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No, you're not past the point of no return Barney. If you think about it, no court wants to waste its time hearing cases that should never have been brought - and every official connected with these cases knows that.

If you're not the right person to deal with the admin people, could you give the job to a trusted friend or family member who is? Someone used to working in customer services, credit control, a legal practice or similar might be a good bet.

Barney, plse rethink! A court setting isn't the best place to sort out an administrative mess (as this situation is) and going to court will involve more trouble and expense for you than resolving the problem with the administrators.

Suggest the personal touch will work best. Collect up all the evidence you've got showing that you have replied to all the official emails, they haven't answered your emails to them and that you're a perfectly innocent victim (of their maladministration).

Then ring up Transport for London, explain to the switchboard operator you need to speak to someone with the clout to sort out this hassle (ask who that person might be and what their job title and department is, make a note of the information and only then allow the switchboard operator to put you through).

If they put you through to someone who doesn't answer the phone, go back to the switchboard operator immediately and get her / him to transfer you to someone with the right authority who will speak to you.

Make it clear in the friendliest way you will launch an official complaint if you're not put through to someone willing and able to help and you intend to go up the management chain as far as is necessary to sort out the problem. If you have to put on the pressure, ask what procedure you should follow to make your official complaint.

When you speak to whoever can help you, explain (nicely) why Transport for London has acted wrongly and how they haven't responded to any of the contacts you have made with them to try to sort out the problem.

Talk them through the history of what's happened and send them the emails which prove your case and prove how badly they've behaved to you. Put a read receipt request on the email and follow up if they don't get back to you when they say they will.

Make sure you get in writing from them an acknowledgement Transport for London should not have issued the fine in the first place and that they will put a stop on the fines and court case. Good luck! Linda

DON'T DO IT STEVE! I tried to get to grips with the Mac I inherited, it is SO,SO different from a PC and the effort was never worthwhile.

I've always hated any technological innovation demanding a rethink of my previous ways of working so I was surprised how relatively quickly I became comfortable using Windows 7. Anyone less like a Luddite than me (you, for example) would sail through the whole process.

If anyone wants an unloved 2006 Mac with lots of software please let me know!

Agree with Sharpink. I wonder whether sometimes you need to re-enact the decisions you've made several times just to check you really have made up your mind?

I vividly remember an abseiling experience ... I knew I wanted to do it (though I'm frightened of heights) but working out how to take the last few micro-steps to get me over the cliff edge took several minutes!

Try your local Chamber of Commerce - they'll know about government, local authority and business development grants generally. They'll also be pleased to tell you about all the wonderful extra benefits you'll get from joining them!

You could also get info directly from the government web sites and helplines. I think there's a Department of Business Information & Skills (dbis) but I'm not sure - anyway you could always try a search under "government advice", "government grants" Best wishes, Linda

..Might not be easy, though, if the email's being spread by other infected computers.

What isn't easy is usually expensive - so there'd have to be a good reason for investing the money it would cost and many customers willing to pay the price. I think most of us just pray our anti-virus and firewall software will keep us safe (even though nothing provides 100% protection against "nasties").

You fell off the wagon once, Dreamraven. If you pick yourself up and climb back again, you're still on the wagon ...

This is what I tell myself during the post-winter weight control exercise - which is never much fun, always necessary and (so far) works.

That government minister was an absolute clot to say what he did. It's common knowledge that petrol's highly inflammable and you don't store highly inflammable substances in unsafe environments (which homes mostly are).

You wonder sometimes how stupid our political leaders actually are.

OK the lady who followed his advice should have known better. Poor lass, she's paid a high enough penalty for one stupid act.

So pleased for you, Sharpink. Good luck Dreamraven.

When I looked at the customer blurb introducing Windows 7, it seemed to be written by computer enthusiasts. They were really pleased with all these glossy things their "baby" could now do.

They'd forgotten about the sizeable percentage of buyers who just want a tool that's immediately easy to use.

I wonder how many Technical Authors Microsoft employs? A good Technical Author would have done a much better job on the documentation for customers!!! Linda