Why the F should I tell BBC every year that I don’t watch TV ?

[LadyGillingham]

Why can’t they upgrade their subscriptions/licencing model like Netflix etc ?

If you look at BBC corporation’s ownership, majority stakeholders are private Ltd companies and individuals. Why the f are they entitled to demand subscription fees from me for services I don’t use!

The language in the emails is quite strong, I’m sure a lot of senior citizens just pay to not get into trouble. That’s extortion!

Somebody told me that they never’watch’ the BBC and then proceeded to boast that their child had learned math skills watching Number Blocks. I had also visited their house when their youngest was watching wall to wall, Alpha Blocks. I look after my grandchildren three days a week and they watch lots of CBeebies and CBBC. The BBC provision for children is world class.
I know they use the programmes in my grandchildren’s primary schools.
It seems mean to use BBC resources and not pay for a licence. I know BBC Bitesize is free on line and I would hate to think that the BBC could no longer fund such valuable resource for young people.

Why are you guys opening these letters? I told them once 5 years ago and get letters periodically. Not monthly

My mum does not even have a TV.
Maybe I also count as one of these elderly women (I am 52), I never watch terrestrial channels.

You can declare NLN but they then have your details. Which is why I have not declared. I have been Getting letters every month for years and just bin them. I dont watch live TV or iplayer
they won’t implement a subscription service as they know it would lose them billions

Same her and it drives me insane! The email treats you like you’re an absolute idiot that can’t possibly not need a license, how they get away with these heavy handed tactics I’ll never understand. Can you imagine getting that level of intrusive correspondence from Netflix or Prime because you didn’t subscribe to their services.

It's a pita but it's once a year, about 2 minutes of your time and you are frothed up enough to spend 2 minutes on here moaning about it and reading replies which will take longer still?🙄
Slag me off if you want peeps but it really isn't a big deal in the grand scheme of things.

You’re missing out on some great shows. Fully worth the money.

Ask to be removed from their mailing lists. Stop paying. Put the letters in the bin. You can literally just ignore them. I haven't paid for 12 years

@Rosesfornoses thats the problem really, people are abusing it and therefore everyone is assumed to be, even when they are not.

tell them over the phone and don’t give your name. You don’t have to

What did they say when you pointed that out to them?

@beAsensible1 im not telling them anything . Ever

Aslong as you don’t watch BBC, IPlayer or anything live on any channel then go online and cancel it. We cancelled ours couple of years ago. We still get a letter every now and then asking if we still don’t need one but we just bin those letters

@DaffodilTuesday you also cannot watch LIVE tv without one.

Defund the bbc now!!!

Indeed, but I don’t want some bloke showing up here and aggressively demanding entry in front of my small children, and I don’t see why the BBC should have the right to demand an annual declaration from me with the threat of home visits if I don’t comply.
The sad thing is, until a couple of years ago I was a committed licence fee payer and I remain generally of the view that a genuinely impartial state broadcaster is a good thing. In the age of Twitter etc there is an increased need for a balanced presentation of the news. But it became clear to me that the BBC was absolutely not fulfilling its obligations in this respect, and was in fact acting as a propagandist for select causes. My letters of complaint to this effect were answered in derisory fashion and on one occasion with a response so irrelevant it felt like I was actually being trolled by the BBC. It’s time the Beeb either fights it out in the wild against Netflix and co or cleans up its act and does what it’s supposed to do.

Well I admit the BBC isn't the great institution that it once was.
And a lot of it's problems actually stem under funding. As well as political interference.

But it still fulfills a very important function. And it would be a sad loss.

I find all this anti BBC campaigning very disturbing.The absolute outrage about being asked if you need a TV licence would be almost laughable if didn't seem so politically motivated.

@RoseAndGeranium they won’t visit.

They dont have the right to enter your house uninvited. Only the police can do that and they have to have good reason to do so

It really pisses me off. My relative of 94 has never had a tv & I assume if she did given her age she would not have to pay anyway. Yet I still have to fill out a ‘no licence needed’ form for her every year & she regularly receives letters threatening a visit, which she finds terrifying. Why should she have a tv? What gives government agents the right to harass an old lady for not wanting state propaganda and mindless crap beamed into her home?

I also don’t have a licence because I never watch BBC or live tv so I have to fill in the forms for me too- but I am not frail & elderly. I get annoyed, not terrified.

Amazed by the suggestions above btw that not having a tv is somehow ‘right wing’ & therefore deplorable (not that being right wing should be seen as ‘deplorable’ in a pluralistic society). My relative grew up in a staunchly left wing household & her radical political views are largely why she has never had a tv! She just spent her time reading instead & now in old age with limited sight benefits from happily remembering the plots of Dickens & the highlights (and lows) of the French revolution.

@Longnightsshortdays they pull in billions in revenue annually. they are not underfunded, they are just spaffing licence fees on pension funds, massive wages to their senior staff and jollies such as five star hotels for 600 staff when it’s Glastonbury

ETA and huge salaries to their ‘talent’ such as Zoe ball raking in nearly a million pounds pa

This would be a shame. But then it needs to do what it was set up to do and act as an impartial broadcaster. If it wants to be a propagandist for pet causes it should accept the same conditions as the rest of the entertainment market. A licence fee funded broadcaster should have specific and closely monitored responsibilities.

To those saying they never visit, my student daughter said the flat below them had someone from TV licensing at the door who refused to go away for 40 minutes. That is harassment in my book.

I don’t see it as polictal at all. It’s generational. If you’re under 50 you’ve been brought up lwith media being consumed on demand or on subscription, or free via the internet. The thought of needing a licence to own what is an every day electrical appliance is an anachronism that is difficult to justify objectively. Either fund through general taxation or make it a subscription service. The ‘presume guilty until proven innocent’ approach of everyone needing one unless they say otherwise and the heavy handed approach of Capita on behalf of the BBC has no place in a modern world.

Precisely what I’m worried about!