Widnes Model Centre

Received a letter yesterday, dated the 19th March 2020. It was from our alarm monitoring company stating that there had been an alarm activation at our premises and to get in touch with them. Thankfully it was sent by a computer system in error. I did say that there was problems with the post in our area. Postie apologised, no need to apologise, we know you are doing your best.

Saw this and thought hmmmmmmm.... Took an order Friday, took payment over the telephone, delivered seven minutes later with the customer. He even looked convinced when I apologised for the delay as "the lights at the bottom of Gerard Street were on red". In relation to Metcalfe, not sure "In Hibernation" is a good description. They are Staying Safe is my preferred wording. They may not be able to work safely and have taken the right action for themselves. Good on Metcalfe.

I have seen a video advert on Facebook with the sale of over 20,000 overstocked items used in the construction of Miniatur Wonderland. The advert states it is only vehicles and planes. Nothing really jumps out from the website, but it is possibly this. https://shop.miniatur-wunderland.com/model-building.html?_ga=2.212399570.777074192.1588928735-2090216474.1588928735&cat=218&mt_act=Website+CtA&mt_cat=Click&mt_lb=Online-Shop+Modellbau

I am not quite sure why you seemed to have joined this forum and immediately posted that what we are doing is against the Law as you were advised you couldn’t do it. If only as you say recognised hauliers/ couriers are allowed to carry non essential goods how come the likes of Curries, Argos, Ikea, ao.com, Amazon etc can do so? They all have their own delivery service. We closed our doors a week before Lockdown and only within the last week or so started up again. Only after we were given the information that what we asked was confirmed, we could deliver. We then had to upgrade at considerable cost our vehicles insurance to cover delivery. This has been a very fluid situation and things have changed since the PM’s initial announcement. The media published their interpretation and continue to do so. Many people were led to believe that unless they were key workers they couldn’t go to work. That was identified as being misinformation. Were we live skips are being delivered on a regular basis as people occupy themselves with home/garden. Is the skip driver a key worker? Local authorities have reopened Recycling Centres. The local Police are giving regular updates as to waiting times as these locations. Have you seen any Government ministers saying you can leave your home to visit the local tip? Can l just ask if you are operating any form of business as you are not identifying if you are indeed a model shop? Did you not consider contacting us to raise these issues before posting in a public forum? We will be in the shop at 10am today if you feel the need to discuss this further. 0151 424 1196. Or perhaps you could check with your solicitor that the advice he gave you was correct.

Having checked with the Law Makers and waited some considerable time to get an answer, if I was you l would check the advice given by someone interpreting the law.. I was given the example of Interflora who deliver all over the country using the florist’s own delivery vehicle. The butcher is allowed to be open so does he need to operate a delivery service? You are allowed to go food shopping so can visit the butcher. Does travelling to the Post Office with non-essentail goods constitute necessary travel?

We have added ourselves to those shops that are operational. You won't find us on one official manufacturers list as we are unable to accept deliveries. We have explored all the suggested methods of posting on another thread. Post Office in fairness trying to help but they are swamped and only operating on very limited opening hours and service. We took parcels on Thursday at around 1130am and we were told that we had missed the collection and it would leave on Monday morning. So expect delays if you ask us to post anything. Instead having waited for an official reply from our local MP and having been told we were acting in accordance with the restrictions. We could and have started our own delivery service. We wanted to make sure that by doing so we weren't breaking any Lockdown restrictions. We are trying to stick to a 20 mile radius from the shop and we have been offering a same day delivery service. All for the price of a First Class signed for parcel. It also keeps us in touch with our customers as they get to see us when we deliver their parcel. Anyone fairly local to this area can call us on 0151 424 1196. 10am until 5pm. Even if we are not in the shop the call is diverted to us and we will call you back if unable to speak at that time.

The one at Farnworth is very close it is inside a general store. Will check it out thank you Andrew.

That’s good to know and very useful. Only once had to send anything that wasn’t a normal size. Quote we got from Royal Mail, drove to Staffordshire with it as it saved us money. These parcels yesterday were both around 0.5 kilograms. Cheers Barry

Thank you. The local Post Office having checked, does show as having this service. I shall make some enquires tomorrow. Knowing the layout, l suspect we would still have to queue in order to drop and go. The counter is at the far end of a very narrow but very long shop. Crown Post Office closed about five years ago.

