Mrs Rock in the Smoke

Mrs Rock couldn’t believe her good fortune. She had never won anything, well apart from that school prize but it was so long ago now she couldn’t even remember what she had done to win it. But here was the proof in her hand. A gold embossed invitation addressed to Mrs. Dollars Rock, Gibraltar, OXON. It should have been “Dolores” of course, but “dollars” had a nice ring to it, and whilst she didn’t understand the OXON postcode, this didn’t concern her. After all, her bank was inviting her to an all-expenses-paid financial seminar at a swanky hotel in London in late November. A great opportunity for a pre-Christmas London trip, she thought.

Anyway it looked too good to miss. A whole day listening to world-class experts at an hotel near Hyde Park with lunch thrown in. “Wine extra”, it said, but as she left that mainly to the more bibulous Mr Rock, this didn’t put her off. Another reason she was keen to visit the UK was that Dolores wanted to experience the “Olympic bounce” she had heard mentioned. She didn’t know exactly what that meant but she had seen that nice David Cameron talking about it some days before and it seemed to be a good thing. Her eldest son had suggested it might in fact be some kind of trampoline, although he had more than just a twinkle in his eye when he said it. He suggested that she might enquire at Hamleys if she had the time but she knew he was being silly. He was always like that when the levanter blew.

Being interested in finance, she was also keen to find out more about this double dip recession thingy. What on earth was that then? Had it gone away now? She hoped the seminar would answer her questions. The only problem was that she had to get to London first. Time for some negotiating, she surmised.

And so it was that after agreeing to have Mr Rock’s friends around more often, and once again being landed with Christmas dinner for 18 – which actually she rather enjoyed – Dolores Rock was booked on to a flight to London to visit “her financial advisers”, as she told her rather sceptical family.
Getting there nearly ruined her. She hadn’t been to London since 1983. Now she was going there alone. She was shocked when asked to pay for her coffee on the plane. “And at those prices”, she retorted, “you can keep your festive open sandwich on ciabatta – whatever one of those might be”.
After disembarking, the fun began as soon as she tried to walk up the “down” escalator. “Follow the signs for the train station Mother”, No 2 son had helpfully remarked. “It’s simple. You can’t go wrong”. He must know what he was doing, Dolores mused. After all, he’s always travelling with his best friend, Sheridan. What a polite young man – and always keen to help with the cooking. Her husband didn’t like Sheridan but then he wasn’t friendly to anyone. Dolores thought it odd perhaps that Sheridan and her son went on all those holidays to that Greek island – how did they pronounce it now? “Mike-o-nose”. And what about their trips to Sitges? Wasn’t that was just an artsy town near Barcelona? Ah well the youth of today.

It wasn’t long before she was cursing them both as she trudged through Gatwick’s north terminal. Then the passport queue. Someone had told her about “Iris” who apparently could somehow save people queuing but she couldn’t find anyone called Iris. Just a security officer with an unpronounceable name. She tried saying it out loud but instead amused herself that she might as well be back in Gibraltar where interesting first names are de rigeur.

After what seemed an eternity, as well as a ride on a funny train without a driver, she dragged herself to the ticket machine next to a hand written notice that shouted “Train’s for London”. She looked at the word “train’s” and knew it looked odd but she ignored it. Single to Victoria she thought. Easier said than done but eventually she stepped on to the platform, precious ticket in hand.
Precious was the word. £18.90 just to get into town? Worse was to follow. At Victoria she needed desperately to find the facilities. But what was this – 30p? Thirty flippin’ pence to spend just one (she was amused at her cleverness but still annoyed at the price). “That’s six shillings” she mused. She always thought in shillings when the price of something aggrieved her. It was the same in Spain when she went to Mercadona. She spoke in terms of duros, which she had to explain to her son was the old way to say five pesetas. She realised he thought her quite mad. But such financial issues mattered a great deal to her. She was obsessed, readers from last year may recall, with the exchange rate as she fretted constantly about getting more euro for her pound. At least she had learned that the plural of euro was also euro, not euros.

So it was a rather weary Dolores who finally got to the B&B close to the station for a well-earned kip. Her husband’s largesse did not extend to paying for her accommodation at the swanky hotel where the seminar was on the next day. Not at £285 per night plus VAT it didn’t anyway.
The next day dawned and the rather chatty taxi driver started talking. “Were you here for the Olympics, darlin’?“ he asked breezily. “No” said Dolores “but I did follow that lovely Georgina Cassar’s progress”. “Didn’t see her”, said the driver, “did she get a gold post box then?” Dolores was mystified. A gold post box? Then it came back to her. Of course, she remembered the red white and blue version outside Gibraltar’s main Post Office in Main Street. Someone said it had been repainted because of the Olympicals. Looked better than gold anyway. What a silly colour to paint something that should be pillar box red. She was quite keen on the price of gold as she knew it was “a store of value” which is very useful in the bad times, but a golden post box, well she thought that was too much, really...

The driver had piped down by now. The taxi screeched to a halt outside the swanky hotel. “That’ll be 12 quid love”. “Twelve quid – err, pounds?” Crikey Dolores thought. She knew London was “dear” but no one had prepared her for the fact that London was outrageously expensive. This seminar had better be good.

Well as it turned out just moments later, she would never know. Apparently it was only open to UK residents after all. The girl on the door didn’t seem to know where “gib-all-ta” as she pronounced it was – nor did she seem to care that much. “Don’t you live in OXON then?” she asked. “No” replied Dolores testily, ”I don’t”. It turns out that there was a small but perfectly formed Oxfordshire town that was named after our Mediterranean home, and clearly the invitation had been misrouted by the Post Office to end up in Dolores’ hands on the Rock. Perhaps it got lost in one of those golden post boxes, she thought.

And that’s how she ended up spending the day doing some Christmas shopping instead before making the equally expensive trip back home. So what had she learned? Certainly nothing about finance. Mainly, it was that one must be wary when dealing with any special offer. The invitation had clearly said that the seminar was open to UK residents only but she hadn’t read that bit. Similarly, some things such as QROPS are only available to non-UK residents or at least those with a demonstrable intention to become non-resident. Dolores realised that these details were important and by now she was feeling rather silly.

And that wasn’t the end of it. When she got back home Mr Rock was none too pleased. “Why don’t you just get financial advice locally,” he asked? “ After all, Gibraltar boasts some world-class minds covering all aspects of personal finance from banking through to investments and beyond.”
He went on to show her the Christmas card the family had received from that odd bloke in specs who writes about financial matters in The Gibraltar Magazine every month. What did it say? He remembered that the sentiment was very satisfying. Before carrying on with the Christmas celebrations, he put on his reading glasses, picked up the card and read the words again. Ah yes, here it was.

“A very Merry Christmas and a Happy, Prosperous New Year to anyone reading this, from all the staff at Sovereign in Gibraltar. “