Radio obsessive threatening to report us to Ofcom..?

[emmalinewre]

Hope this is ok to post here!
Got a knock on the door a few days ago from a man carrying a full sized aerial under his arm..
He said could he walk around the perimeter of my house with his radio frequency thing to check where some interference is coming from?

Turns out he’s a radio person (uses aerials and such to communicate with other radio fans, just a hobby but seemingly a rather serious one)

He said he’s been picking up lots of interference when trying to use his equipment and has tracked said interference down to our house..

He told me to turn some lights on and off and showed me on his screen thingy (?) how its an adapter we’ve put on our kitchen cabinet lights which is knocking out his frequency. Said we’d need to remove the adaptor else he’d have to report us to Ofcom as its a protected frequency, and also interefering with aeroplane signals or something?
Anyway, he’s the neighbour across the road so we did it and he hasn’t come back, so we assume the problems is fixed.

However. Is this reasonable?
He said the adaptor is probably Chinese imported fake CE marked and not legitimate which is why it has started to fail and mess with signals (we installed it six months ago and only now is there a problem)
But we bought it from a really quite high-end retailer - its not fake or dodgy.

Do we all just have to do whatever the local radio ham tells us to do, including removing perfectly legitimate and useful technology in our own homes?
We don’t really have that much of a problem with it - but it still feels a bit cheeky - and we do miss being able to control our kitchen lights remotely, as the rest of the house is set up that way.

Can ofcom really fine us for using a light switch?

Thanks!

Bemused, Cambridge

So you've unplugged lights based on the ramblings of some daftie that's come to your door spouting nonsense?

Dont encourage him. Plug the lights back in & if he comes back tell him to fill his boots & report you to whoever he likes 😂

I would ignore him and not let him near your house again!
Tell him to go away.
I've got a very suspicious nature anyway, so I would think he is either unstable or up to something.

Tough one. If it's his hobby and it's being stopped then I can see why he's frustrated, however there are a million nicer ways he could have approached that and you'd have probably been more understanding.

as he wasn't. I'd happily plug my lights back in. :)

Personally I would have told him to fuck off and report me to Ofcom and wait for them to deal with, that's assuming they would anyway!

Just tell him to report away. Sounds batshit crazy. Make a foil hat and put it on when he comes to the door.

If there is a genuine problem, Ofcom can investigate. You are not doing it deliberately.

Did he arrive wearing a tin foil hat?

Leave them off for a week. Then turn them on. Record a video of you doing so. If he doesn't turn up again, it's BS. If it takes him a month to turn up again, he's crazy and/or spying on you.

I would assume he’s paranoid and is off his meds. Tell him to leave you alone or you will report him to the police for harrassment.

Don't engage.

I'm sorry OP but he sounds like he's in the grip of a paranoid illness.

I would have ignored him.

I mean it’s cheeky but it’s not tin foil hat territory as it’s science.

Why on earth did you entertain him?!

Do we all just have to do whatever the local radio ham tells us to do, including removing perfectly legitimate and useful technology in our own homes?

You don't have to do what random neighbours tell you to do obviously, but you do have to comply with the law, so it depends whether the two things overlap!

Yes, you are not allowed to pump out rf interference out of your house because it interferes with other equipment.

Whether you actually are doing this or not is harder to ascertain. Some people can and have the right (and expensive) equipment to determine this. Others don't. It's far more likely that your adaptor is causing issues with his hobby than it is with say, emergency service and aeroplane services.

The way I look at it is this. You can spend a relatively small amount of money on a new adaptor to power your lights which will hopefully solve the problem, keep your neighbour happy and hopefully the whole thing goes away.

Or you can carry on as you are.At which point if it turns out your adapator really is pumping out significant amounts of interference you may well get a visit from the authorities if and when he reports you, assuming his conclusions are correct (not a given).

