Advice for advisers Helping your clients pay for their TV Licence

Transcription

1 Advice for advisers Helping your clients pay for their TV Licence

2 The TV Licence is one of a number of bills your clients may be facing. This leaflet aims to help advisers to support their clients and guide and advise them on the best payment method. Who needs a TV Licence? Anyone who watches or records television programmes as they are being shown on TV needs to be covered by a TV Licence, no matter what device they use. This includes TVs, computers, mobile phones, games consoles, digital boxes and DVD/VHS recorders. Currently, TV Licence costs are: Colour TV Black and white TV What is the penalty for not having a TV Licence? People found guilty of using TV without a valid licence risk prosecution, legal costs and a fine of up to 1,000. Plus, they will still have to buy a TV Licence.

3 Work with the community TV Licensing would much rather people paid their TV Licence fee than face prosecution. We work in partnership with a number of community and social agencies across the UK to reach individuals who may not know about the legal requirement to have a licence or about the many ways they can pay. Other resources TV Licensing produces a number of pieces of literature to help our customers and professionals. These can be ordered through our campaign team or downloaded from our website. Go to then click on Media and Community and Community Relations. Multilingual leaflets: We have information in the following 20 languages, and other languages may be available upon request: Albanian Arabic Bengali Cantonese Gaelic Greek Gujarati Hindi Polish Portuguese Punjabi Russian Serbo Croat Slovak Somali Tamil Turkish Urdu Vietnamese Welsh TV Licensing offers a telephone translation service for anyone who does not have English as a first language. To buy a licence, or ask for further information in over 150 languages, just call us on Specific information leaflets include: Information for housing professionals Tenants pack If you would like to speak to our campaign team, which coordinates our work with community organisations, or order any literature, please call or campaignoffice@tvlicensing.co.uk.

4 Concessions There are four types of concession on the cost of the TV Licence: For people aged 75 or over A free over 75 TV Licence is available to anyone aged 75 or over, even if they live with younger relatives or friends. It is important to note that this free licence does not mean that people in this age group do not need a licence. They do. Once customers have received their free over 75 TV Licence, it will be automatically renewed each year. We will only write to customers once every three years to confirm and update their details, so the dates on their licence will cover a three-year period. If customers have a short term TV Licence (see below) they will automatically receive a free over 75 TV Licence when they turn 75, assuming we have their correct address details. If not, it is essential that they apply for one by calling For people aged 74 A reduced-fee short term TV Licence is available to anyone who is aged 74 and will turn 75 before their current TV Licence is due to expire, even if they live with younger relatives or friends. This will cover their address until their 75th birthday when they become eligible for a free over 75 TV Licence. With a short term TV Licence, customers need only pay for the number of months between the date of their current licence expiring and their birthday. To find out how much their short term TV Licence will cost and to apply, customers should call For people who are blind or severely sight impaired A 50% concession is available to anyone who is blind or severely sight impaired or who lives with someone who is blind or severely sight impaired. To claim this concession, they will need to provide a photocopy of either their document of blind registration or a certificate from their ophthalmologist stating that they are blind or severely sight impaired. This must be posted along with their current TV Licence and their payment (by cheque or postal order) to TV Licensing, Blind Concession Group, Bristol BS98 1TL. Customers are asked to include their TV Licence number, address and phone number. Where a full fee licence has already been purchased, customers may be entitled to a 50% refund and should call for information. For people living in residential care A concession is available to people living in certain types of residential care accommodation, such as homes or sheltered housing. For information, please call

5 Payment options There are many easy ways to pay for the TV Licence, including: Online Customers can visit our website at to pay by debit or credit card. Direct Debit Customers can pay yearly or spread the cost of their licence by making monthly or quarterly payments. It takes just moments to set up a Direct Debit, either by phone on or online at Phone Customers can call us on to pay by debit or credit card. PayPoint Customers can visit any PayPoint outlet to pay by cash or debit card. To find a local PayPoint outlet, visit or call Post Customers can write a cheque made payable to TV Licensing and send it to TV Licensing, Bristol BS98 1TL. TV Licensing savings card Customers can save towards the cost of their TV Licence using a TV Licensing savings card. Customers can take their savings card to any PayPoint outlet to add to their savings in cash or by debit or credit card. Or they can call In addition to the payment options listed above, there are various payment schemes designed to suit a range of financial circumstances and offering ways to spread the cost of the TV Licence.

6 TV Licensing payment card What is it? The TV Licensing payment card helps you pay for your TV Licence in regular weekly, fortnightly or monthly payments from as little as 5.60 per week. When you join you will be sent a payment schedule showing how much to pay and when. You can pay online, by text, at any PayPoint outlet, or over the phone. How does it work? Once you ve joined the plan, you ll be sent a card and a schedule showing how much to pay towards your TV Licence and when. If you pay weekly, the first six-month plan will involve 25 weekly instalments of 5.60 followed by one weekly payment of 5.50, bringing payments to the total licence fee of If you choose to pay monthly, you can pay for your first TV Licence over six months. After this, you begin to pay for your next TV Licence over 12 months so your payments will be smaller. To enjoy the benefit of paying weekly, fortnightly or monthly, you must keep up the regular payments as shown on your payment schedule. How can you join the plan? Simply call us on Monday to Friday between 8am and 9pm or Saturday between 8am and 5pm.

7 How can you make payments? Online If you are an existing TV Licensing payment card customer you can make a payment on our secure website at using your debit or credit card. You can also check your balance and view your payment history online. To log in you will need to enter your surname and payment card membership number. By text If you have previously made a debit or credit card payment towards your plan, simply text PAY followed by your membership number along with the amount you wish to pay to For example, if you wanted to pay 5.60 and your membership number was , you would text PAY to We ll never ask you to text your full debit or credit card number or details. All texts will be charged at your standard text message cost set by your mobile phone service provider. At a PayPoint outlet You can make payments by cash or debit card at any PayPoint outlet. Simply take your payment card to a PayPoint outlet and tell the retailer how much you want to pay. You will be issued with a receipt as proof of payment, which you should keep with your TV Licence. To find a local PayPoint outlet, visit or call By phone Call us on to pay by debit or credit card. You can either pay by our 24 hour automated enquiry service or talk to an agent. If you ve missed a payment, or are having trouble with your payments, contact us at the same number and we may be able to help.

8 For debt advice call , or to look for a money adviser visit For Scotland call , or visit For more information about the TV Licensing payment card, please call For general information about TV Licensing, please visit If you have sight problems, you can get this information by or in Braille, large print or audio by calling Also, a textphone facility for the deaf, hard of hearing and speech impaired is available on CPP/GDE/05/12/E