Well hello again, sadly due to work committments and other chores I have recently had to ignore Dennis. However, this week I was pleased to see him back and on top form. You see Dennis hates anything and anyone official. Too many times he has had to deal with a jobs worth beaurocrat and this week he had to take on Her Majestys Revenue & Customs. Now, Dennis has had several battles in the past with HMRC. Notably several years ago whilst in the middle of, what he likes to call, his dark times, not because things were so bleak, but because for two months thank to an administrative error on his part, his electricity supplier saw fit to turn off his electric supply. This meant every evening he found himself leaning out of the window of his first floor flat straining to see next doors TV. All was fine until he realised that not only could he see Coronation Street for the deaf but he could also see into the flat directly below where a certain Mr and Mrs Ziomber lived with their 17 year old daughter Ania. Sadly for Dennis her room was in his eyeline. Accordingly one Saturday night whilst watching Match of the Day he excitedly called out 'let's see what you've got' unfortunately Ania was just going to bed. With something lost in translation Dennis found himself first in casualty and then in the local police station trying to explain he was calling at the TV hoping to see his favourite team show some backbone and not at young Ania hoping to see what she had.
Anyway, I digress. Dennis has a very low opinion of HMRC. Once before he found himself arguing with a faceless voice from the Revenue because they had written to Dennis tellling him they owed him £410 for a tax overpayment. Sadly for Dennis they had also discovered that the following year Dennis had underpaid tax to the tune of £143.16. With the Revenue being the Revenue they wanted their money first before they would pay Dennis. Despite his protestations they insisted they could not offset one amount against the other and Dennis had to pay the underpayment. Of course the Revenue then took two months to pay Dennis during which he entered his 'dark times'.
This time Dennis knew he was right. He was owed money by the taxman and he wanted it. He had already spent it several times and now he needed what was his. However, when ringing the tax refund hotline he was treated to the full soundtrack to Sound of Music, twice, before someone called PJ answered. It soon became apparent that PJ had no idea what was happening and passed Dennis onto a colleague. After a further round of the Sound of Music and man who was Mr. came on the phone. Surely if he is called Mr then he must know what was going on with Dennis's claim. But no, he claimed it was nothing to do with this department and rather hurriedly put him back to the switchboard where he renewed his relationship with PJ, who this time sticking to his story that he knew nothing put Dennis through to a technical expert. By now Dennis had lost the will to live and was filling in his organ donor card when he was stopped in his tracks, because the new Mr. actually did seem to know about his circumstances. Dennis felt a smile coming across his face as Mr Technical expert said all the right things, but then came the double whammy, he couldn't help but felt Dennis needed to speak with a 'colleague', the line went quiet for a moment and then back came...........Julie Andrews and the hills are alive, Dennis closed his eyes, took a deep breath and was transported to the Austrian Tyrrol.......again.
