Halls of Residence TV licences

[Janh]

DD2 is off to Manchester Uni at the weekend (hooray!) (not that she's leaving cos she doesn't live here but that she's getting on with her life at last) and I have just discovered - and confirmed with DD1 - that each student in a uni flat has to pay for a whole licence - presumably because each room has its own key?

Is it me or is that seriously greedy of the TVLA?

erm yes htey are shite and their collectors leave a lot to be desired.
we mags hate them

Do you mean the Licence Officers, or the Enforcement Officers warty?

Janh - surely this only applies if the student has their own television in their room. The students could share the cost of a license for a tv in their common room or living room say. But yes, if you have a hall of 80 rooms each with their own tv, then 80 licenses it is (no different froma block of flats).

Oh yes, LM, that is how it works - but a block of flats isn't quite the same (I mean a flat in DD2's uni block has 4-11 bedrooms + one communal living room/kitchen, a single small flat in a normal block might have 5 rooms but only one licence) and I know students are silly with money but they still don't have much so making them do this with some of it is wrong.

They should have a special rate for students in hall IMHO - £52 maybe, a pound a week. Charging them the full whack is OTT.

I mean 5 rooms and more than one TV but a single licence!

Do I have to pay for a whole year even if I go home for the summer?

If you are going away for summer and you're not going to need your licence again before it expires, you can claim a refund for any completely unused quarter (three consecutive calendar months e.g. July, August, September).

You'll probably need to buy your TV Licence at the beginning of your first term in order to receive a refund, so the earlier you get it, the better chance you have of claiming some money back.

They don't go away for a whole quarter of calendar months though, do they?

so in effect if they're sensible and buy at the start of term then claim their refund they don't end up paying the full amount

If they have rooms in uni then they pay individual licences BUT I think if its a flat then its one license for the flat. If it has a separate key and is separate to the corridor IYSWIM then that'd be just the same as me having locks on the bedrooms here and having to pay a licence for the different tv's

There isn't an unused quarter whenever they buy it, QoQ. Summer break is mid-June to mid-Sept - ie 2 whole months plus 2 half months so no refund. Why not monthly refunds, like road tax?

TVLA has it covered

I can't quite make sense of it but this is what is says about "shared accomdation"

"If you are going to be sharing a house, a separate tenancy agreement would normally mean your room is classified a separately occupied place. In this case, if you have a TV in your room, you will need your own TV Licence.

However, if there is only one TV in a communal area, then only one TV Licence is required. Similarly, if your house can be treated as one place shared by all, then only one TV Licence is required - a joint tenancy agreement would normally indicate that there is only one separately occupied place."

but mid june- mid september is 3 months isn't it??

Surely that's why they say you should buy it at the very start of term to make sure you qualify .

I think it's fair enough

It is a flat, with communal living areas, in a uni block, Pf. DD2 shared a student house in which all the bedrooms had locks on the doors but they only needed one licence even though they all had TVs in their rooms.

TVLA must be making an awful lot out of this and even more out of the ones who gamble.

if she can't afford it, don't take a TV. she's not seriously going to spend the best 3 years of her life watching tv is she? youth of today etc

[shuffles away counting pennies into a tiny purse]

if you can afford a tv, surely you can afford a licence? personally i think it would be fairer to exempt pensioners

QoQ, it says

Pensioners are exempted, aren't they?

just get it october 1st. 2 weeks without ain't so bad?

I'm sure they don't make much out of those who 'gamble'. Only those who refuse to pay at all - or can't be bothered.

As for the house - surely that depends on the tenancy agreement?

Oh, only 75 and over - again! Ten extra years!!!!

I agree with you there, bundle, all OAPs should be exempt.

I'll ask DH when he gets home

They can always take a pocket sized tv which is powered by internal batteries - and then they can still use your license (I remember seeing plenty of those at Uni friends flats in Edinburgh LOL).

Over 75's get free licences.

And for those on benefits there's the Cash Easy Entry scheme.

i think Countdown etc more important to 75+ generation than students (and have been one myself, remember holding the aerial so we could watch Spitting Image on the only tv on our floor of the Halls...sigh)

The rules are definitly that if you have a lock on your door the nyou need your own license..
however..my friend was in halls a few years ago, and the one time they had a visit the news spread along the corridors like chinese whispers and they all hid the tvs in their wardrobes...
not that I'm condoning license evasion..but in the end they didn't check anyones room, just politely told them they would need one if they had a tv in their room, and that was the last they heard.
It is actually quite affordable if you pay by direct debit, though I'm not sure I would trust a students bank account to have the money in there every month...