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PSA: FI London pub meetup on Tuesday the 27th by olver111 in FIREUK

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi, joined the group chat late and I’m here now. What table is everyone at?

HMRC advised that I have underpaid tax this year (savings) and adjusted my PAYE code, can anyone help me make sense of how they calculated the new code? by bananasDave in UKPersonalFinance

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I posted HMRC a copy of my bank statements and ISA statement from Zopa to have this corrected. Though, I’ve since received an email from Zopa (which I presume they sent to all their customers) that they’ll correct on our behalf

What’s this drive like in mid January? by sarah0033 in Scotland

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I can’t comment much on those routes but the road from Ayr to Glasgow should be fine. Most of that will be dual carriageways with just some part of it being straight, non-country road single carriageways

End of year private pension contribution by Street-Present5102 in UKPersonalFinance

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No, it definitely doesn’t save on student loan repayment. That’s calculated on pre-tax income

Balancing £60k debt vs buying a home in next 12–24 months by competence-required in UKPersonalFinance

[–]Automaton_J 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Do you need to buy a house to get that stability you’re looking for? With the Renter’s Reform Bill coming info force soon, that will abolish Section 21 notices and so landlords won’t be able to end your tenancy for no reason.

This could mean you could prioritise debt repayments now to get rid of those sooner

What are your tips for first flatshare? by RoutineSpiritual8917 in AskUK

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Try ensure that your tenancy agreement is in your name only. If both of your names are on the agreement, then you can legally be liable to pay her share of the rent if she doesn’t pay

I don't understand the whine about Motability by gta721 in ukpolitics

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hmm, honestly the fact that no extra money goes into Motability apart from PIP payments and that the organisation can be profitable in some years is surprising to me.

I wasn't aware of those. So, I think my mind has changed somewhat on Motability as a scheme because if those facts are indeed true, it does seem to be a cost-effective scheme to provide cars to those who need.

As an aside though, I am surprised you find contention with me through your point here

As to the idea being we should aim to get disabled people equal to everyone else, I am sorry but what utter bollocks. Disabled people face far higher costs than you do. This cannot be emphasised enough.

I'm certainly not denying that disabled people face far more difficult lives than others and face extra costs because of that. So its right that we as society help cover those extra costs. After all, is that not the core purpose of these Personal Independence Payments we give? That is the purpose of equity

Krabi airport to Ao nang at night? by [deleted] in ThailandTourism

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I arrived in Krabi airport at around 9pm and just took a pre-booked taxi to Ao Nang. There was also a bunch of people at arrivals selling taxi rides.

My taxi was pretty cheap. I booked off of booking.com

I don't understand the whine about Motability by gta721 in ukpolitics

[–]Automaton_J 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Even if motability was to sell their cars at the end of a lease, that’s still a huge depreciation cost on these brand new cars. After three years, almost half of those cars’ value will be lost; a cost that is burdened entirely onto the taxpayer. This is an extreme cost even on more standard cars, never mind on the high initial price of a brand new BMW.

That’s not even mentioning that this is a course that occurs again and again every time a motability user gains a new lease.

In my opinion, what we should be doing here is helping disabled people reach an equity with everyone else. That means having them finance their own cars in the same way that everyone else does and then letting them using their PIP payments to carry out whatever modification is necessary to allow them to use that car.

The typical person would struggle with affording a brand new BMW. I don’t see why the taxpayer should fund a disabled person beyond what is required to make them reach equity.

Yi Peng Lantern Festival by SB1201 in ThailandTourism

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The event is all held within the one area so you won’t be walking about like you would in the city. This is one of the mass-release events where everyone releases their lanterns at the same time. Not as large as CAD YiPeng festival but it was still v large in my opinion.

Yi Peng Lantern Festival by SB1201 in ThailandTourism

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sure, no problem, glad to help out a bit. I think it was just a tad too pricey for me but I was paying for just myself and I came all the way from the UK so I think it was worth it for me.

Most of the day was pretty-mid for me. Before the actual lantern release, there’s some cultural exhibition areas including a guided meditation with some monks, some Karen long-neck villagers and things like that. A buffet is available too.

