½ûÂþÌìÌÃ

Good morning. FIrst you need to see if ADSL is available in the area you are moving to. To do that you would need to know a phone number of either the place you will stay or a neighbor. You can then go to [url]http://www.alice.it/alice/ep/programView.do?channelId=-1073753205&programId=1073762568[/url] (Telecom) and under where it says Verifica Copertura, put in the area code and then the number.

For regular phone calls, I use a special card from SISAL (the lottery people) where I get great rates. The post office also sells cards now that I hear have great rates.

HTH

Cristina

Hi there!
Good luck with the move - we have a small house near Lucca and were due to move over late last year... it hasn't quite gone to plan and I guess it's all on hold at the moment - for the time being we visit when we can.
Anyway, everyone tells us how expensive gas is, we have installed central heating but will be using it sparingly! Most people we know have open fires where possible, using the gas as a back up - does the house have fireplaces or wood burners?
With electricity it is apparently cheaper if you take up residency. To do this you need to be there more or less full time... we are not able to do this at the moment, so we are on the higher rate electricity tariff! I guess if you are renting, a lot will depend on whether the landlord will be putting the bills in your name, if so, I think you need a tax code. We got our tax codes when we bought the house, so not sure how you do it otherwise... I'm sure someone on the forum will be able to help you with that one.
We haven't connected a phone, but it seems there are many cards you can buy that give you amazingly cheap calls with your landline - local bars sell these, sorry can't be more specific, again I'm sure someone will have more info...
Anyway, sorry for such a vague reply, but maybe you can pick out a bit of useful info. Good luck, Lucca is a fantastic place!!!
Sue

You shouldn'tnhave a problem getting ISDN installed; ours was in within a week of putting in the request on Telecom Italia's web site. The cost of installation is €120 and the monthly line rental about €20.
[url]http://www.187.it/cgi-bin/di_187/di/187/demand/product/serviceDetailCost.do?channelId=-536887615&tabClicked=Dettaglio+Costi&productOid=11592&BV_UseBVCookie=Yes&pageTypeId=536888874&indexHistory=2[/url]

Our experience of phone networks has led us to use only Tele2, who provide a clear pricing structure and a good billing system. They also do ADSL.
[url]http://www.tele2.it/[/url]

Thanks so much for your replies. Yes we are very excited about the move. Our five year old son is nervous about an ½ûÂþÌìÌà school but we hope he'll be happy. The bonus for him is that he'll get his mum every afternoon. She's worked almost fifty hours a week since he was two so is looking forward to the time off.

The owner of the house is putting all the bills in his name so I don't think we'll need a tax code. I'm taking our car and renewing the tax for a year the week we leave. Is there anything else I should know about the car?
I need to get it insured in Italy. My insurer will allow 120 days In italy on my current policy but I'll have to change after that. Any recommendations there too?

Couldn't agree more about Lucca. We have had a number of holidays there
and have fallen in love with it. Who knows, maybe we won't come back!

Hi

You should probably still go and get a tax code, a "codice fiscale". It's probably one of the easier things I've done since I got here and you need it for loads of things you wouldn't even think of - i.e. buying a mobile phone, opening a bank account. You'll probably need it for connecting your landline, internet etc as well. You don't need to be resident here, just go along to the nearest "Agenzia delle entrate" with some identification and they can sort it out quite quickly (you may also need something with your ½ûÂþÌìÌà address but I'm not 100% on that).

Car insurance is very expensive here - I have a 7 year old ½ûÂþÌìÌà car and the cheapest insurance I could find was approx 900 euros for the year - this is the basic required by law - ie 3rd party with no fire or theft cover. I did get told that if I had kept my UK car and shown some proof of my no claims they "might" have been able to do it cheaper - worth bearing in mind. Don't ask me who it was with though - we arranged it through an agent and are still waiting for the official documentation to come through (possibly why it was cheaper than the others!). It may be worth looking into insuring the car for the full year with a UK insurer although I don't know anything about that myself.

I've also got ADSL at home through Telecom Italia. It all works as it should now but I did have to wait around 5 weeks for it to be installed.

Good luck!

Car Insurance

There are a couple of threads on this Forum about car insurance - it looks horrendous for taking your car with you.

However - The AA do a policy [if you retain an UK address] for at least 1 years motoring abroad - but I'm told it isn't cheap.

Buying a car in Italy is difficult [impossible?] unless you are Resident - same applies to re-registering the car over there.

Good Luck.

I put some details in another thread regarding insurance. We used Direct Line Italia for ours and got a years 3rd party for a lot less than the 900 suggested here. Think it was more like 400ish.

They will insure for 1 year on UK plates, after that you have to register the vehicle in Italy. This is almost certainly the cheapest option. They were very friendly too and I have given names of English speaking contacts....

Will post the contact details again if you like, or perhaps it would be a good exercise to browse deeper into the gunnels of the forum. I have checked it is still there.........

Hi Tim,

I found your thread and have spoken to Direct Line Italia. Usually they can only insure ½ûÂþÌìÌà residents but they are seeing if they can swing something. Very nice and helpful too. So thanks. Also I'm getting a quote from Stuart Collins insurance brokers in Swansea.

This forum is great. All of the little frets that I've had in the past few weeks have been answered so I'm very grateful.
I have to improve my (basically hopeless) ½ûÂþÌìÌÃ.

Just to add to this. Direct Line Italia can only insure ½ûÂþÌìÌà residents. Stuart Collins brokers ([url]http://www.stuartcollins.co.uk[/url]) have quoted me £550.00 for an AXA policy with 12 months [u]fully comprehensive[/u] insurance (issuing a 12 month green card), with my wife as named driver and including legal cover with a £100.00 excess. My car is a 3 year old VW Golf 1.4. I think this is fairly reasonable as I pay £450.00 in the UK anyway.

[QUOTE=Mhvoiceuk]Hi, I'm new here.

In August I'm moving to Montecarlo in Tuscany for a year with my wife and children. We've rented a three bedroom villa from a local farmer.

I've got a few questions about utility bills. Can anyone help?
What should we budget for utility bills? We've been told that gas is horrendously expensive compared to the UK. The property has a bombelone. What should we expect to pay for water, electricity and gas (family of four)? Also, because of my work, I need to install both ISDN and ADSL (yes both!). Can anyone recommend a good service provider and advise on tariffs? We will presumably rent our main phone line from Telecom Italia. In the UK I use [url]www.call18866.co.uk[/url] in conjunction with my BT line for all my UK and international phone calls (2p a minute to Italy). Is there a cheap international call service like this that I can sign up to in Italy? Also are there any mobile phone providers - ( Tim, Wind etc) - who are better for international calls than others? T Mobile in the UK has an international option which makes their call charges far cheaper than the others.

Sorry to have so many questions. Any advice will be much appreciated.[/QUOTE]
Hi, to do cheap calls go to a local Tobacconist and ask for International calling cards, they cost 5 euros and are good. Internet cost a bit more than here and in rural areas is simply not existent. we used to spend about 150 euros per year in water, 100 a month electricity, 500 euros every 3 months for heating but our house still reached no ore than 9 degrees in winter in Tuscany! Good luck...