Poll: Would you use a pet cemetery?

The Team from Neighbourly.co.nz

Dave Stephens has created a pet cemetery on his land.

The 10-acre site in Albany, Auckland, features graves nestled among beautifully manicured gardens and unique art pieces, offering a serene space where visitors can pay their respects in their own way.

Is a local pet cemetery something you think you would use? Share your thoughts below.

Would you use a pet cemetery?

• Yes
• No
• Other - I'll share below

Vote View Results

• 31.4% Yes
  31.4% Complete
• 67.1% No
  67.1% Complete
• 1.5% Other - I'll share below
  1.5% Complete

1307 votes

Neighbourly Q&A: Consumer rights with CAB's Andrew Hubbard

The Team from Neighbourly.co.nz

What can you do if you buy something that breaks soon after you buy it? It's time for another helpful Q&A.

This week we have Andrew Hubbard from Citizens Advice Bureau New Zealand (CABNZ) who will be answering your questions about your consumer rights.

A little bit about Andrew:
Dr Andrew Hubbard is deputy chief executive of Citizens Advice Bureau New Zealand (CAB) and loves working for the CAB so much that he’s been there for more than fifteen years.

Andrew believes in the difference people can make working together in the community and loves being able to support the work of the more than 2000 CAB volunteers across the motu. Andrew’s background is in policy and he’s been actively involved in consumer issues for the fifteen years he’s been at the CAB.

Andrew and the CAB team are ready to answer your questions about your consumer rights. This might be questions about when you can get a refunds, your rights when buying via Facebook or overseas, product delivery issues and what to do if a retailer won't sort a problem out for you. Ask away!

Andrew will be here live on Wednesday at 9.30am, but go ahead, and add your question below now ⇩

10 Mistakes Job Hunters Make WAY Too Often

Brian from Mount Roskill

1. Oversharing. Sometimes, it is fascinating to debrief candidates after interviews and find out some of the things they say. One was asked about who he works with and described them as “slobs and Indians.” Someone actually thought that it was a good idea to be insulting and racist on an interview. Amazing.

2. Being Unprepared. I started in recruiting more than 40 years ago before moving into coaching. Back in The Stone Ages, it was hard to research employers. You actually had to go to a library and use microfiche or read original newspapers. Unless you were interviewing with a senior executive with the firm or with the PR head, you could never obtain any information about a person you were meeting with in advance of your interview. LinkedIn and Google make things much easier, don’t they? Yet there are people who arrive unprepared, knowing nothing about their potential employer or the hiring manager(s) they are meeting with. Insane!

3. Lying. It used to be hard and take time in order to be found out. Your new employer would have to type a letter to your former employer who have to look up information in file cabinets in order to substantiate your previous dates and salary. Now, they start off by comparing what you uploaded to their applicant tracking system the last time you were looking for a job and applied to them to see that you have covered up that previous employer or are lying about your salary. You can be disqualified before speaking with anyone. And it happens all the time and no one will ever tell you.

4. Forgetting/Ignoring the Original Question and Babbling On. When qualifying people or doing mock interviews, job hunters will have done so many interviews that they clairvoyantly believe they know what the interviewer is looking for so they go off on this long monologue about what they’ve done and how they went about doing it in response to the question, “Tell me about yourself.” I remember listening to someone for about 5 minutes, and asking, “By any chance, do you remember my original question?” They didn’t.

5. Seeming Angry. Like a lover scorned, they arrive at their interview ready to complain and moan about their previous manager, co- workers, how they have been mistreated and more. Like a date who is stuck pretending to listen, your interviewer is calculating when the right time is to end their interview.

6. Not Knowing “The Single Best Question You Should Ask on Any Interview” and When To Ask It. Interviews are normally constructed for a hiring manager or HR professional to elicit information from you at their pace in ways that don’t help you. Not knowing the one question that levels the playing field and allows you to talk about what you’ve done that matters to them and not just talk about what you’ve done is a colossal mistake.

7. Saying Different Things to Different People You Interview With. Imagine telling people radically different or subtly things about your role, responsibilities and your level of impact or success. Do you think people don’t compare notes?

8. Arriving Late (or Missing the Interview Altogether) and Not Acknowledging It. Things happen but you acknowledge and apologize for being late. You apologize and explain your (perhaps) confusion that caused you to miss the interview. Trust me. No one will hire you (although they might re-schedule you) unless you acknowledge the previous ) confusion that caused you to miss the interview. Trust me. No one will hire you (although they might re-schedule you) unless you acknowledge the previous “bad behavior.” In just lingers around the relationship stinking things up.

9. Asking Stupid Questions.
“Do you give a drug test?”

“Do you do a background check?“

“Do you have any other jobs available?

10. Creating a Weak First Impression Whether the weak impression is created because you have a soft handshake (shaking hands with a fish), your hands are cold or are sweaty, your body language is poor, you’re dressed poorly by the standards of the firm you’re interviewing with or some other reason, if your first impression is weak it is hard to recover and win the interview.
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