My guess would be that generally the authorities would not be hugely concerned unless they were receiving reports of it interfering with critical services like plane radios and emergency services and how seriously they are likely to take the complaint and the action they are likely to take on dealing with it probably depends on the severity of the interference and what it is actually interfering with. If say planes overhead were reporting issues you might find yourself getting a visit quite quickly, and your noise source would be located/triangulated by the authorities fairly quickly. If on the other hand it is just one amateur hobbyist complaining then it might end up taking some time.

He sounds like a fruit loop. I would ignore.

My dad was a radio ham and had to fix a few neighbours TVs as they were creating interference, he did it for them more than for himself as they were getting poor signals.

Those guys are the backbone of tech, mostly crazy 60+ year old men, but fascinating humans, they were communicating globally prior to the internet, they get used by all sorts of government departments for their skills and they are normally friendly and helpful. My dad used to help with the communication for the Welsh rally's.

If it's no skin off your nose I'd remove it, and just don't engage if he was rude, but it sounds like he wasn't rude just helpful.

Can you be a bit more specific about what kind of adaptor it is? Is it some kind of wifi controller thingie?

TBH I'd be a bit concerned about a plug in thing in my home that was emitting such strong signals.

If it's interfering with his signals, it's almost certainly going to be doing bad things to your wifi too - noticed any difference when you stopped using it OP?

I think calling him a fruit loop etc is unfair. He's just a man with a hobby and some dodgy electronics are interfering with it.

By all means ignore him, and plug your jobby back in. Either he'll notice and come back, in which case you've got your proof that the bit of kit is the problem, or he won't and you've got your answer.

If you do get a visit from Ofcom, the worst they'll do is tell you not to use it. Loose wires etc in electronics can give off radio signals, there's a radio telescope in the US with a town near by, where noones allowed to use mobiles / microwaves etc. They quite often have to drive round and pinpoint interference, and then replace someones aging TV or hoover.

Put the adapter back on. See if he comes back. If he does, say you threw it away. Don't let him in to check obviously. Let him report you to Ofcom. The end.

Just tell him that you'll be happy to liaise with Ofcom about it when they contact you, and you will follow whatever guidance they give you.

He could report interference to Ofcom:
"Report the interference to Ofcom Finally, report the interference to Ofcom. Recent experience with Ofcom has been mixed, with them taking effective action in some cases and being less responsive in others. But it is important that they are made aware of interference even if they are unwilling or unable to resolve the problem."
https://rsgb.org/main/faq-2/interference-faq/

well I can't believe he did all that and didn't have the courtesy to tell you what to buy to replace it. knock on his door and ask what to buy instead.

Another thread that makes you realise there are a lot more nasty people around than you could ever imagine.

@emmalinewre

as some of the more knowledgeable posters have pointed out, it is against the law to cause this interference, but unless it's affecting emergency services etc it's highly unlikely to go anywhere if he does report it.

However, no matter how much of a 'nerdy' thing you think it is, it is his hobby and it's really unkind to screw it up for him, when it's something easily fixed!

ok so he doesn't have great social skills (some people don't) but that's no reason not to get your unit looked at, or replaced by the company that sold it to you.

its not great for you/your wifi etc either.

My husband and works in broadcasting, he said that if there was a problem Ofcom would probably seize the equipment (same rules as pirate radio). He said the same thing as your neighbour about Chinese made equipment often interfering. He suggested using the lights as usual, as it’s not something that is likely to be top of their priority list. Incidentally this is one of the things your tv license fee pays towards (not just the BBC like people complain about).

I work in this area. Everything he says sounds plausible. Doesn’t mean you are in fact causing interference.

if your device is emitting in a radio band it shouldn’t or with too much power in a band that it can use then he is right that its use could be unlawful and Ofcom could take action (likely at most to tell you to stop using it).

Does the device have a CE and/or a UKCA mark attached to it - likely hidden on the back somewhere?

if it doesn’t it’s not been lawfully sold. If it does and it still emitting in a way it shouldn’t (and I’m not saying it is) then it’s faulty. Either way the retailer you bought it from should be willing to refund or replace.