5:41pm Monday 31st August 2009
By Michael and Peggy Hunt
We had quite a few holiday enquiries about our accommodation, through the web site but as we didn’t have the health and safety approval we had to let them go. When Health & Safety did inspect they suddenly wanted a cooker-hood with lights and extractor fan fitted. We went to buy one from a DIY store then an electrical shop only to be directed to specialist kitchen designers. They explained that if you want something for the house it is quite usual to have it made to fit especially in the older properties where walls are not perpendicular or the rooms square. Naturally they tried to sell us a fitted kitchen but were happy to just supply the cooker-hood when they realised we were not interested. The plumber installed it, although we could have done it ourselves but we needed the certificate from the fitter for the Health and Safety lot to say it complied and the work was done correctly. A copy was also gave copies to both the accountant and geometra and a week later the tourist office and Comune came visiting again. We had our planning passed for the changes for the kitchenette and received our certification. We could open as soon as we had the room prices issued by the tourist board.
This caused all sorts of paperwork. We had to buy invoice books which are registered with the government, paperwork from the police to register the clients, another invoice record book for the accounts and the tourist board gave us something we had to record every arrival and departure monthly for the government statistics. We also had to register to pay National Health contributions to qualify to use the Italian Health services. The Comune also asked us to pay the rates ( ICI) due from when we had purchased the property. We said we had been told by the accountant and the estate agent that an agritourismo was exempt. “Only if you are open” was the reply “and you have only just received your licence after the change of ownership, so pay up and by the way the rubbish tax is due too”. It appears that unless you ask no-one mentions these things and they don’t send invoices, you have to go to the office and ask to pay. They were kind and reduced the late payment fine to a minimum but it was still an unexpected out-going.
The postman left us a note to say there was a recorded delivery waiting at the post office, he doesn’t deliver bad news, to us anyway. It turned out to be a red letter from the water board to say our half yearly bill from December was over due. We phoned the Tuscan office, for although we are officially in Umbria the property was originally in Tuscany and has Tuscan water and telephone numbers. A nice young man said not to worry as his mother’s direct debit also hadn’t worked either, we had to go and cancel the order and retry a week later but to pay the bill manually in the mean time. It was a good job we had taken the young man’s name as the field below the house, which had been left fallow for 5 years was suddenly ploughed. The ploughs here are massive, fitted to the back of bulldozer type tractors, cutting a furrow about a metre deep. It also cut through the water main to our house. We phoned the water board and asked for the kind man again who assured us our neighbours had all ready phoned. Despite knowing the pipe crossed the land they managed to slice into it on two more occasions in the following months. Once the crop of tobacco was harvested the water company did re-route and mark the plastic pipe so they will hopefully avoid it in the future.
Early May and we resumed chasing the first geometra about the planning for the retention of the footprint of the pigsty. We had heard a rumour that the Comune were going to ban all new projects in the next year and the only reconstruction allowed in the future would be for agricultural buildings unless you had some meterage ‘saved’. We hope that sometime in the future we will build a small bungalow on the ‘look-out’ point. We visited his office and despite making several appointments our geometra was never there. His partner tried to deal with the matter but seemed surprised by some of the paperwork we had been given. One day when Max, the builder, and second geometra were on site discussing where and how to fit the chimney for both a small kitchen wood cooker and a wood burining bio-mass* central heating boiler, Max mentioned the on-going saga of the pigsty. The geometra was appalled when he looked through our file and said we must go to the Comune that week and he would come with us to see what had been filed with the planning office.
(* GPL gas is shockingly expensive and we use about 1 cubic metre and hour to run the heating for just one floor. To heat the house to around 18 degrees would cost about a £1000 a quarter where as we can achieve the same heat using around £800 worth of wood for 6 months.
The woman in charge was charming and invited our second geometra, Signor Cini, to stay, (he had been her boss once,) and went through the papers. Disaster!! The Annesso had been cleared without permission, the fax (remember the fax?) the geometra had sent us was bogus as only the Comune could give us the authority to clear a building. The papers lodged were for the wrong application, no recuperation of meterage had been filed and we had signed nothing so what they did have was incomplete. She asked if she could phone the instigator of the fiasco and we readily agreed. She was polite but firm, he had to attend a meeting, with us, on the next Wednesday and she would open especially for us as the planning office was not open to the public on that day but this was urgent.
