BEEZLY dot ORG dot UK

That parliamentary debate link is pretty interesting. It makes me wonder why anyone pays their TV license, because really they don't have the right to do anything about it. They basically have no choice but to write agressive letters pretending they're going to raid your house, because if they wrote more truthful letters then people would stop paying in their millions.

You should do a funny experiment. Just deny having a TV, but don't elaborate on this at all. Put up a TV arial, and when they come round act really suspiciously, but refuse to let them enter your house. Put on the TV theme tunes CD in the background. What are they going to do about it?

Here's the reply my dad got from the TV Licensing folks. Lets see what happens now. If I receive another letter from them before I move in, then perhaps I might just go bananas!

Telephone : 0870 243 0840
Facsimile : 0870 243 0226

Our Ref : C/174151
Date : 1st October 2004

Dear Mr Beresford,

Thank you for your recent e-mail, which has been passed to the Customer Relations Department for my attention.

Firstly, I would like to apologise for the difficulties you have experienced when trying to contact us by telephone recently. We have been experiencing difficulties in dealing with the volume of calls being made to our office. In an effort to resolve this situation, we have been recruiting extra staff and we hope to feel the benefit of this very soon.

Regarding the property belonging to your son. I am very sorry that your son has been troubled by enquiry letters. We send letters to addresses where we have no record of a television licence and where we do not seem to have received a reply to previous enquiries. We do not assume that people are guilty of an offence. Our enquiry letters seek information, however, we would be failing in our responsibility if we did not remind those recipients who might consider evading, the consequences of such action.

However, it is clear that every effort has been made to contact us and advise us of the situation at the address, and that our enquiries were inappropriate on this occasion. Our records were not updated sufficiently to show that the property is likely to be unoccupied on a long-term basis.

I have noted your comments in respect of the tone of our letter. As the BBC’s agents, we are expected to make regular enquiries to addresses where no television licence is recorded. Unfortunately, there is a need to deter the would-be evader and it is important that our enquiry letters reflect this. On the other hand, neither we, nor the BBC wish these enquiries to cause offence to anyone who has no requirement for a licence.

I can confirm that I have updated our records to show that 14 Bradshaw Avenue does not require a television licence at the present time. This will prevent further enquiry letters being sent for the next six months. If the property is still empty after six months, please let me know and I will update our records again.

It is possible that one further enquiry will be received, which may already be in the postal system and I cannot prevent from being sent. If this does occur, please ask your son to ignore this letter.

I hope that you and your son will accept my apologies for the inconvenience caused.

Yours sincerely,

Sue Barnett (Mrs)

Customer Relations

Once they're satisfied that you don't actually have a TV, remember to tip them off about your mate Andy from Salford Uni, who has many unlicenced TVs in his appartments and, coincidently, looks a lot like Micheal Owen.

Notice how the letter apologises for the intimidation in the case that you've recently bought a TV licence, but not in the case that you really don't have a TV. They never seem to consider that possibility.

They have a vastly inflated opinion of the importance of BBC funding. Check out this snippet of parliamentary debate.

To summarise, if you don't have a TV they want to visit your house every two years, interview you under caution, and inspect the main living areas. They don't actually have the right to do anything like that of course. Tell them to sling their hook.

In reality, what I guess will happen is that some guy will turn up while you're not there, see the bath full of bricks out front and note the building "unoccupied".