GEZ - the TV licence fees agency - Germany

Do I have to pay a TV Licence fee? It has been suggested to me by a very nice lady at my accommodation agency that I should pay GEZ Gebühren, and the way she explained them made them sound pretty similar to a TV Licence back home. Is this so? And IF I don't bother (I'm generally a law abiding person, except for when it comes to crossing when the red man is lit) what I my chances of being caught and what are the penalties? And if GEZ Gebühren are not TV Licence fees, what pray tell are they???

Cheers.

if you have to pay for it, it shouldn't be that much.

Apparantly its about 16€ per month and yes you do need one. Daft thing is though the licenses here dont cover the property like they do in the UK, they only cover the person, so if you are sharing a place and you have two TV's, the other person needs a license as well

You do have to pay it, although there are a few people who believe you shouldn't have to:

http://www.rundfunkgebuehrenzahler.de/

Not sure what the law says. I don't think the GEZ can force you to pay because they're not a government agency. We had a thread about this a while back, but I can't see it at the mo.

Moin,

You have to pay it. But it's up to them to prove that you actually own a television and/or radio. Unless you don't have a car the only way for them to do so is ringing at your door and ask. That's what they do from time to time. Karen

You have to pay for a RADIO!!! That's incredible! 16€ a month for crap TV, and even worse radio? Can I ask if many of you guys are dodging the charge, or are they pretty hot on it?

I've been ok cos the TV in my place belongs to the landlord, so he has to cover that...but there again considering how much I have been paying for my apartment, I am more thatn likely covering the TV license as well.

My rental contract states that I have to cover the TV costs, though technically it is not my TV, and nor is the stereo. I've pretty well decided not to pay, and if they knock at the door, shut it in their faces and phone the embassy for armed assistance.

i used to pay both until my t.v. started acting up and since they don`t reimburse you for any advance payments, i decided to de-register my t.v. right away. so i do pay radio. every 3 months it's €16.

they have showed up at our apartment (i live in a w.g.) twice, once they cornered my housemate as he was checking the mail and was asked about t.v's etc, he said he doesn't have one and didn't know 'bout me. incidentally he used the computer for t.v. viewing which also means he should pay the fee! they've changed that law!

then the second time they rang, i was on the phone thing by the door and refused to let them in. they asked me about my roomates and said i had no clue. then they tried to trick me by saying, well ms. jones you`ve just moved in, why don`t you just tell us want we want to know. it's no biggie, right? i just laughed and said, well actually i do pay radio and have been doing so since i've lived here. then tehy said they would leave something in the mailbox to verify i answered their questions. i also did not put a stamp on that letter as they asked for (bitte freimachen!). figured it'd arrive.

and if they do show up, you do not have to let them in. that's important! and yes, youRe supposed to register all radios, even at work or at your ski apartment.

Hiya
I pay it but had to arrange it when Herr Indoors was out of the country as he doesn't believe in paying it on principle.
GEZ will cover you for radios and tellys (there is a radio licence and a telly+radio licence - you can have as many as you want under a licence though) but as well as the sharing a house = one per person thing (so really, Herr Indoors should have an extra licence for his car radio...married/gay licensed people can share one licence but the unmarried/unlicensed may not), the self-employed who have a home office must have an extra licence should they have a radio in their home office (the home office counts as a business premise). Students living in a StuWo must pay per student room but can apply for a discount subject to earnings/BAFöG.
By the way TV detector vans can't actually detect anything, it is just a fake aerial stuck on top of a Transit, they just work off computer print outs.
Katrina

It's not the one who owns the apartment who has got to pay but the person living in it.

Jimbo, the license we are talking about is the GEZ-Fee /34,- Euro per 3 month) charged for TV and/or Radio. They money goes to all public TV and radio stations. There's another fee your landlord is interested in. It'S called KAbelfernsehgebühr. This money has to be paid to a local company that runs your cable. This sometimes is covered by the monthly rent.

I pay it too, which is particularly annoying because my English TV set can't even pick up the channels here (well, at least not with sound), and I don't listen to the radio. So I'm basically paying for the right to play my own DVDs and PlayStation games...

Exactly. They aren't part of the government so they have no right to enter your property. Nor can they force you to pay any fines.
I'll need to find a link to back up that info - maybe there's something on the site I posted to earlier.

from my experience they monitor "official" address lists to see who is added then they write to them.

I know (well, guessing) this because Deutsche Telekom made a million spelling mistakes when they added me to the directory and the letter I had from GEZ used the same weird spelling, so I assume that's how they discovered I had just moved in.

Still nothing in my post box from them - are companies allowed to data share like that? In the UK I don't think that data like that can be distributed without your say so, and I thought that that was Europe wide...