Life / Ripped Off in Poland? - Expose here: [185]

Actualy your consumer rights in Poland are almost identical to those in the UK. regardless of any so called guarantee. If the goods are not fit for purpose within 2 years of purchase you have the right for repair or replacement. If repair or replacement can't rectify the problem (eg. It's so crap it's never going to be able to do what they said it would) then the contract can be terminated (you get your money back in other words).

Plus the two year period starts again from the replacement / repair of the goods.

How far you would have to go to enforce it I don't know. But I think if you threatened legal action (seeing as that if the supplier lost he would also have to pay the costs) should usually get the result.

This law has been about since 2003.

Hence all the super warranty offers ( our product comes with a two year warranty ). That's because in law it already does (unless it's clearly stated that the lifetime of the product is limited when you are buying the goods).

You don't have to have the silly warranty documented stamped and signed. You do need to keep the original proof of purchase (this is your contract).

Work / Why is Polish workmanship so bad? [52]

Unfortunately it's true. The standards of workmanship here are generaly terrible. There are guys who can do a really good job but they are far and few between and really difficult to find. But from what I can remember there were plenty of 'cowboys' in the UK as well.

I did all the work on my flat myself (internal walls, installation, plastering, tiling etc.) the only job I didn't do was the final mounting of the radiators (as the supply and fitting of the heating was included in the price of the flat). The pipes were laid for them to the correct position, all they had to do was fit the valves and mount the radiators on the walls. The stupid twats fitted compression fittings to plastic pipes and every radiator leaks where the valve is fitted.

That plumbing work was carried out by one of the largest specialist companies in this town, I hate to think what a cowboy plumber would have done.

Life / Russian Language - is it offensive if I speak it to Polish people? [69]

My wife comes from a fairly small village. When I'm there some of the older neighbours try to speak to me in Russian (even though I can communicate quite well in Polish). They know I'm a foreigner and perhaps they're just testing too see if I understand Russian better than Polish. I agree with the earlier posts, I think that most of the older generation would be quite happy to try to communicate with you in Russian ( and as you're not Russian I don't think there would be any resentment).

With the younger generation English would probably be the best option.


Perhaps English native speaking to a Frenchman. When we were in France I was amazed how many of them understood and replied in English to my Polish freinds. I'm going to practise a fake accent before my next visit.

Love / Insultive opinions about Polish girls... [139]


Neither do I. Which is why I said I didn't want to sound derogatory. I find wild people interesting and the most likeable. I spent most of my life in the UK hanging around with people on the wilder side. Conversely I've spent most of my life in Poland with people on the more conservative side. Which is why I say you can't generalise.

I wasn't exactly a battered husband in the UK but I've been on the recieving end of a few freshly brewed mugs of tea thrown in my direction and on a couple of ocasions a cut glass ashtray. But I wouldn't begin to claim all English girls are violent.


Correct I haven't been on this forum long enough to read all the posts. But I'm getting the idea that there is a concensus on this forum that racially Polish women are apart from other nationalities (in a negative way). I have however spent 30% of my adult life here and have met a large mixture of people, some nice some not so nice. I know it's boring and a bit PC but I don't believe you should insult Polish women by generalising.

I agree there are some common customs amongst them like insisting on cleaning the house and I mean really cleaning, before any visiting guests arrive (perhaps they adopted Hyacinth Bucket as a role model). But I haven't noticed common traits of bad manners, violence etc.

Love / Insultive opinions about Polish girls... [139]

Generalising about any race is a very stupid and dangerous thing to do. Obviously there are cultural, environmental and economical differences between nationalities. That's what makes travel interesting.

Unfortunately the loudest, brashest types of people are often the first encountered in every country and always this is only a sub-set of the general population.

For instance in Poland a relatively small amount of people frequent bars, clubs etc. Many of the male visitors to this country may well end up meeting and dating Polish girls who frequent these places. (This is in no way a sugestion that there is anything wrong with the girls who do). But many of these girls are on the extreme side of Polish culture. Basing an opinion on a small sub-set and their friends isn't a valid opinion on Polish women. The vast majority of which you will probably never meet.

For instance, I had friends working over here in the late 90's who dated Polish girls (a few of them ended up marrying them). Some of these girls came from (i don't want to sound too derogatory) the wilder sort of families. So my friends made a lot of assumptions based off their experiences. Most of these assumptions were that all Polish men were complete a**holes, that all the families were money grabbing etc. And of course they were experts on the matter because they'd lived here for a few months.

There are some lovely women here, some average women here and some awful women here the same goes for just about every other country. There is one big difference though, in your own country you recognise subtle differences in peoples use of your own language, mannerisms etc. This gives you some important information in whether or not the person you've just met might be suitable for you or not. You're not judging simply off physical attractiveness, which when you're in a strange country may be the case. Any attractive girl who can speak your language (no matter how badly) is going to be interesting.

Feel free to shout about it later, when it turns out that she's the biggest gold digging, boyfriend battering b*tch from hell.

Don't feel free to tell me that this is how all, or the majority of Polish wome are.

Language / Can you recognise the nationality of foreign Polish speakers by their accent? [43]


I agree, I doubt any foreigner would not eventually be recognised as such. I was just wondering if the nationality could be detected by a common mispronunciation of words by everyone from a particular geographical region. As an example the pronunciation of the english 'i' sounds closer to the english 'e' from most eastern europeans when they are speaking english.

Then again, my polish must be getting fairly close because my wife always tells me to explain to people that i'm English when i'm talking by telephone. Just in case they think i'm a Pole who is either:-

a) very drunk
b) mentally retarded
c) under the influence of halucinogenic drugs

Life / Are foreigners welcome in Poland? [267]

Unfortunately there are stupid people in every country who look for an excuse to be violent. Sometimes they can be your fellow countrymen and you 'looked at them the wrong way' or 'dissed them' or you can be a foreigner in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I've lived in poland for over ten years and have never personally witnessed any unprovoked form of racism.
Niether have I ever encountered the staring syndrome (but I'm english and white so I don't really look very different).
Then again I live in a smallish town (about 50 000 residents). Probably it's worse in the bigger cities. Possibly because they have to put up with tourists getting very drunk and behaving very badly and assuming an absurd sense of superiority.

A year ago I was in Kraków and I was terribly ashamed to hear almost nothing but drunken brits making an exhibition of themselves in the market square.

Of course ten years ago it was a little different, there were less foreigners here and most people automatically wanted to 'be your friend' if only to practice there english. Nowadays we are not so much of a novelty.

As an aside, I find it difficult to believe polish people don't like foreigners when one of the most popular main stream TV programs is Europa da się lubić. Polish people in general, seem to be very interested in how foreigners experience life over here.