TV Licence rant

Snaggles

Lol, I can see both sides of this - yes, admittedly you had 2 weeks free overall (naughty ) BUT they didn't know that - if you were buying a licence today (and it was your first day of needing one), you would have to pay for the whole of September, even though we are half way through it. Which is a bit annnoying!

Soooo...in the spirit of DFWness, lets all make sure we only buy a tv licence on the 1st of the month, to make sure we get our moneys worth...hehehe!

Badger_Lady

floss2 wrote:

"You need a TV Licence to use any television receiving equipment such as a TV set, set-top boxes, video or DVD recorders, computers or mobile phones to watch or record TV programmes as they are being shown on TV" Quoted from TV licence website

I've been curious about this before - if you have no "traditional" TV equipment, only your PC / Mac, how can they prove that you need a license? I know they used to say "if you own a telly, you need a license even if you only use it for videos", but can it really be the same situation for computers?

I had a similar worry when my tenant bought himself a laptop - I'm fairly sure he was watching TV but I didn't have a license because there was not supposed to be a TV in the property.

I let it go because it was only for a few weeks until he moved out, and I figured any "enforcing officer" would find the property devoid of TVs. (Worst case scenario, leave the laptop in the car).

So how do they enforce it these days?

rayday2

I think they target known addresses without a licence but I didn't realised they covered computers now under there description - you could have upset some people here now lol! But wait till 1 October

Kevicho

"as they are being shown on TV"

Which means downloads are fine unless they coincide with being shown on TV

Badger_Lady

Yes... they sent me a threatening letter when I moved out saying "this has been identified as an unlicensed address". I explained that it was also an unoccupied address and they questioned it no further, but they would otherwise have arranged a "visit to determine that no license is required".

So, in that visit, they could have said "You own a mobile phone, therefore give us £10 a month" (based on the above). Bit expensive, eh? So basically no-one in the UK is exempt any more?

hbslc

I'm probably an annoying person. But i lived alone in 2 houses. A weekday crash pad and a house in the country.

I had 2 TVs, 1 in each house, and was annoyed that I had to pay for 2 TV licenses even though i can only ever physically watch 1. Same arguement with Council Tax!

I no longer have a TV, nor my weekday crashpad. Its cheaper for me to live in Hotels during the week. I've even concluded that its cheaper to live in hotels all the time, so i'm trying to sell my home too.

Danni-R

What about internet centres? or schools? effectively a work place could need a licence as they have the ability to watch tv? I think its just the licence people trying to con as much money as they can. (can you tell I'm not a fan?)

shell_girl

I'm afraid they do count computers- basically it's any equipment capable of receiving a television signal. This means that if you have a TV card in your PC then you need a license...
HOWEVER you don't need to have a TV license if you're just watching programmes that are available 'On Demand' ie over the internet then you're ok and you don't need a license.

shell_girl

In reply to Badger Lady, no they couldn't do that unless you had an aerial plugged into your phone that could recieve a TV signal- don't know how 'mobile' that would be lol!

immoral_angeluk

This is why we pay by monthly direct debit.....