UK, Ireland / Recruitment agencies advertise for Polish only workers [162]


Because they are in it to make as much profit as possible, which is pretty much what most businesses are about, so I don't understand why people complain about it all the time.

Law / Anyone recommend any Polish accounting software? [4]

thanks to both of you.

I will have a look at both of them.

Life / Insuring a car for over 90 days with an English insurer? [16]


Actually I had to renew my insurance today. This time I paid out a whopping 135 PLN for a policy with PZU.


Have a look at britishinpoland.com/blog/2008/02/importing-a-motorbike/

Sorry don't know anything about track days as never done one...

Life / Insuring a car for over 90 days with an English insurer? [16]

I bought my suzuki GSF 1200 bandit to Poland. Was paying 600 GBP per year for 3rd fire and theft. I pay 50 zloty per year (no, that's not a typing error) for 3rd party only here in Poland.

I imported my bike and have got Polish plates now. I can give you the details of how to do that if you are interested.

Regarding the car you will need to be registered at an address in order to register a vehicle under your name. Temporary registration is only valid for 3 months at a time which means you will keep needing to extending your vehicle registration in person at the transport office which is a pain. Once you get your residence card then you can register for 5 years, so might be worth doing it through your father-in-law until then...

Life / Insuring a car for over 90 days with an English insurer? [16]

OK fair enough. I guessed it was something like that or sentimental attachment to the vehicle.

No you won't pay akcyza because you owned it for more than 6 months. I had the same thing with my motorbike and just had to write a declaration to say that. But you would have a very tough time to register a RHD vehicle (theoretically possible, practically impossible).

I just sold my UK car and bought a Polish one - simplest solution...
You will save a lot on insurance - I only pay about 300 PLN per year, plus no road tax. Plus if you run your own company you can offset all costs (depreciation, fuel, parts, servicing, insurance...) against tax.

Life / Insuring a car for over 90 days with an English insurer? [16]

MCA and Inkrakow - if you don't mind can I ask you why you choose to keep UK cars in Poland? Is it because you are planning to return soon(ish) to the UK? Because insurance, MOT and a tax disc are so expensive in the UK I don't see the logic of keeping a UK car in Poland long-term...

Life / Insuring a car for over 90 days with an English insurer? [16]

remember that any EU insurance policy gives you 3rd party cover in the rest of the EU. So if you don't care about fire or theft you are already covered.

Read the small print in your policy and it will tell you about it.

Law / Register for VAT in Poland [9]

What you are saying doesn't make sense. What difference does it make to your customer if you have an Irish or a Polish VAT number? None. That's the whole point of being in the EU. I don't even know if it is possible for you as a non-Polish company to get a Polish VAT number.

As a non-Polish company to get a Polish NIP number you have to write to the Urząd Skarbowy in Warsaw and enclose all your company documents (originals or certified copies) including Polish translations. But I really don't see the point....

Law / Register for VAT in Poland [9]

Who is issuing the invoice to the end customer? You? If so why can't use just use your Irish VAT number?

Law / Register for VAT in Poland [9]

I had a similar situation - I needed my UK company to have a Polish NIP number to pay a Polish employee. In the end I found it easier to open a Polish company to pay the Polish employee, and then bill the UK company from the Polish one.

I would be amazed if you can do this online. The Polish authorities aren't quite as technologically advanced as the rest of europe.

But can I ask why you need a Polish VAT number? We are all in the EU so is your Irish VAT number not sufficient?

Language / Case used in the sentence "Lecę do Francji." [5]

The good news is that the use of cases is quite strict and regular with very few exceptions.

Prepositions usually require certain cases, and verbs often require certain cases.

There are only two exceptions I can think of:

* One is when people say "słucham panią". Normally the verb słuchać takes the genitive so you would expect "słucham pani" but it is often said with the accusative.

* The other is when people say "nie mam nic". Normally something which is accusative when negated becomes genitive so you would expect "nie mam niczego".

Whether these are in fact "exceptions" or just "common mistakes" is a debate and as I'm not a native speaker I won't start on it :-)

Language / Case used in the sentence "Lecę do Francji." [5]


genetive (dopełniacz). Reason is simply because "do" requires the genitive as does its counterpart "od".

Law / Linux, Unix, and Open Source in Poland [119]

Thanks - will have a read of all that.

Yes I probably could use wine, but if I have to emulate windows I might as well just boot windows to start with, hence why I still keep a copy installed on one PC. As a web developer I also need to use internet exploder to check my websites render OK (although I use firefox exclusively otherwise)

Law / Linux, Unix, and Open Source in Poland [119]

whilst we are on the topic of Linux in Poland can anyone tell me if there is a linux alternative to the programme called "Płatnik". This seems to be the only official programme for doing ZUS forms. They gave me an install CD for it at my local ZUS office (or online here platnik.info.pl ) but it seems to be Windows only.

Law / Linux, Unix, and Open Source in Poland [119]


Well they don't seem to be doing that good a job - the bugs list in windows is always huge. Every few months some spotty teenager in China manages to break something open and Microsoft issues security patches and offers a reward. That doesn't happen on linux.

