TV Licensing Clowns Performing to Camera

TV Licensing appear to have adopted a new strategy to deter people from filming their employees in action.

It is perfectly legal for anyone to film TV Licensing employees, affectionately referred to as goons by the legally-licence-free community, working in a public place. Furthermore, the occupier of any property is well within their legal rights to film any TV Licensing goon that visits. 

It is fair to say that TV Licensing, despite acknowledging an occupier's right to film, absolutely hate it when they do. It's even worse for TV Licensing when their people, who are sometimes motivated more by earning commission than telling the truth, are caught behaving badly on camera.

Regular readers will know that we take particular delight in watching TV Licensing goons squirm on camera. The exhilaration of seeing TV Licensing door-steppers gasping for thought is second only to that experienced when their BBC bosses are exposed as incompetent half-wits by Parliament or in the national media. We actively encourage members of the legally-licence-free community to film every TV Licensing encounter.

Until fairly recently TV Licensing's policy was to abandon a visit the moment it became apparent to the goon that they were being filmed. The latest edition of TV Licensing's Visiting Procedures, a voluminous document freely available on the web, was amended to give fearless goons the option of concluding such visits normally.

It appears that at the same time as pressing print on the new version of Visiting Procedures, TV Licensing were also updating their goons with unofficial advice to combat camera-wielding occupiers. That advice appears to be: "If you're being filmed, make sure you read out the occupier's name and address for the benefit of the camera."

TV Licensing's logic appears to be that the occupier would not wish to publish video footage of a goon reading out their name and address. As is often the case TV Licensing's logic is fundamentally flawed, because they appear to have overlooked the ease with which sound can be edited.

We still strongly recommend people film TV Licensing goons for their own protection. To be frank, TV Licensing goons cannot always be relied upon to tell the truth. Video footage gives the occupier an extra layer of security in case the conduct of the visit is disputed later on. Serious consideration should be given to covert filming of TV Licensing goon encounters.

Happy filming.