As I anxiously press "Refresh" on orders we have posted out via Royal Mail. I see many reports on here of rapid delivery, is this possibly Regionalised? In an attempt to try and sustain our business we have tried a small amount of mail orders. We are still very mindful of the need to help prevent the spread of this terrible disease but are trying to make a very slow return to some sort of service. We are certainly not fully operational. In our shop which is in a town centre the couriers aren't delivering. The shop mail isn't being delivered, our local, brilliant postie is bringing it to our house on a very infrequent delivery service. The Post Office is open 9-1pm with very long queues. My wife queued for an hour yesterday to post a couple of parcels. In an attempt to ease the queue the new postmaster came out to the people waiting 2 metres or more apart as they should be. He then went up to them and took the parcels off them to save them holding them!! Any closer would have meant a proposal of marriage! A friend of ours helped us out with some stock, thank you Mike at C and M Models, Carlisle, open for mail order himself, he can be contacted on 01228514689. Excuse the plug but he deserves it for helping a fellow trader out . We needed the items to fulfill an order. He sent me a parcel and paid for Royal Mail Special Delivery guaranteed by 9am. Knowing that we needed them the next day. Royal Mail guarantee that this service will deliver before midday. The track duly arrived and we were able thanks to Mike, to fulfill our order. The cost of sending a pack of standard Peco N Gauge track, yes just one pack was £22.89p. That is a pack of standard straights, not a box of flexi track. My admiration goes out to any shop that is working and doing Mail Order at these most difficult of times. Well done to those shops. Please be nice. As we have found out they are wholly reliant on the variable postal deliveries for your parcel to reach you.

Not sure how much research you did Phil. There is however a resemblance to the man himself.

Just had to add that one of the fairly local, on line only traders is working 24/7 . He is 3-d printing face masks clips and chin straps for the local hospice. Thank you, Leigh Models and Hobbies.

Some very interesting points. I really hope that Phil Parker is way off the mark. I fear he may be very accurate in his timescale for a return to normality. A few issues in relation to deliveries. As we are in a town centre with lots of non essential shops, we are reliably informed that couriers are assuming shops are closed and not even attempting to deliver. We do know for certain that The postie isn’t delivering mail on the same assumption. Apart from the independent food shop and the bike shop there are no other shops open. Insurance for shops alway have a maximum number of days unoccupied clause. Ours is thirty days. Very worrying if you had to prove that you hadn’t exceeded that. Our insurer has hinted that we may need to check our alarm system is working by opening the door and then reset the alarm. That way the alarm company logs the entry and exit. It was only a hint and not policy. Business Interruption Insurance? Great for fire, flood, criminal acts. If any shop has cover for Infectious Disease, why did you pay extra for that? But with hindsight....... Car insurance? My wife’s car insurance has gone up by 50%. No reason whatsoever and she is an excellent driver! Managed to get it reduced by £96. But with insurance agents working from home not a great time to shop around for a better quote. I would encourage modellers to try contacting their local shop. You may find that they are doing mail order.

We are only in a small town but we have Liverpool and Manchester fairly equidistant. We also have another model railway business nearby. We manage in normal circumstances to have a lot of footfall being in the town centre and where it is actually impossible to pay for parking. Customers can park on the single yellow line and the Police understand that they are supporting local businesses and turn a blind eye. There are NO traffic wardens. We will be absolutely delighted to make a profit and pay tax in this financial year. We have a very loyal customer base. As alluded to above. We just hope that when we open they will return.

Due to a unrelated family illness we closed a week before Lockdown in order to arrange care for our relative. We opened on the Saturday before Lockdown. We haven’t opened since. We took this decision as a family owned and run business for what we thought and still think were the right reasons. Our location and travel time time for our son made the non essential travel even more reason to explore if/how we could safely run a mail order operation. The local and extremely busy Post Office reduced their opening hours to 12 hours a week. When it is open there are long queues. Not very safe no matter what the staff try to do. We are determined to start business as soon as it is safe to do so. As a Partnership we are all self employed so none of us can be Fairloughed. No income for four weeks is obviously hitting us hard. We have yet to receive any government assistance and cash flow is nil. We are paying our suppliers for goods already delivered, some delivered after we had asked for goods to be placed on Hold. We we have been asked by one supplier if we anticipate any problems with future payment. If so can we put the reasons in writing and hopefully the reasons will not effect our credit rating. Note, not a company that appears on this forum. There are plenty of shops in our situation and we are sure that they will be equally hoping that their businesses survive. We we just hope in our business that customers understand, and that they will come back to us again.

Mike was having website gliches. He CAN provided a mail order service. Spoke to him recently. Try ringing if not sure.