Personally I quite like open source stuff. I now use Ubuntu 90% of the time and use a lot of open source projects for work. I used to be 100% microsoft though so am not anti-microsoft, but I do find linux more usable.

But I still hang on to Windows XP on one computer because there alway seem to be one or two programmes that just won't run on anything else...

Law / Linux, Unix, and Open Source in Poland [119]


Sorry I have to jump in here, most of these home programmers are not hobbyists as you are implying. I would guess that the majority of them are specialists and professionals. An example is Doug Cutting who wrote the open source Nutch and Lucene projects which are used for searching and indexing. He now works at Yahoo. To tinker with this stuff requires a lot of in-depth knowledge.


Again not sure I agree - how many people does Microsoft employee to test product X? Pick a number, 50? 100? 500? Now compare that with the potentially thousands of people who use an open source product and report back problems to the developers. The result is that the quality might be lower for a newly released product but after a couple of releases it's usually fine. But that's why open source projects usually come out at version 0.9 so they have time to incorporate feedback.


I read an academic article that talked about peer review for software once. Microsoft or other proprietary software is closed and therefore can't be scrutinised unlike open source stuff, so the logic goes that a major bug is less likely to go unnoticed in open source. That's why architects use peer review for their plans. They don't want to build a new suspension bridge and then realise later they messed up their maths somewhere...


Yep, there is a lot of crap out there too. Lots of projects are started and not maintained, or badly organised etc.. But the good ones bubble to the top. But the great part is that if you have a problem with the code or functionality you can always fix it or modify it yourself (if you are so inclined), and help is usually available on the net.

Law / Costs for importing a car from Germany to Poland. [34]

See this thread which is related: https://polishforums.com/archives/2005-2009/law/poland-costs-importing-car-germany-31446/
and about where to go and what to do this is related: britishinpoland.com/blog/2008/02/importing-a-motorbike/

Law / Costs for importing a car from Germany to Poland. [34]


Yes, but now your next-door neighbour who resents you not paying UK car tax rings up the DVLA to report your car that's been here for 2 years. I have heard about this happening to Polish people.


Yes you're right, but you are wrong to say that it is perfectly legal to keep any EU car in any other EU state without restriction, because that's simply not true - there are restrictions.


Yes I agree with you that for continental Europe this is probably much much easier, and I doubt that anyone in Poland would care how long your German registered vehicle is here for. So I think that your suggestion not to bother importing a German car is definitely worth considering...

Law / Costs for importing a car from Germany to Poland. [34]


I don't think you are right about that. If that is true then why can't foreign people keep their cars in the UK without restriction? According to the DVLA you can only keep a foreign vehicle in the UK for 6 months per 12 month period: dvla.gov.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/archive2006/20060308_24.aspx

I would be very very surprised if Poland didn't have similar restrictions (although whether they are enforced or not is a different question).

Life / Sat TV providers in Poland [18]

I used to have sky but couldn't receive BBC or ITV and a couple of others. Now I have got "n" instead and am happy enough with it.

The n box isn't as functional as the sky box - for example you can't record two programmes at once like you can with sky. Also the movie channels are crap compared to sky movies etc..

Regarding the picture the screen pixelates sometimes for a second when the wind blows a lot but otherwise it's been fine for the past year.

The customer service with N isn't great either. Sometimes really hard to get hold of them. Luckily haven't needed to recently.

Life / Satellite type connections in flat in Poland [18]


Just playing devil's advocate here - surely the plural of child is just "children". So where has the s come from if it's not genitive?

Love / Dilemma, Flight School or beautiful polish women????? [19]


Don't worry about it. As a qualified pilot I am sure you will be able to find plenty more where she came from :-)

Law / Costs for importing a car from Germany to Poland. [34]

No, I think it is pretty clear that there is no VAT, just a Polish tax called akcyza which is customs tax.

If you want to find out yourself then go to the office called 'Urząd Skarbowy' in the town where you will register the car.

Language / Rok vs. Lat [30]

Could well be - often the most commonly used expressions in a language (such as expressions of time, the verb "to be" etc..) are the most irregular...

Language / Rok vs. Lat [30]

exactly - the word "years" and "summers" in Polish is the same...

Language / Rok vs. Lat [30]

Funnily enough we have just been talking about the rok/lata thing on my blog:

britishinpoland.com/blog/2008/12/5-polish-language-oddities

Work / I definitely want to move to Warsaw- But i'm lost, Where should i start?? [3]

Guide for new arrivals

Love / KISSING ON THE LIPS (problem with my Polish in-laws) [17]

I have lived in Poland for about 3 years and I can't say I have noticed the family kiss on the lips. But culture aside they sound like horrible people. It wouldn't have been much for them to accomodate your request but instead of trying to make you feel welcome they deliberately antagonise your over it. I am sorry to hear about your experience.

Work / Moving to Poland in April 2009, need to find IT-related job! suggestions? [21]


Well if you don't try it you'll never know. Come to Poland and see what happens. If after 6 months you aren't making progress then you can always re-think things.