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Sympathies Layla. I very much hope life is getting easier and better for you and your husband.

I suspect part of our problem in the UK is because few of our politicians have much knowledge or personal experience of life as it's lived by at least 80% their constituents. They'd be better MPs if they'd personally tried to live for weeks on the same benefits or low wages they claim others can survive on.

Seen the various press articles about the number of people queuing up to apply for very ordinary jobs??? There was one in my local paper yesterday - 320 applicants for 10 jobs I think. The problem isn't the jobless not wanting to work - it's the lack of jobs for people wanting them.

The government could help if it wanted to do so by not stopping benefit claims while claimants do the short-term jobs that might possibly lead on to permanent jobs. The benefits could be clawed back slowly, everybody'd win.

At present, someone on benefits can't afford to take a very short-term job (one lasting only a few weeks or a couple of months), even when they hope such a job might lead to something permanent. The reason they can't take the risk is because of the sheer administrative incompetence of DWP.

It takes around 6 - 8 weeks for DWP to reinstate someone on benefits after the short-term work has finished, often longer. During that interval, the claimant has no money to live on - no money for food, rent, energy costs, 'phone, internet, bedroom tax or council tax charge.

Would you risk being totally without money for 8 weeks or longer for the sake of a couple of weeks employment? Especially when the couple of weeks employment would be probably a National Minimum Wage job and require upfront payment of travel costs?

I disagree about psychometric tests being stupid (though I'd agree they're often mis-used and job applicants get short-changed when this happens).

However good any tool is, you don't get good results using it if you don't know what you're doing, use it badly (cos that's cheaper) or use the wrong tool for the job.

One of my particular bugbears is the widely marketed DISC "recruitment aid". When I last read the publishers' blurb about it, the text said openly it isn't a genuine psychometric test; however few managers and recruitment consultants seem to read that far!

If you use a "recruitment aid" as opposed to a properly researched, peer-evaluated psychometric test, you can't rely on anything it says about the candidate.

Agree with you on both points, Steve ...

When there aren't any good guys to support why support one or other of the bad guys?

Agreed, the Syrian regime seems to have become a whole lot nastier than it was when securely in power (when there's a survival threat to the regime that's always the most likely outcome).

Personally, though, I can't see any benefit to the Syrians in the rebel coalition taking over. The coalition includes monsters such as Bin Laden and Taliban-style groups. They haven't any agreed aims or policies. If the coalition "wins" against their government they'll spend the next ten years tearing Syria apart as they fight between themselves. Israel might be happy to see that result but it won't be good for Syria or Syria's other neighbours.

Why not simply do what's possible to protect the innocents by insisting on safe passage for refugees, funding good quality, well-protected asylum in accommodation outside Syria and trying to help the neighbouring countries to remain politically, economically and socially stable?

Oppose war, wage peace ... OK it's only a slogan but it's sensible advice.

Just a thought ... direct contact with eye hospitals?

Hospitals like Moorfields need suppliers who can do "extreme glasses" fast. The kind of glasses I'm talking about are those which have lens as thick as ancient bottles (though coatings and special glass technology etc can improve their "look").

Off the cuff thinking ...

Couldn't quite work out whether you do the eye testing as well as the glasses.

If it's only the glasses, then your sales "gatekeepers" are the opticians, you'll need to sell, sell , sell to them and you'll have to negotiate deals they like ... so they can sell directly to the end-customers.

Are you in touch with all the opticians who can feed you business? Do you know what kinds of customers come to their shops - and what appeals to them (eg are they after a same day service and designer frames?)? It'd be worthwhile putting some effort into up to date market research.

I'm assuming you can't compete on price with the Specsavers of this world so you'll have to find some way of being "better" than they are.

Have you talked to opticians about providing a "we come to you" service for those in nursing homes or disabled at home? Do you know anything about working with customers suffering from dementia or other disabilities? I've heard it can be very difficult finding an optician skilled in helping ill / disabled customers; the carers' grapevine will pass your details round if you're good at assisting the people they care for with their sight problems.

GOOD LUCK! Linda

Dunno whether this is an old-fashioned approach now - it might help you rank higher than otherwise in the search engines if your company name reflects the services / goods your customers search for ...

We're a careers counselling company working across the UK so Careers Partnership (UK) is a sensible (if boring) name for us...

You'd have thought EVERYONE (even this government) would have learnt from the Olympics debacle when a huge, high profile security contract was handed over to an MD with a criminal conviction and a string of company liquidations behind her... Perhaps not.