BBC & Capita: Rogue Organisations Unfit for Purpose

TV Licensing Watch receive quite a number of comments about how infrequently we publish.  It’s true, we cannot deny it.  We are more than happy to play second fiddle to TV Licensing Blog. 

However, this week's front page expose with supporting video evidence by the  Daily Mail, of the disgusting, bullying con artist tactics deployed by the BBC’s prime TV Licensing™ administration and enforcement contractor, Capita Business Services Ltd, obliges us to add our two penn’orth.

Well, thank you, Daily Mail, you had the resources to do what you did which we do not have and the general public in the UK owes the Daily Mail, something of a debt of gratitude.  It is also very satisfying to see that allegations repeatedly made by us and many others in the anti-licence fee movement for over a decade being confirmed with firm proof.  What took you so long, Daily Mail?

Capita were awarded the contract for BBC TV Licensing™ (now Capita TV Licensing™; please note that) in 2002. Capita have been administering and enforcing the BBC TV licence fee for 15 years. Yes, 15 years!  A 2 year extension of the BBC TV licence fee administration and enforcement contract has been recently, on the nod seemingly, awarded to Capita.  It is expected that Capita will continue to administer and enforce the BBC TV licence fee until 2027, the anticipated expiry of BBC Royal Charter, also seemingly awarded on the nod after the one of the dodgiest BBC Charter renewal consultations in public service history.

If Capita retain BBC TV licence fee administration and enforcement contract until 2027, that will be a total of 25 years and Capita are expected to accrue up to £1.55 billion, plus the fringe benefits of 25 years worth of KPI related bonuses and commissions, courts awarded prosecution costs and compensation, unpaid fines’ inflated bailiff collection fees through Capita owned Akinika, transaction fees, taxpayer subsidised (£66.54 per prosecution; source: MoJ/HMCTS) zero courts fee access to magistrates courts in the UK and the list could go on.

A casual perusal of the titles TV Licensing Blog since 2008 or our blog since 2012 should be sufficient to convince any sensible person that from the very start, Capita’s operation of BBC TV licence fee administration and enforcement seems to have been and is riddled with Capita “canny” profit boosting enforcement and transaction scams and abuses, not least of which is the direct linkage between doorstep sales of TV licences, prosecution statements and the payments of bonus commissions.  An outlawed 18th century Thief-taker model of law enforcement.

As a participant in the anti-licence fee movement, TV Licensing Watch, were not aware of that but suspected it since we blogged “Harassment: A BBC Formula” and we thank the, Daily Mail, for confirming our suspicions.  That is before there is any mention of crooked Capita BBC TV Licensing™ field sales and enforcement staff awarding themselves unofficial bonuses and commissions by various transaction and prosecution statement falsification frauds.

The BBC, BBC TV Licensing Management Team, BBC Monitoring, CSC, BBC’s lawyers and its various TV Licensing™ contractor hangers on have been obsessively monitoring every part of the anti-licence movement they know of and have access to.  The BBC first awarded BBC TV licence fee administration and enforcement contract to Capita in 2002 and has renewed that contract with Capita every fifth year since.  BBC and Capita have been together 15 years and the BBC do not know what misdeeds their prime TV licence fee administration and enforcement contractor have done and are doing? In 15 years! 15 years of connivance and collusion between BBC and Capita.  In 15 years obsessively monitoring the anti-licence fee movement!  15 years of complaints by people in the UK who repeatedly write to BBC Director General "Phoney" Tony Hall.  It's interesting to note that Hall's complaints handling technique seems to consist entirely of redirecting complaints about Capita directly to Capita seemingly unrecorded and unread.  A staggering lack of enquiring corporate nous and initiative in a corporate leader, to say the least.

The Daily Mail, part of the legacy mainstream media have confirmed what the anti-licence fee movement have said all along. To quote, Watchkeeper, if you are reading this Watchkeeper, and we hope you are, here’s a reminder of a Watchkeeper’s Log prescient blog title “BBC and Capita: Rogue organisations not fit for purpose”.

Image credit: Daily Mail 

The value of domestic cctv surveillance and handheld video camera can prove invaluable in gathering evidence of the serial abuses and misdemeanours perpetrated by employees of Capita Business Services under cover of the BBC TV Licensing™ contract. TV Licensing Watch advise anybody who has the misfortune to have face to face dealings with Capita Business Services TV Licensing™ to make an audio-visual record of those dealings in their entirety covertly or overtly with cctv and handheld video cameras.

For people who have not exercised their right to remain silent, TV Licensing Watch advise anybody who has had the misfortune to have face to face dealings with Capita Business Services TV Licensing™ and have received a summons as a consequence to contact a licensed law practitioner if: there is the slightest discrepancy between the actual situation regarding viewing habits and/or what actually happened during the interview compared with what has been written on the TVL178 Record of Interview self incrimination form.