Originally Posted by perthhomeschool (Post 10570595)

I look forward to it, Rodney! I would love to see the Dickens Museum. Also want to visit Thomas Hardy's Dorset while I'm down that way. (Can you tell I was an English major?) :)

Originally Posted by J.JsOH (Post 10573728)

I have no personal evidence but yes, my understanding is age is a factor when seeking employment in Britain. Of course, it depends on your skills and the job you seek. I think it would be important to match your abilities to the needs of an advertised job, find some synergy, take some recent training.

It is still generally expected that people retire at coming of age, even though the law recently changed so that companies now cannot force someone out at their retirement age. A few may work on longer but it seems the norm is that everyone is looking forward to retiring, not to keep on working.

Large store checkouts seem to be willing to give anyone a try, I see many older people there. B&Q has a policy to hire older workers.

Finding a job could be a long and tiring road as many newspaper stories attest.
But then not always, an older newcomer to my street got a job as a legal secretary (she has admin experience) after only a few weeks looking, and now she has split the job to part-time with someone else.
I think her strategy of chasing for jobs as soon as she moved into town worked for her and made her stand out amongst the long term local unemployed.

As for the story of high numbers of applicants for a coffee bar job, I wonder why so many are looking for the comfy warm low-skill regular-hours, fixed pay rate and benefits of employment with a established company? Are as many applying to be farm workers or cabbage pickers or flower packers? Maybe not, because immigrants seems to walk into those positions.

Originally Posted by jasper123 (Post 10573884)

Yep sure can!!!! and me ----- well I didn't even pass my 11 plus :eek:

Originally Posted by jasper123 (Post 10573884)

Yep sure can!!!! and me ----- well I didn't even pass my 11 plus :eek:

Originally Posted by perthhomeschool (Post 10573923)

Oh who cares? You couldn't be a more lovely man. That's much more important :) And my college education did naught for me. I ended up doing something completely different - as English majors usually do :rofl:

Originally Posted by cheers (Post 10573958)

I wish you could correct my grammar on my posts. I keep looking and I remember a rule something like ....not ending a sentence with a preposition 'with'

Originally Posted by cheers (Post 10573958)

I wish you could correct my grammar on my posts. I keep looking and I remember a rule something like ....not ending a sentence with a preposition 'with'

Originally Posted by Sally Redux (Post 10573971)

"That is a rule up with which I will not put." ~ attributed to Churchill ;)

Originally Posted by Sally Redux (Post 10573971)

"That is a rule up with which I will not put." ~ attributed to Churchill ;)

Originally Posted by J.JsOH (Post 10573728)

I have no personal evidence but yes, my understanding is age is a factor when seeking employment in Britain. Of course, it depends on your skills and the job you seek. I think it would be important to match your abilities to the needs of an advertised job, find some synergy, take some recent training.

It is still generally expected that people retire at coming of age, even though the law recently changed so that companies now cannot force someone out at their retirement age. A few may work on longer but it seems the norm is that everyone is looking forward to retiring, not to keep on working.

Large store checkouts seem to be willing to give anyone a try, I see many older people there. B&Q has a policy to hire older workers.

Finding a job could be a long and tiring road as many newspaper stories attest.
But then not always, an older newcomer to my street got a job as a legal secretary (she has admin experience) after only a few weeks looking, and now she has split the job to part-time with someone else.
I think her strategy of chasing for jobs as soon as she moved into town worked for her and made her stand out amongst the long term local unemployed.

As for the story of high numbers of applicants for a coffee bar job, I wonder why so many are looking for the comfy warm low-skill regular-hours, fixed pay rate and benefits of employment with a established company? Are as many applying to be farm workers or cabbage pickers or flower packers? Maybe not, because immigrants seems to walk into those positions.

Originally Posted by cheers (Post 10573917)

There was a different view of school back then and I'm guessing that only about 10% of the youth went on to college because they passed the 11 plus exam.

Note: What they call high school in the US they called it college in the UK. Correct me if I'm wrong.:confused:
I didn't pass the 11 plus back then but I was able to attend the university in the US and I graduated with high honors to boot.
Cheers

Originally Posted by perthhomeschool (Post 10572086)

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Apparently, Amazon Prime is offering a free trial right now also (they don't do it very often so grab it while you can).

Originally Posted by windsong (Post 10575422)

T I don't know what the retirement age is over there these days but I expect to stop full-time work at 65 but, having said that, even when I am unemployed now I get fed up after being home for more than a week.

Originally Posted by cheers (Post 10573958)

I wish you could correct my grammar on my posts. I keep looking and I remember a rule something like ....not ending a sentence with a preposition 'with'

Originally Posted by rebs (Post 10575437)

The best way to keep track of the retirement ages in the UK is to use the online calculators on the www.gov.uk website:-

https://www.gov.uk/calculate-state-pension

Originally Posted by windsong (Post 10575422)

Thank you. It's good to know what to expect - forewarned is forearmed. I don't know what the retirement age is over there these days but I expect to stop full-time work at 65 but, having said that, even when I am unemployed now I get fed up after being home for more than a week. I also want to work to keep my brain active as I get older but perhaps the business I have started will turn into something that will suffice in this respect. It is too soon to say yet. If it is "really" successful, then I can keep my brain active by traveling :) Seriously, though, no matter what age we retire from work, you never know what will happen and it is nice to be able to pick up a part-time job if necessary.

It will be a while before I move back but this knowledge is always useful so I can at least strategize.