BBC: Thousands have monochrome TV licence
July 12, 2018
By Chris Forrester
The BBC’s Annual Report & Accounts states that at least 6000 homes are viewing TV on monochrome licences. The colour TV licence was introduced as a £5 supplementary fee to the – then – £5 monochrome licence in January 1968.
The fee for a monochrome licence (for 2017) was just £49. This has risen to £49.50 for 2018.
Moreover, the BBC says that the number of people buying colour licences has fallen. Last year some 21.667 million paid for a colour licence.
This year there are 21.611 million colour licences issued, down some 56,000 homes.
The Annual Report says that 4.455 million licences were in force (paid to the BBC by the government for homes where at least one resident is over 75 years-of-age). This is down on the 2017 total of 4.285 million.
The BBC’s total income from licence fees is £3.83 billion (up on the 2017 figure of £3.787 billion) helped by the annual fee rise, from £145.50 last year to this year’s £147.