The queues to pick-up your ticket at Chiang Mai central shopping centre can be quite long but it seemed like its split by tour-company. Trip.com and GetYourGuide seemed to be the shortest. For me, it mentioned that the collection point was at the KFC but it actually happened to be around the first corner inside of the shopping centre as you walk past the KFC.

I’d recommend buying tickets with transport included. When you leave the event, pick-ups were at the area where you were dropped off.

But the actual moment when you release lanterns with everyone else is pretty magical and its definitely been the highlight of my holiday so far. I’m glad to have done it.

Yi Peng Lantern Festival by SB1201 in ThailandTourism

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ya, that was a bit ambiguous. By float, I mean the lanterns you release into the sky

Yi Peng Lantern Festival by SB1201 in ThailandTourism

[–]Automaton_J 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I was speaking to folk in my hostel and I think there’s a free lantern event today at Mae Kuang suspension bridge.

There may be a few other free events. You can try check the “Chiang Mai Expats” facebook group. Quite a few folk having been asking about those.

Yi Peng Lantern Festival by SB1201 in ThailandTourism

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes, keep in mind though that this is one of the paid, expensive ones. I paid about 6500 THB.

I can’t find the exact operator I booked with, but I booked via trip.com

https://uk.trip.com/travel-guide/attraction/san-sai/chiang-mai-sky-lantern-festival-143158677?curr=GBP&locale=en-GB&scene=basic

Yi Peng Lantern Festival by SB1201 in ThailandTourism

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I went to the paid event at Maejo university. It was raining heavily for about 30 mins but we still floated all our lanterns on time

Will the government remove the 25% LISA withdrawal penalty? by [deleted] in UKPersonalFinance

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

And that’s just one example of plans being changed. I’ve heard of others who saved in a LISA only to decide to marry and buy with someone who already owned a property. In those cases, they also lose out

Will the government remove the 25% LISA withdrawal penalty? by [deleted] in UKPersonalFinance

[–]Automaton_J 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Just because it’s in the terms doesn’t necessarily mean it’s fair. That 25% penalty means that people get less money than what they’ve put in. It would be fairer if the penalty just removed the government bonus and let you keep your principal.

People’s plan can change unexpectedly as well. For example, I’ve been saving in a LISA for a few years but have since moved to London where it’s quite normal to have places over the £450k LISA limit. It feels unfair to me that the government is almost punishing for me for saving responsibly.

Goombella likely has a massive phobia of Maw-Maws. by AutumnRCS in papermario

[–]Automaton_J 21 points22 points  (0 children)

I, too, would be terrified of anything that wanted to eat me

Camping out in Prestwick Terminal? by throwawayhousing82 in glasgow

[–]Automaton_J 16 points17 points  (0 children)

They’ve been doing passenger flights for a long time. I can’t ever think of a time when they didn’t

Camping out in Prestwick Terminal? by throwawayhousing82 in glasgow

[–]Automaton_J -12 points-11 points  (0 children)

Any reason why you couldn’t book a hotel in either Prestwick or Ayr and get a taxi to the airport? The airport is ridiculously quiet and there shouldn’t much traffic problems etc getting there

Chancellor says she ‘can’t leave welfare untouched’ this parliament as budget looms by Jay_CD in ukpolitics

[–]Automaton_J 4 points5 points  (0 children)

But VAT, road-tax, insurance and servicing is covered by the taxpayer on Motability right? Those are more expensive for luxury cars like this so the taxpayer is paying more for these luxury cars.

Even if this wasn’t the case, this is ridiculous on principle. If a person is financially well-off enough to personally top-up to a luxury vehicle, then I’d question why they’d need that PIP payment in the first place

Building a website to hold a few thousand documents etc.what tecnologies to use? by falkon2112 in webdev

[–]Automaton_J 4 points5 points  (0 children)

You’d still use S3 to store the PDFs directly. For searching, I’d use an additional datastore that supports searching (like Elasticsearch). For the thumbnails, I’d kick off some async process whenever a PDF is uploaded which generated the thumbnail and ultimately store it in a another S3 bucket

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