This should help those shops that remain open for mail order and delivery: We are still unsure what "delivery" actually means, i.e. Can we deliver to local customers, or is it only using a Courier, Royal Mail etc. Direct lift from Twitter via BBC Web site. UK cabinet minister Michael Gove has been asked to provide more clarity on the government guidelines announced on Monday night. Speaking on Radio 4's Today programme, he said: Chancellor Rishi Sunak will outline more help for self-employed workers later Deliveries of "non-essential" goods such as toys and clothes can continue He says people should work from home "wherever possible" but there will be exceptions. For example, he says plumbers may be called out to emergencies but Sports Direct stores "should not be open" Ministers want to "reduce the rate of infection" and will follow scientific advice on whether or not to change the measures after three weeks Children under the age of 18 can travel between the homes of separated parents - a point he reiterated on Twitter:

We decided that we should close in order to try and stop the spread of this virus. We will be operating a Phone and Collect service. Going to the absolutely rammed Post Office to send parcels seemed to us to be adding to the problem. If we can help, Monday to Saturday 10am until 3pm, call on 07860 313130, or email barrywilliams8@hotmail.com We shall be working from home and only going to the shop to pack orders when sufficient received. Stay Safe.

Hopefully of interest: Liz, the 84 year old owner of Transport Models of Preston has started a Live Blog. Apparently she says it was my idea. She must be going a little stir crazy as she has put her age on there. She used to tell us that she a "Tad over retirement age". Liz is Self Isolating and I am sure she would enjoy railway modellers in particular contributing to her Blog. Just don't tell her I told you! Far right is Blog, sign up is simple, enter your email address and create a password and you are in. http://www.transportmodels.co.uk

Good spot Jim. That is actually Hattons phone number. MIB is 01656 665511. Hope l have got it right.

Agree with Derek 19B. The sight of a couple with a baby buggy, with or without a child and the alarm is raised. We have 12 cameras and you will literally see them counting the cameras. Our biggest loss to date was by a couple filling a baby buggy with Bachmann trains. Thankfully we recovered every one of the items on that occassion. The couple didn't even have a child and although it couldn't be proved, chances are they stole the buggy from another shop. To be totally honest, our biggest shoplifters tend to be well over the age of retirement. Exhibitions are the biggest cause of losses with large crowds milling around stalls. On a slightly lighter note, a few years ago we had a fairly large radio controlled boat stolen. The following morning while studying the cctv system, I had the face of the offender on screen, looked up and there he was looking through the shop window. I was still giggling when he got a free ride to the local Police station. Never recovered the boat though.

Hi all, most of you will know we sadly lost Paul Price last year. I know he had many friends on here. He had conversations with many of you. Doeas anybody know what Paul had done with his layouts, stock etc? His family are looking to find them and have so far drawn a complete blank. Please PM me if anyone has any idea. Many thanks Barry

We had the reverse experience, just prior to boarding a flight from LA, we were approached and as the flight was overbooked (it was about twenty years ago), would we mind delaying our flight? One night in a hotel all inclusive and $100 each, with the possibility of a second night as the flight the following day was also overbooked, another $100. All three of us jumped with joy. We had been playing in a golf tournament in Arizona and fancied some free time in LA. We were asked to remain in the departure lounge while the arrangements were made. Then came the biggest kick in the pants ever, there were some no-shows and there was now room on the flight. We were practically dragged onto the flight kicking and screaming. Still use that airline, just in case it happens again.....

Just checking out allocation of R3809 and my confirmation email shows my final allocation on the 20th January 2020. The Centenary products are the only ones with a specific limit. I cannot see any restriction on R3810. So there should be plenty of model shops with them available. Prices in certain model shops? We are often asked if we can price match certain retailers. Nobody asked us to price match when we were selling a LE Airfix kit, at £27.99, one shop mentioned here was giving customers free post but charging £59.99 for the same item. As georgeconna discovered, Marc’s Models had one in stock. We also had a walk in customer who spotted R3809 on our shelves. One happy customer. In other words if you are lucky to have a LMS, check them out. Rocket is delicate, it’s a scale model. I model in N Scale and the wiring can be so fine that you could mistake a wire for an errant eye lash. Putting crew in a loco requires the eyesight of an Eagle and the hand of a bomb disposal expert. Packaging, we have clam shell, foam, egg box and probably more that l have missed out all using various methods of trying to help get your model to you intact. Then they put their faith in a courier. I had a damaged loco returned by the manufacturer and then dropped from chest height by the courier. It had to go back for repair again. lf only Rocket had been made larger in the first place. Then again, would he have even dreamed that someone would want a model of it in 1/76 scale?

Hornby have been using the finger holes at the back of the packaging for as long as l can remember. I believe that it’s even more important with a model of this size. N Gauge steam locomotives are just as delicate and they can be very difficult to remove from packaging. Warranty returns or repairs should only be returned to Hornby if bought direct from Hornby. Otherwise speak to the retailer and they can advise. Hornby will always give assistance to the shop in my experience and l don’t see anybody with a faulty Rocket having any issues other than initial disappointment. If returned to a retailer then l would strongly advise to return in all the original packaging. If in in doubt give Hornby Customer Service a call on Monday, they are really helpful.