Advice needed on harassment(?) from TV Licensing

[pallymama]

Over the last year we have had several bouts of threatening letters, followed by visits, from TV Licensing. Our home was originally a house, but when we bought it, it was split into two flats. We have since converted it back to a house again, and we informed TV Licensing immediately, along with the local council etc. We have always had a valid license for the property; however we keep getting these nasty letters. Every time we get one, I call them up and explain all over again. We have had the property inspected twice, by the same officer. The last session of letters we received started in June, at which point I raised a complaint with the customer service department and told them that I considered this harassment. I had two phone calls back to explain, apologise, and promise that it wouldn?t happen again.
We have just received yet another f**king letter!
Has anyone else been through this or something similar? If so, how did you get them to leave you alone?
Can anyone advise me where we stand legally?

When my parents moved abroad they informed TV licensing of this but kept getting nasty letters demanding that they give their new UK address for several months. I had to make several long phone calls to get them to stop sending these. They are like rottweilers.

Just ignore them. The worst that can happen is that they will come round - you show them your licence, end of story. If they continue to write, continue to put them in the bin, unopened.

I recently had a run-in with the DVLA, who had not only lost my driving licence and marriage certificate, but were INSISTENT that I didn't have, and had never had a driving licence. I've been driving for 25 years FFS! But they wouldn't have it, because their computer said no.

but you had a photocpy suprise? to proive you had a driving licence..

It's absolutely not true that you need a "television licence" (a misnomer which should not be allowed as it leads to the sort of misunderstanding shown here) if you own a television. You may own as many items of broadcast-receiving equipment as you choose and still - quite legally - not need to buy a licence. What you pay for by purchasing a licence is the right to watch or record broadcasts as they are being transmitted (known in broadcasting parlance as "live"). This, and only this, generates the legal requirement to purchase and hold a current licence.

TV Licensing is just a name. The activities of collecting the licence fee (and attempting to intimidate people into letting them into their homes etc.) are given over to private companies by the BBC and those activities are conducted under the name of TV Licensing. The people who come to your door are not 'officers' in anything other than name and they have no rights at all over and above the rights that we all have. They cannot demand you answer questions, they cannot enter your home unless you invite them, and any 'caution' they issue is irrelevant in legal terms.

As people on Mumsnet have pointed out, it doesn't matter what you do and/or how you respond, TV Licensing will continue to harass you. Ignore them other than asking them to leave your premises if they call (and if they do not leave at once, they are committing trespass, a civil offence, and you can prosecute them). Other than that, do not speak to them and certainly never sign anything - only people who incriminate themselves by signing a 'confession' of wrongdoing are ever prosecuted by TV Licensing.

The other thing to note is that there is no way of establishing whether or not a television or other equipment is being used in any way which requires a licence - short of catching someone not covered by a licence actually watching a "live" programme. This means that it is completely pointless allowing anyone from TV Licensing inside your house. The fact that a television is "installed" - and that's the word used in the relevant Act - does not mean that it is being used to watch live broadcasts.

I do not watch television, and if I was to sit down and watch again all the programmes I have watched in my life (including broadcasts to which we were subjected now and again at school) I would probably be watching for about a fortnight in total. I do have a television, and have had one for a couple of decades now, and it's used to watch DVDs and videos (some for work, most for leisure purposes). TV Licensing periodically attempt to get me to buy a licence and constantly harass me with letters etc. However the sole result of this has been them paying me compensation for harassment and a lot of red faces at Capita (employed most of the time by the BBC to run the TV Licensing operation).