TV Licence demand

I haven’t had a TV licence for years, we got rid of the TV. They still keep hounding us though ...

I will pay but not a year in advance. If I peg it I doubt if any money would be refunded to my account.

I am also going to attempt to say I cannot afford it so I will be paying monthly. They will be denied of a large lump sum if many of us go down that route.

At least I have had one free year!

If only I could buy one.
I have been trying to sort my license out for weeks.
When my H died his licence was rescinded but nobody told me!!

I have been watching and listening illegally for a year.Trying to sort that out has been and is continuing to be a nightmare.
Yesterday I managed to get through to them, after two long conversations in the last six weeks , only to be put on hold to be transferred to the right department, after42 minutes of The Four Seasons I rang off.

They have sent me forms to apply for a free licence , I do not qualify for a free licence as I am tired of telling them, I cannot do it on line as I keep getting told a licence for this address already exists, no It doesn’t.

Head against a brick wall syndrome.
I am now waiting for a knock on the door when I will tell them to listen to all the phone calls I have made as I am told every time that the call is being recorded.

We received a letter about paying this week. I’ve elected to pay monthly by direct debit, just so they don’t have all my money at once!

annsixty, I do sympathise.thh I think you're doing the right thing, the ball's in their court so let them sort it out!
As for us, our plan of action is to wait until we're on the verge of being taken to court and then pay in full maybe with a wrongly filled in cheque which will have to be sent back for correction!! We shall then have a repeat performance next year, hopefully always being in arrears ! Prior to our free licence we always paid fully on the nail for 50 years, but we feel strongly about anyone having to pay for a licence in this day and age not only the over 75's, so they will as they say, have to whistle for a while!

We will pay, we had it for two years. Anybody on pension credit will still get it free. We will pay by direct debit as before but haven’t had a letter from them to arrange payment. We cancelled our previous direct debit but haven't had a letter yet.

When my boss died it took me months to sort out the TV licence for the business, the email correspondence ran to 13 pages!

I know, because I printed it out and posted it to them along with a strongly worded letter!

BTW, as Mr P and I are in our sixties, we have never had the free licence, but have always paid it by monthly direct debit.

Yes, I believe it does cost slightly more than a one off payment, but we find it easier than a sudden largish amount going out that you may have forgotten about.

No letter yet. I expect we will pay, but will be in no hurry. Perhaps wait for a reminder

No letter yet, but yes I ll pay it, this was to be my first free year bad luck eh

I could be wrong but I think I read that they’re sending letters out over a period of some weeks so it could be a while until everyone’s arrives.

We only had three months of a free licence. We did Consider paying weekly but that turned out to be too much hassle. The letter I received said it cost the same whether you paid monthly or annually.

My annual fee's due on 31st August, but I'm not renewing it as I don't have a TV and watch nothing on Iplayer (the 1.5hrs a week of TV I used to watch and pay a licence for on IPlayer has now gone because of covid). So to me it's not worth the fee.

I get Pension Credit, but as I am not 75yrs, still have to pay for the licence. I find c£160 is too much to pay for what has now become a luxury.

We expect to have to pay even though we have no tv but watch on line on BBCiplayer. And both well over 75.
Very tempted to refuse and see what happens but at my age couldn't face the hassle.

This should NEVER have been the responsibility the BBC. It was the government that withdrew the over-75's free licence. Then the BBC kindly and generously took this over for the intermim. But with more funding cuts and increased costs just cannot keep it going.
So, do not blame the BBC -blame the government.
In fact, if pensioners in this country received state pensions in line with that of most other countries in Europe, then all these little 'handouts' (£1- Xma grant!!!, £200 winter warmer money, 25p per week to over-80's, etc._could cease.

Another trick is to send them 12 post-dated cheques!

Squirrel away some money and leave yourself with the allotted amount which falls into the free licence arena.

I did read a thinly-veiled hint that would see the end of the £200 winter payment. Be prepared.

That would not surprise me because the general feeling is we can all afford to lose that money. I would not mind if the Christmas tenner vanished- that must cost a lot to administer.

The deal with the BBC was brokered in 2015 with George Osbourne. In return for taking on the free licence paid for by the government up till Jan 2020, when they themselves would take it on, the BBC by their own admission got a very generous deal, one of which was the necessity of a licence to watch iPlayer which up to Jan 2020 was not an obligation! The BBC have decided not to keep the free licence but have happily accepted all the benefits to them from this deal but sadly couldn't fund the over 75's even for one day!

Jabberwok is correct. I was just about to say the same.

The £10 at Xmas is quite absurd. My parents first received this way back when and it wasn't exactly a fortune then. It should have been quietly stopped years ago! £ 200 winter fuel allowance? Yes I think we can kiss that good by along with triple lock! Oh well, we were unaffected during austerity so perhaps it's only fair that we should have to pull our weight now!

We didn’t even know what the extra £10 was in dh’s pension! We thought our bank account had been hacked or that it was a phishing scam.

I don’t know why the BBC doesn’t market iplayer abroad. I have friends in the US who would love to watch BBC programmes via iPlayer but currently there is no legal means to do so, that I’m aware of. That seems to me to be an obvious source of income.

I've heard that too SD, goodness only knows why the BBC doesn't tap this particular income! Perhaps someone on here knows?!

You mean I'll get an extra 25p in October ? Can't wait. I'll be asking them what they think I'll propose doing with it.
It'll cost them more than that to let me know

Do I need to buy a BBC TV license? I am over 75 but my TV has been broken for some time and I never watch BBC - only SKY News and other things online. I'm getting a form and email to pay. In France you get to pay something called an audio visual tax (in French of course) which you pay with the annual property tax - that seems more logical but here the fee only goes to BBC .