You know how those 'best of' lists are...popularity contests won by places with a big mailing list. We get tons of people thru here every year who HAVE to go eat at ABC because they've heard about it forever. Then they come back and say, 'So what. There's gotta be a better place than that,' and then we tell them where else to go.
What I wish some people realized before they moved to a foreign country to open a biz there is what, exactly, is required of them in doing that. We've heard so many horror stories from innkeepers forced to sell and 'go home' because they could not make the quotas required by the gov't.
Nothing like going off "half cocked" in a foreign country. Like letting your cousin do your website and relying on print marketing. So there would be problems if their B&B was in California even without the language difficulties. Wonder if they have been able to surmount their difficulties. Perhaps so, sounds like their learning curve can be a little flatter without mortgage payments to make. Stay tuned for part 2!
This language thing we have a nightmare with it as tons of brits think oh we will go open a B&B in Spain or France as it is so close and as we are all eu you don't need a visa or work permits or any of that stuff. However they forget (conveniently) that the law is completely different about property buying, food hygene, tax and a million other things and they are super lazy and don't learn the language so then have to pay someone to sort all these things out and then wonder why they go belly up. In spain especially there are all sorts of rules about water that are complicated as it is so hot there you can't have the guy at the top of the hill using it all so the people at the bottom have non (makes sense). My chamber maid has been here 5 years from Lithuania and is now at the level where she can just about manage. But I have had to sort out interpriters for lots of people at the hospital and all sorts. Mind you they are brave comming here with little or no language and giving it a go. Part of the trouble in Harrogate is there are so many poles and lituanians they tend to stick to their own and so don't speak english outside of work and sometimes not even then. Many bosses are learning polish for this reason.
Tons of them (Brits) come here and find out the gov't here has all sorts of regs for how much money they have to make and how many employees they have to support, etc. And, apparently, your visa can be revoked at any time if you look at someone crooked. At least that's what they've told us. (The Brits that is.)
We have the same sort of problems with Yanks. Want to open up businesses in Canada because they think it's the same as the US and that we will spend extra money because it's American. Only to find out that you can't do what you do in the US to employees and deal with labour bureaucracy. (Minimum wages, paid vacations, worker safety, employment insurance, drug/alcohol testing, national holidays, work norms, language and harrassment.) We actually have laws in place to protect employees from verbal harrassment.
We have a lot of the different last name thing as a lot of women now keep their last names as it saves changes to all your professional stuff ie if you are a doctor you confuse all your patients etc.We have the same sort of problems with Yanks. Want to open up businesses in Canada because they think it's the same as the US and that we will spend extra money because it's American. Only to find out that you can't do what you do in the US to employees and deal with labour bureaucracy. (Minimum wages, paid vacations, worker safety, employment insurance, drug/alcohol testing, national holidays, work norms, language and harrassment.) We actually have laws in place to protect employees from verbal harrassment.
I've seen it before... large corporations come to Canada, bring their goods that they have already paid duty on, for the US and then expect that they can pay duty a second time and then mark it up for Canada. Then they don't understand why we won't buy it (we travel to the US all the time, we are you biggest group of visitors - I was in the US for the day yesterday). We know all your prices! They close the store and eventually come back after hiring a consultant who tells them to import directly and keep the prices close to the US prices. Takes a genius!
And then there is the whole marriage thing that the US doesn't get. Almost everyone in Quebec gets things in duplicate because the US doesn't seem to understand that married people can have two different last names. We have already had two PM in Canada who's wives had different last names!
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(Minimum wages, paid vacations, worker safety, employment insurance, drug/alcohol testing, national holidays, work norms, language and harrassment.)We have the same sort of problems with Yanks. Want to open up businesses in Canada because they think it's the same as the US and that we will spend extra money because it's American. Only to find out that you can't do what you do in the US to employees and deal with labour bureaucracy. (Minimum wages, paid vacations, worker safety, employment insurance, drug/alcohol testing, national holidays, work norms, language and harrassment.) We actually have laws in place to protect employees from verbal harrassment.
I've seen it before... large corporations come to Canada, bring their goods that they have already paid duty on, for the US and then expect that they can pay duty a second time and then mark it up for Canada. Then they don't understand why we won't buy it (we travel to the US all the time, we are you biggest group of visitors - I was in the US for the day yesterday). We know all your prices! They close the store and eventually come back after hiring a consultant who tells them to import directly and keep the prices close to the US prices. Takes a genius!
And then there is the whole marriage thing that the US doesn't get. Almost everyone in Quebec gets things in duplicate because the US doesn't seem to understand that married people can have two different last names. We have already had two PM in Canada who's wives had different last names!
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Nope he is saying they are even strickter in Canada. In the UK they are trying to make it easier to fire people to help the economy the idea is if you know it is hard to get rid of someone if you can't aford to pay them you won't take them on in the first place but if you could make them redundant relatively easily you would be more willing to risk taking them on. Might work see how it goes. Not for hiring and firing willy nilly but think it might make people more willing to risk taking someone on if they knew if money became tight they could let them go at least they would be in a job for a bit.(Minimum wages, paid vacations, worker safety, employment insurance, drug/alcohol testing, national holidays, work norms, language and harrassment.)We have the same sort of problems with Yanks. Want to open up businesses in Canada because they think it's the same as the US and that we will spend extra money because it's American. Only to find out that you can't do what you do in the US to employees and deal with labour bureaucracy. (Minimum wages, paid vacations, worker safety, employment insurance, drug/alcohol testing, national holidays, work norms, language and harrassment.) We actually have laws in place to protect employees from verbal harrassment.
I've seen it before... large corporations come to Canada, bring their goods that they have already paid duty on, for the US and then expect that they can pay duty a second time and then mark it up for Canada. Then they don't understand why we won't buy it (we travel to the US all the time, we are you biggest group of visitors - I was in the US for the day yesterday). We know all your prices! They close the store and eventually come back after hiring a consultant who tells them to import directly and keep the prices close to the US prices. Takes a genius!
And then there is the whole marriage thing that the US doesn't get. Almost everyone in Quebec gets things in duplicate because the US doesn't seem to understand that married people can have two different last names. We have already had two PM in Canada who's wives had different last names!
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Are you saying you don't have these things?
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Professionals (meaning doctors, lawyers, politicians, etc, not hookers) have retained their maiden names for years here for just that reason. It is not at all unusal for women to retain their surname today.We have a lot of the different last name thing as a lot of women now keep their last names as it saves changes to all your professional stuff ie if you are a doctor you confuse all your patients etc.We have the same sort of problems with Yanks. Want to open up businesses in Canada because they think it's the same as the US and that we will spend extra money because it's American. Only to find out that you can't do what you do in the US to employees and deal with labour bureaucracy. (Minimum wages, paid vacations, worker safety, employment insurance, drug/alcohol testing, national holidays, work norms, language and harrassment.) We actually have laws in place to protect employees from verbal harrassment.
I've seen it before... large corporations come to Canada, bring their goods that they have already paid duty on, for the US and then expect that they can pay duty a second time and then mark it up for Canada. Then they don't understand why we won't buy it (we travel to the US all the time, we are you biggest group of visitors - I was in the US for the day yesterday). We know all your prices! They close the store and eventually come back after hiring a consultant who tells them to import directly and keep the prices close to the US prices. Takes a genius!
And then there is the whole marriage thing that the US doesn't get. Almost everyone in Quebec gets things in duplicate because the US doesn't seem to understand that married people can have two different last names. We have already had two PM in Canada who's wives had different last names!
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