Renew TV Licence. Or not!!! 7 March at 5:20PM in Praise, vent & warnings 25 replies 1.1K views

Gastines3

My TV Licence is due for renewal end of July but  have twice had renew warnings and requests fot payment via an old e-mail address. Please make sure you are paying the correct people. Easy to check by puttinf either your address or last Licence number on the BBC site which will give you the correct info. Doubt every request for payment these days!  I was going to ask for a 50% discount on mine,still paying at 81 ,as about 50% of the programmes are repeats and multiple repeats at that.

Brie

quite agree about all the repeats.  then again some of us haven't seen the programmes previously but heard so much about them.  a friend posted something about Magic Roundabout today - I've never seen that as it was on a couple of decades before I came to the UK! 

oldagetraveller1

I have been (legally) T.V.Licence free for 6 years now and don't regret not being fleeced one bit.

Most content is accessible online with catch up services anyway plus subscription services, eg.Netflix. No BBC iPlayer of course, no loss there.

Not necessary, but I do complete a no licence required declaration every two years on their website. Not yet received any threatening letters from them or visits from Capita's commission based sales people . All I have received is the confirmation of the declaration and we will contact you again in two years.

I wouldn't be surprised if Magic Roundabout content wasn't available on Youtube Dougal.

Murphybear

Gastines3 said:

My TV Licence is due for renewal end of July but  have twice had renew warnings and requests fot payment via an old e-mail address. Please make sure you are paying the correct people. Easy to check by puttinf either your address or last Licence number on the BBC site which will give you the correct info. Doubt every request for payment these days!  I was going to ask for a 50% discount on mine,still paying at 81 ,as about 50% of the programmes are repeats and multiple repeats at that.

Tip:  if you fancy going into sheltered housing, the sort where you have your own flat plus communal areas,  when you are older then the tv licence is only £7.50 a year.  Not many people know that. 

Albermarle

oldagetraveller1 said:

I have been (legally) T.V.Licence free for 6 years now and don't regret not being fleeced one bit.

Most content is accessible online with catch up services anyway plus subscription services, eg.Netflix. No BBC iPlayer of course, no loss there.

Not necessary, but I do complete a no licence required declaration every two years on their website. Not yet received any threatening letters from them or visits from Capita's commission based sales people . All I have received is the confirmation of the declaration and we will contact you again in two years.

I wouldn't be surprised if Magic Roundabout content wasn't available on Youtube Dougal.

Trouble is if you like to keep up with current affairs etc then US entertainment channels, like Netflix, Disney+ etc is not much use.
The other day I switched over to watch sky news and the number of adverts was incredible. Gladly pay the licence fee 5 times over to watch the Beeb ad free .

mrbuster

Wish it was ad free !
Before and after every programme there are plenty of there own ads even when the next
programme is running late

km1500

I know people love streaming, but the one advantage of freeview / freesat and a pvr is that you can fast forward over the ads - even the BBC self-promoting ones. Also over the beginnings of many programs that spend an inordinate amount of time telling you what you are about to see.

MattMattMattUK

km1500 said:

I know people love streaming, but the one advantage of freeview / freesat and a pvr is that you can fast forward over the ads - even the BBC self-promoting ones. Also over the beginnings of many programs that spend an inordinate amount of time telling you what you are about to see.

How is that an advantage over streaming though? There are no ads on Prime, Disney+ or Netflix, you can skip forward over the beginning/intro/recap if you want, they even provide a one click option to do this when you start watching.

TimSynths

mrbuster said:

Wish it was ad free !
Before and after every programme there are plenty of there own ads even when the next
programme is running late

I don't watch anything live on any channel- everything is recorded now so I can fast forward through the "coming up", "what happened last week", the recap of what happened 5 mins ago (looking at you CH5), "on next weeks show". It never ends and as you say the BBC are just as bad, I fast forward the first 4 mins of every program now.

I can dispense with a 1 hr CH5 show like traffic cops in 31 mins, its like having a time machine, I gain 29 mins of life back for every tv show. Haven't watched an advert for 14 years.

Did enjoy The Gold on BBC1- wish they made more shows like that.

ElefantEd

TimSynths said:

I can dispense with a 1 hr CH5 show like traffic cops in 31 mins, its like having a time machine, I gain 29 mins of life back for every tv show. Haven't watched an advert for 14 years.

You could gain another 31 minutes of your life back by not watching it at all!

Troytempest

And save money by not paying for a licence.

Hundreds of thousands of people are not paying these days even though they watch liveTV - nothing they can do about it if you don't speak to them. About time it was abolished....