two policies – make sure that you take some stringent financial advice and you know what you are doing. Unless of course you really do have squillions sitting in the bank and you are just bored stiff staring at your large bank balance everyday.
If you are relying on those funds being there in full after the 2 or 4 years you have to tie it up – be very careful.
Share investments we have can cope with the ups and downs – we have time for things to correct. But think about this:
What would you have done if you had invested in this policy 5 years ago, and needed to take what was left of your $1,000,000 about 12 months ago?
This isn’t about Immigration Advice – its about financial advice. There’s a lot of money at stake here, and you need to ensure you don’t lose the lot.
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The Power of Networking; Social & Drinking
It took coming to NZ five years ago before I really started doing the coffee (well, tea – Earl Grey) socialising thing.
Just over 18 months ago I joined Facebook, about a year ago I joined LinkedIn. I’d sort of avoided the whole internet social networking thing up until that point – being paid to think about risks of identity theft meant I’d kept a low profile. But Avalon was on there, and kinda cajoled me into it. You try arguing with her is all I can say!
In the last couple of weeks I’ve come to benefit from all the networking.
- You’re very welcome – Avalon
As soon as I came out of the first ‘your role is possibly redundant’ meeting, having been ambushed with the news that I had 3 days to consider my options – I was not crying in my tea – I was on the phone setting up coffee meetings for the next morning with other people who do similar jobs in different companies. We all know each other, regularly meet up and we all keep an eye on what’s happening with different companies.
So in less than 24 hours, I’m finding out what options are available, and getting new names to contact about possible jobs. (And somehow I still managed to find the time to fix yet another management screw-up and get an important piece of work done to meet a deadline while 5 managers who were not losing their jobs were nowhere to be found. Some things never change.)
The day I had my official ‘your role is definitely redundant’ meeting, there was an article about redundancy rumours in the paper. This meant Avalon could officially blog about it, without revealing anything that wasn’t public knowledge.
So that evening two things happened, Avalon’s blog post was published, it automatically fed through to LinkedIn and Facebook page via a nifty widget, plus lots of other sites like Technorati. I also updated my LinkedIn status with just five words.
Within an hour I’d had contact from someone about contracting work.
Another contact having read the blog put me in touch with their companies recruitment specialist.
By the morning three emails arrived to meet up for coffee. Two more emails followed that afternoon.
I had a call from someone pointing me to three different jobs he knew were going in the field, and checking whether I knew the people who were recruiting. (The next day he rang back about a role at his current organisation too).
That evening a former manager, currently travelling in Europe, had made contact. He’d find something.
The coffee chats resulted in two further options for contracting work.
Emails were asking if I wanted a job in Sydney, or Melbourne.
My as yet not updated CV was heading off to a variety of contacts in Melbourne, Sydney, Perth, Christchurch, Auckland, Singapore and of course Wellington – all of whom know someone who is interested in my skills & experience. This included a couple of people who are moving on to new jobs of their own choice, and are putting me in touch with their soon to be former employers. That’s quite a recommendation, “I’m leaving, but here’s someone good enough to replace me”.
And this is before I actually update my CV and proactively send it out to recruitment agencies, or respond to job adverts that I actually see on TradeMe or Seek.
All within two days of formally being told my services are no longer required by my current employer.
Who funnily enough, is competing in the market place for exactly the same custom from the same clients that most of the opportunities I’ve been told about are also looking to win.
Then one of Avalon’s contacts also wants to hear from me – he can put me in contact with a lot of his fellow business owners.
It’s now taken me two weeks to get my CV updated properly. I firmly believe it’s worth getting feedback from others on your CV, and taking the time to look at it with a fresh mind and different perspective. It may seem a little superfluous, since I’ve already had all these meetings and I’m likely to find out from people I know that roles are available.
You never know though, a friend of a friend who has just been passed your CV could be that fantastic new opportunity you didn’t realise you were looking for.
The New Temporary Retirement Category.
This is for people who do not have children who are resident in New Zealand and allows them to live or travel here for up to two years at a time, rather than the current maximum of 6 months.
As long as they pay.
So what’s the deal?
- You get a 2-year visitors visa that allows you to come and go from New Zealand as you like during that two years.
- You need to be 66 years old or over
- You need to bribe invest $750,000 in New Zealand for the two years.
- Suitable investments are the same as for the Parent Retirement category.
- You need to be able to show $500,000 in maintenance funds for the two years, plus $60,000 a year in income.
- Have comprehensive travel / health insurance during the two years (you wont be eligible for public health care as this is not a residency visa)
- You need to meet the standard health and character requirements (so yes – you still have to go through the medical process – there’s just no getting round it is there?)
- The Application fee is $2.600
- If you want to stay longer you can re-apply (for another $2,600) for another visa.
- You only get 3 months to invest your money here, rather than 12 months under the Parent Retirement Visa
- You can get a 3 month visa to enter NZ to investigate “investment opportunities” before you plough your life savings into a “suitable investment”.
- You apply through the Business Migration Branch in Wellington.
The good news is that this policy doesn’t screw over the parents of residents who have worked their butts off in New Zealand for three years to earn the right to bring their families with them.
There’s no cap on the number of visas available, because this is not a permanent visa.
Still, I’m somewhat concerned that immigration policy is basically sinking to the level of “Gives us loads of money and you can come in”. I guess it has the advantage of being honest for a change.
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