Firstly, although the .com and .fr versions of the websites are supposed to be in english and french respectively, the information sent to me by Hornby's european agents will sometimes be in english and at other times french (or spanish in the case of Electroten). Whilst I can automate some translation it is a lot of work. Please forgive those items that have only a french or partially translated "franglais" description. If there are any examples of this (or indeed english grammatical or spelling errors in other text) that offends you and you care to politely point these out I will slowly attend to them.

All pages should be regarded as "E & O E".

I order on a roughly fortnightly basis. If the items are in stock at the warehouse it will probably take a week to reach me and another week in the post before it is due to be delivered to you. It must therefore be understood that there could be a four week delay before delivery. In some instance it might be quicker but you should not rely on that. If this delay is not acceptable then please do not place an order. If you have any questions on the products please feel free to ask away..

I am trading under the Micro Entrepreneur regime, I pay the equivalent of TVA/VAT sales tax up-front when I buy goods and I can not exempt this for any purchasers who might be TVA/VAT registered.

I am happy to post within metropolitan France and also the "western" EC countries (United Kingdom, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Austria, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Luxembourg, Monaco, Republic of Ireland) plus the Channel Isles. When using the site please select between the "France" or "other country" shipping option (if you should make a mistake on this then you can zero out the shopping basket and start again).This is not to say that I may not consider posting to other countries such as Switzerland, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore or Japan who generally have a reliable delivery system and if you happen to live in one of those and would like to buy anything then please contact me and I will see what can be arranged for shipping.

A further comment on postage costs: I am initially having to guess at the likely cost of posting single items. I would agree that adding in a duplicate item ought not to double the cost however I am having to make a choice within the options of the Paypal shopping cart and have defaulted to the method where there is no postage discount for multiple items (which worked for my previous web shops where multiple item purchases were not that common). If you are buying lots of compact and lightweight items then I can either offer to refund the excess postage or, if you prefer to pay the correct amount in the first instance, send me an email with your items and I can then make a specific invoice for that bundle.

Although, as a dealer, I have full access to the Hornby Hobbies image bank I have been surprised to see that many items in the Hornby catalogue do not have individual stock images to download although images may well exist within their printed and on-line or downloadable catalogues. If the web pages on this site do not show pictures of an item that interests you and you want to view an image then may I suggest that you search within the catalogues or alternatively see what your preferred internet search engine pulls up.

Please note that products supplied with mains plugs will most likely be of the european "round pin" variety rather than the uk style rectangular pin, if plugs are depicted.

My individual product line pages are intended to show the items that are available in the warehouse now or slated for production and open for pre-order. Please understand that I use the predicted production dates as provided by the factory or importer and these may be subject to delay, or in a few cases possibly brought forward.

You should also understand that some of the older items in the catalogues will be out of production whilst newer ones may not yet have been produced. In certain cases the whole production run of a particular item will be sold prior to production, which may explain why that model is in the "old items" page despite having a future predicted arrival date. If you are searching for older models and a simple internet search does not provide a solution then perhaps one of my contacts may know something. I can not promise that anything positive will result but I can try.

French is not my natural language, and for the limited range of words that I do understand my speed of translation is slow. If you are able to speak english I will be able to answer your queries more quickly. If you want to contact me please use email. If you speak french (or another language) then please either use a translation facility (such as deepl.com) or at least understand that I will be trying to use such a system on your text so please avoid abbreviations, slang or idioms that are likely to provide problems for a silicon based translation.

Perhaps of greatest importance (and a sad reflection on either the common sense that the general population has, or more specifically that legislators think the general population has) please note that the various products are best matched to appropriate ages, particularly when chosen as gifts. Finer detailed models might easily be broken by carefree or careless children whereupon small parts (or even large ones) be ingested. Paints and adhesives are not intended as liquid or solid refreshment and sharp tools, along with other "pointed" objects present other hazards. Please take care to keep your valuable models and model-making accessories out of harms way.

As general guidance Hornby recommends the following minimum ages:

Corgi "chunky" toys: 4

Other Corgi models: 7

Airfix quick-build: 7

Other Airfix kits: 8

Micro Scalextric G1141 G1144: 4

other Micro Scalextric: 5

Other Scalextric: 8

Jouef HJ1501, Lima HL1403 HL1404: 5

Hornby "railroad": 8

Other Hornby, Rivarossi, Jouef, Lima, Arnold, Electroten: 14

Humbrol: 14