All scaremongering. Note how they formulate "you might have to pay a fine of up to 5000 Franks". I have never ever met anybody who was made to pay a fne. Unless you admit outright that you have been in an illegal situation they can prove nothing and they know it. Scaring people is just the easiest way of making money.

I'm not sure about that. I've watched these people discretely and in my building at least they really do go from door to door. So either the whole building is inhabited by people who don't pay or they haven't a clue what's going on. The letters they give me have my name handwritten (and often misspelt, I have a difficult name) so I guess they write it just before calling because if it was taken from a database I guess it would be printed. They are also eternal optimists seeing the number of times they have called and the time it must have cost them, meaning they either still believe I'm going to buy their TV thing one day or that they're just not keeping records.

They are rewarded directly in terms of the number of new customers they sign up. That's what makes this scheme is so evil. A bit like the Jehovas Witnesses. They can't go to heaven if they don't sign up 144,000 new clients or something like that, and they don't even get 72 virgins. That's why they don't accept "no" as an answer.

Many years ago my brother had a visit from the UK license people and he was also very polite but also let them in. He told them he didn't have a TV but when they pointed to the box in the corner he said "that's not a TV, it's a monitor for my computer" (home computers were pretty rare back in the early 80's.

Unfortunately, his computer was showing Coronation Street and they didn't believe him.

What a bunch of luddites!!!

ZH city, no he did not have any thing. He just asked me an I told them the truth. He came in but did not search for any thing. I think he realized I was just telling him the truth. I am still waiting for their letter. Almost a week past and nothing yet...

It's always safest you don't open the door for people you don't know. We have CCTV in our building and if its somebody I don't recognise and I'm not expecting visitors I just ignore them. If it's not the Billag it could be Jehovas Witnesses or it could be a snake-oil vendor or just somebody sniffing around to see if its worth breaking in. My neighbour's new mountain bike was stolen from the basement some weeks ago. The thief must have come in through the front door comepletely legally so somebody must have opened it for him.

I invited them in shortly after I arrived here and they said that they weren't allowed and they didn't come in. Not really sure what the point of the exercise was. I told them I didn't have anything and they accepted it and went away again.

Did you telephone them to come???
That could be very dangerous!

Yes, it has some advantages and it's much cheaper.

The billag-mentality could also be applied to trams and trains. Imagine we had to pay a monthly pass whether we use them or not, only because we can use them free...... Billag is so a nonsense.

Hi all,

Just wondering what the current cost of the Billag is in Canton Zug (or is it the same across all cantons?)?

I know there's a link, but my German/French/Italian isn't good enough yet to navigate the website.

Thanks in advance.

Al.

It's 462 CHF a year, and you can request to pay this amount quarterly.

Amount is the same for all cantons.

How much does it cost to have a ipod with radio? I have just bougth this accessory...

You need to pay a TV license if your TV is able to receive terrestrial channels, even if you subscribe to a cable package. Radio licenses also need to be bought e.g. for radio alarm clocks, etc.

As stated lots of times in this thread, Terrestrial plays no part. If you are capable of receiving any TV programme from anywhere then you are liable for the TV tax.

Similar for radio.

The fee is owed to the government when programmes are received. Which programmes, by which route, plays no role.

Do I also have to pay a fee if I receive no Swiss TV programmes
Yes. It doesn't matter which programmes you receive, whether you use a cable connection, a satellite dish or room-antenna; or how often you receive programmes. You are obliged to pay even if you only receive foreign broadcasts.

http://www.billag.ch/web/de/fragen_u...en/geraet.html

__________________
Nothing of value kept in this post overnight.

Nope, this is a common misconception.

Billag is not the government. It is a private company, part of the evil Swisscom conglomerate. Part of the money collected is wasted in Billag's hopelessly inefficient burocracy. Another part of that money goes to insane bonuses for Billag's management. The government is not even consulted over those two. Billag basically has free reign to cream off as much as it wants. Some of the money that is left is used to make rubbishy TV entertainment for the undiscerning consumer. It is at Billag's discretion how much or how little that is. Of course if they didn't give any money to the TV folks, there wouldn't be any Swiss TV and a lot more people would stop paying the fee, so it is in their own best interest to let some cash percolate through and close the cycle. But that's not the real objective. Nothing in that is actually owed to the government. The government has basically signed away its rights to interfere. But there is a silver lining. The contract will expire at some point. The Bye Bye Billag initiative wants to ensure it isn't renewed but that the government replaces this nonsense by an honest tax. And of course Billag is fuming. But their days are numbered.

Sorry, but this is totally wrong.

In addition to the programming, the fees pay for the infrastructure, and there are 170 transmitting stations in Switzerland (there used to be more) in order to provide total coverage. This costs a lot more than places like NL where one station can provide a valid signal to the entire country.

Also, Swisscom has nothing to do with programming, they are only involved with program distribution, not programming itself.

Tom

True, Switzerland and NL being the two most extreme opposite examples of transmitter efficacy. Or we could all just get satellite receiver dishes and be done with it.

That whole post is utter nonsense, and you know it.

It is not a Billags discretion to "cream off as much as it wants". The sum it gets (about CHF 56 million) is fixed. The rest (about CHF 1.2 billion) goes to the financing of the various TV and radio programs.

And no, I do not work at Billag nor do I particularly like them.

How do you know that? Have you seen the invoices?

I want to support the swiss-TV but I don't want to pay 2x for this nonsense so that they need people who control us and another burocracy... we pay bonuses for some people who don't really need this money...