subject: Home Emergency Cover – What The Butler Saw! [print this page] Home Emergency Cover What The Butler Saw!
I know that this sounds like one of those tacky Blackpool promenade peep shows, but in actual fact, it refers to a school associate from many years ago.
I went to school at a time when they still had some of the old prefabricated buildings in use from after the war. They were still heated by the old coke-fired boilers in each classroom! In fact, one of the easiest ways to get out of lessons was to volunteer to fetch the coke scuttles full of coke for the teacher to put on the fires.
One of the abiding memories of those times was a young girl who always spoke in a very `posh` accent, nearing in mind we lived in a village near Manchester. As we got older I became quite close to her, even though she tended to keep herself to herself.
When she had her 11th birthday, it coincided with us nearing the end of our tenure in Primary School and we all knew that our paths would inevitably drift apart from the moment it ended. As far as I know, I was the only pupil from our class to be invited to her party.
She lived in a beautiful farm house on a working farm and I was astonished to find that they had what I would call a butler. Really, he was a hired help, but to me he seemed like a butler. Anyway, whilst we were there, the electricity went off and we were plunged into semi-darkness. The `butler`, as I called him, was despatched to try finding out what had happened. There was no home emergency cover in those days!
Needless to say, he disappeared for quite a while before reappearing looking dispirited. He could not sort it out and we had to leave the party early whilst there was still some daylight.
I can remember to this day, the disappointment I felt at missing out on further investigations into the farm and that `butler`! So much so, that when I came to the point where I had my own house and young family, I decided to ensure that I never had to put my kids through a similar ordeal, even though the thought of entertaining a house full of my daughters 11 year old friends filled me with much more fear than any power cut could ever contrive.
So I took the plunge and took out some home emergency cover. I just did a search on the internet and found a really helpful website that did not just fire a pile of quotes and figures at me, but gave me the reasoning behind the various levels of cover and the relative necessity depending upon my circumstances.
We did eventually have our party for my eldest daughter without any hitches or problems. We even went on to stage parties for my other two children and then adult dinner parties for our friends.
The reason we felt confident to invite people to our home was because we knew that whatever may happen whilst we were entertaining, we would not be left looking helpless if something untoward happened.
I never really fully understood what all the fuss was about so-called `peace of mind` that I heard so much about. Since we have had the reassurance of our home emergency cover, I now fully understand what it means.
