How many TV licence warning letters can you receive before a £1000 fine after BBC crackdown
Millions of Brits will have received a warning letter from the BBC in the past year, urging them to pay for their TV licence or face a fine of up to £1000.
Sending out 41 million of these warnings between 2023 and 2024, there was almost a 13 per cent increase in the number of letters sent compared to the previous year, when 36 million letters were sent out to households who had yet to pay their TV licence.
The TV Licence fee in the UK was ranked fourth highest compared to other European countries in January 2023 by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU).
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Currently a TV licence in the UK costs £169.50 annually. However, it is set to rise to £174.50 later this year - and less and less people have been paying theirs.
The BBC has seen a sharp decline in their revenue from TV licence fees in the past few years, as it fell by half a million in the year up to April 2024. And the broadcasting company's latest financial results revealed an £80 million drop in licence fee revenues.
But what happens if you don't pay your TV licence? And what if the 41 million people who received warning letters simply kept ignoring them? Here's everything you need to know about the consequences of not paying your TV licence.
What happens if you don't pay your TV licence?
Of course, you only need to pay a TV licence if you watch television. Paid streaming platforms like Netflix or Disney Plus are separate from broadcasted TV, so if you only use these, you are exempt from having to pay the £169.50 per year.
However, BBC iPlayer does require a TV licence, so if you use the platform while at home, you need to pay the licence fee.
Usually, not paying your TV licence without having applied for an exemption will result in a warning letter. If ignored, you will continue to receive the letters until it its arranged for a TV Licensing Officer to come and visit your property to determine if you've been watching television illegally.
If you are then prosecuted, you could be fined up to £1000. You can also be ordered to pay compensation for the time you watched TV without one.
There is no set number of warnings you will receive before a visit to your property is arranged, and you will normally be notified of when the officer plans to visit.
The TV licencing website states: "We could visit your address to confirm if you need a TV Licence. If we find that you have been watching, recording or streaming programmes illegally, you risk prosecution and a fine for not having a TV Licence of up to £1,000 plus any legal costs and/or compensation you may be ordered to pay."
In 2022, there were 44,245 prosecutions and 40,654 convictions for TV Licence evasion, according to government research.
So, if you received one of these warning letters, you should keep in mind the consequences of ignoring it.