He didn’t show up. She went berserk, in a controlled manner that was most impressive and gave him the option to show up the following day or the Comune would report him for malpractice. We arrived with the Cini’s female assistant, who was there as a friend as she spoke enough English to translate and to ensure they didn’t pull a fast one on us again. This time the two partners arrived and said it was a misunderstanding due to our inability to speak Italian, suddenly our bi-lingual geometra was unable to speak English. We sat and the words flew over our heads like bullet’s. They denied ever sending us the fax although it was on their headed notepaper and the planning office had seen it. They blustered through why the plans we had a copy of and those submitted were totally different and couldn’t account for why we had not seen the paperwork to sign it. The end result was the planning officer gave us the option to a) Sue, b) drop them as our representatives and start afresh with a new geometra c) continue with them and hope they got it right. We took option b. The Comune asked they send a formal letter asking for the retraction of the incorrect application from the planning files.
We left and descended in the lift together, suddenly his command of the English language returned and he asked that we come to the office in a week’s time to sort out the outstanding paperwork. What paperwork?? The application was dead and they had to write the letter not us. The bill was the reply. Michael, very calmly, told them that not only had we never signed anything and were therefore under no obligation to pay for anything they may have done but to demand for money for a blatantly incorrect and possibly illegal application was asking for steps to be taken in the direction of their governing association to see what they thought of the matter. They left muttering about never dealing with the ungrateful English again.
Our new geometra Sig. Cini, said he hoped to be able to untangle the mess but it would take time and we at least had the sympathy of the Comune on our side and that counted for a great deal. We could only wait and hope.
The weather was glorious and the pool men due to uncover the pool and get the water chemically balanced and everything sorted for the summer. We decided we needed a treat so we went to Castglione del Lago and ‘grazed’ our way up the town in the shops offering samples of their wares as we passed by and collected information in the tourist office. Whilst there we asked about the “wine and oil” route signs we saw along the roads and if there was a map or other information on them. The tourist office didn’t have the details, we had to go the wine producers Chamber of Commerce in Montipulciano. We ate lunch in a cafe with a balcony looking over amazing views to Lake Trasimeno before driving on to Montipulciano to find the wine offices. They were great handing us free maps with every wine producer marked on them and lists of sellers and outlets on the back. Several places did wine tasting for a small fee, shipping all over the world, tours of the vineyards and works. They also had huge tanks where you take in your own bottles to be filled up. We had a wonderful time sipping and sampling our way around the countryside on our way home.
Summer was fast approaching so we had to get the house looking good for our guests. We were fortunate to have some bookings for the July and August so family and friends who were visiting before the season began helped get the summer bedding in place, window boxes and the mowing routine underway. We explored the countryside and found a first class golf course and a paragliding club along side. We located two cinemas in Chiusi, the largest also had a bowling complex and restaurant but according to the information stuck to the doors only opened Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings and closed all of August. We found a small chapel, now in private hands, where the fresco’s show Mary Magdelen in a boat coming to France with a baby. We asked about the baby and were told if even hinted at Dan Browns books we’d be asked to leave, the baby was allegorical!
We were not going to worry but go with the flow, of wine preferably and thanked them for the tour, leaving a donation to help with their good causes and left to find a pleasant place to eat and relax for a while.
Recipe: Rabbit Tuscan Peasant Style 1 rabbit cut into 6-8 pieces, 2 cloves of garlic, 2 sprigs of rosemary, 4 large sage leaves, parsley, 1 cup of olive oil, ½ cup white wine vinegar, seasoning and 6-8 slices of crusty bread.
Chop the garlic with the herbs until quite fine put in a bowl with the oil, vinegar and seasoning. In a casserole arrange half the rabbit pieces in the bottom spoon over the garlic and herb mixture before repeating for a second layer or until all the ingredients are used. Put a tight fitting lid on the casserole and cook in a medium to low heat for an hour without stirring.
Toast the bread and serve the rabbit on the bread with a selection of roasted vegetables, or green salad.
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