Demanding Money With Menace

About once a month or so for the last few years I’ve been getting these letters (full text below photo)

Dear Legal Occupier,

An INO100 code has been issued against your address. We use it to target unlicensed homes like yours that require a visit from our Enforcement Officers.

This letter is a formal notification that your details have now been passed to the Enforcement Team for your area. And you could be visited at any time, day or evening, weekdays or weekends.

We need to check you are not breaking the law.

It’s a criminal offence to watch or record live TV without a licence. On any device. You also need a TV Licence to be covered for everything on BBC Player.

You could be prosecuted* and have to pay a fine.

If Enforcement Officers find evidence of illegal TV viewing:

You could be interviewed under caution in accordance with national criminal law, which could lead to prosecution*

The maximum penalty is a criminal conviction and you may have to pay a fine of up to £1,000 plus any legal costs and/or compensation

To stop this visit from the Enforcement Team:

Buy a TV Licence at tvl.co.uk/pay or call 0300 790 6097. Payments start from £6.50 a week.
See reverse for more details about your options

Or, move an existing licence to your current address at tvl.co.uk/moving

Or, tell us you don’t need one at tvl.co.uk/noTV

To stop this visit to your home – and change the status of your INO100 code – you need to ACT NOW.

Yours faithfully,

Sut Rôn

Scott Robson

Dasanal Mananar _ Enforcement

O0 INO- 1EN-06-24

At first I let them know regularly I don’t need a license but they expect you to keep telling them.

The online link tvl.co.uk/noTV leads to a yes/no survey which always tells you that you have to buy a license even though you’ve ticked that you don’t watch any tv nor record anything from the tv.

Now I just recycle the letters and never have any follow up.

It gets very boring to tell them I don’t need a TV licence to listen to my music or audiobooks and tv is pointless without consistent audio description and even with audio description it’s not as good as an audiobook which is far richer in relevant descriptions and details.

However though they send letters demanding money with menace it’s all perfectly legal because it is for the BBC to be funded.

I know you’re thinking £6.50 a week that’s only £28.17 a month… but I don’t want to pay that for a service I don’t use just because there’s 2 or 3 programs a year that might be interesting…

That’s 5 extra credits a month I can use on audiobooks I know I will enjoy.

It’s not hard maths really.

So I’ll get back to my book until next time