Student houses

Former Member

im due to move into my new student house next week yay:yippe: , but me and my friends have been talking about tv licenses. a few of them have suggested something, i personally dont think they would be fooled. is there any chance of us being able to get a tv license just for that address, or will they have it down as a student house, therefore meaning for us all to have a seperate tv lincense? i think we will have to pay seperate, but a few of my friends think we could get away with just buying one for the house.

JsT

If there are locks on the doors then you need one each.

Or you could just have a TV in a communal place if such a thing exists?

Former Member

if we try to get one for the address, the tv lisence people will have it as being a student house won't they? therefore wouldnt allow one to be bought just for the address, they would have on their files as each room surely? we do have a lounge.

Former Member

JsT wrote:

If there are locks on the doors then you need one each.

Or you could just have a TV in a communal place if such a thing exists?

You only need seperate licences if each room has an individual lock (ie - one key doesn't open all the doors) because then they are classed as individual flats.

Former Member

You sure about that? I thought it depended on whether the house was under seperate contracts per room, or a joint contract.

Former Member

we have a joint contract.

Former Member

\

Former Member

I'm With Stupid wrote:

You sure about that? I thought it depended on whether the house was under seperate contracts per room, or a joint contract.

Nowt to do with contracts. Just about locks and if each room has a seperate individual lock.

Former Member

Straight from the TV Licensing website " a joint tenancy agreement would normally indicate that there is only one separately occupied place."

Former Member

Just get one between you. It's a bloody cheek expecting students on a low income, to get one each, when the family of 10 next door only need one between them all.

I lived in a shared house last year and we only had one, and had locks on our doors, and we never got hassled.

littlemissy

Thunderstruck wrote:

Nowt to do with contracts. Just about locks and if each room has a seperate individual lock.

:yes:

And it also depends on how many tvs are in the house too.

Examples:

Three of you in the house, all three have bedrooms with locks and you have a tv per room you need 3 TV licences.

However, the above scenario with one tv in a communal area instead, you only need 1 licence.

Six of you in the house, no locks on the doors but each of you have a tv then you need 2 licences (one licence only covers 5 tvs).

HTH.

Former Member

PussyKatty wrote:

Just get one between you. It's a bloody cheek expecting students on a low income, to get one each, when the family of 10 next door only need one between them all.

I lived in a shared house last year and we only had one, and had locks on our doors, and we never got hassled.

i agree that its a cheek. i suppose we should try and get one between us and if they tell us to sod off and get one each, we havent lost anything, its better than gettin one each only to find out we could have got one together.

Former Member

\

JsT

PussyKatty wrote:

Just get one between you. It's a bloody cheek expecting students on a low income, to get one each, when the family of 10 next door only need one between them all.

I lived in a shared house last year and we only had one, and had locks on our doors, and we never got hassled.

Having said that this year I lived in halls with 7 others, all seperate locks, all with TV's and none of us with a license.

Didn't get caught...

Former Member

\

Former Member

just get the 1

Former Member

Just get the one between you.

Former Member

Just get the one, I would. I doubt they would come checking when you have 1. Correct me if I'm wrong anyone?

Former Member

Here's the full thing that I just posted, direct from the horses mouth.

"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."

There you go. Nothing about locks on doors. Seperate contract = seperate licence. Joint contract = joint TV license. And I don't know where this number of TV's limit is coming from, because I can't find anything mentioned on their website about it.

Former Member

I'm With Stupid wrote:

Here's the full thing that I just posted, direct from the horses mouth.

"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."

There you go. Nothing about locks on doors. Seperate contract = seperate licence. Joint contract = joint TV license. And I don't know where this number of TV's limit is coming from, because I can't find anything mentioned on their website about it.

thanx, that's cleared alot up, we'll definetely be okay with just the one license :thumb:

Former Member

In my last year at uni we had separate locks on the door, but a joint tenancy agreement. At the beginning of the year we all brought licence each...however half way through the year one of my housemates looked into it and because we had a joint agreement we only needed one license, so we applied for a refund and just kept the one licence. It took a while to be processed, bt eventually we got our refunds, the TV licence people just wanted a copy of our contract as proof :thumb:

Former Member

thats the same as our house then, thanx everyone for your replies, great help xxx

Former Member

Hey... i was having this confusion yesterday - it is to do with contracts - if you have a joint/group contact, you can have one license per house... if you all have individual contracts, you count as seperate tenants... check on the tv licensing web page, thats what it says

Former Member

for the past 2 years i've lived in a student house and we always just got one between us. we had locks on our doors and had seperate contracts. they never bothered us.

Former Member

From http://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/information/students.jsp

Do I need my own licence if I live in shared accommodation?

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.

Former Member

There is no restriction on the amount of TVs you can operate under a licence, providing they are for domestic use only. AFAIK retail have to have retail licences, but don't quote me on that.

I personally wouldn't get one at all. They can do very little to you unless you are thick enough to fess up and let them in the house. They like to act like they've got power, but they only shout so loudly because they basically have no legal rights.

Don't pay a penny to the thieving BBC scum, and maybe they'll get shut down that little bit sooner.

Oh, and unless you intentionally receive a TV signal on your TV, you don't need a licence. You can have a million tellies in your house, but if you only watch DVDs and X-Box on them then you don't need a licence.

Former Member

Kermit wrote:

There is no restriction on the amount of TVs you can operate under a licence, providing they are for domestic use only. AFAIK retail have to have retail licences, but don't quote me on that.

I personally wouldn't get one at all. They can do very little to you unless you are thick enough to fess up and let them in the house. They like to act like they've got power, but they only shout so loudly because they basically have no legal rights.

Don't pay a penny to the thieving BBC scum, and maybe they'll get shut down that little bit sooner.

Oh, and unless you intentionally receive a TV signal on your TV, you don't need a licence. You can have a million tellies in your house, but if you only watch DVDs and X-Box on them then you don't need a licence.

I bet you have a licence.

Former Member

Tweety wrote:

I bet you have a licence.

If it was my choice I wouldn't. And its not in my name.

And I didn't have a licence for three years whilst I was a student because we only watched DVDs- even then, I "accidentally" ended up watching the Champions League on ITV without one.

Former Member

Kermit wrote:

If it was my choice I wouldn't. And its not in my name.

Yeah i begrudge paying it too and think it's a rip off. My point is though that it's easy to say don't get one but it's not you that might end up with a big fine thats all.

Former Member

Tweety wrote:

My point is though that it's easy to say don't get one but it's not you that might end up with a big fine thats all.

It's unliklely you'd get caught, let alone get a big fine.

Most people who get caught are the dozy sods who think the TV gangsters have rights to come in your home.

Former Member

\