TV, postcodes and privacy lost
John recently wrote about how he was asked for his postcode when making a purchase at a high-street store which reminds me of a similar incident I had a while back whilst purchasing a TV for my brother at Dixons. Having gone through the usual battle that is off-line shopping, we managed to make our way up to the till whereupon the unnecessary question was asked "Can I have your address and postcode?".
Why was this question unnecessary, you may ask? Well, the reason is because we were just buying a portable TV. Therefore, they didn't need my information for delivery as I was taking it away there and then, and I wasn't interested in being ripped offpurchasing their extended warranty. As such, I asked why I needed to hand over my details and wasn't given much of an answer beyond "because we need to". She wouldn't allow us to go on without a postcode and since I wasn't the only one there and didn't want to be a dick, I decided to wimp out and hand over my details. Annoying but at least it was all over or so I'd thought.
Loss of privacy
Now fast-forward a week or so whereupon a letter in a brown envelope arrived at my doorstep addressed to yours truly. What do I find when I open it up? A letter informing me that I needed to pay my TV licence. It turns out that that Dixon's and other TV retailers are obliged to hand over your details to the authorities once a TV purchase was made. So by giving over my details, I get a nice letter demanding payment. Forget fancy detector vans and enforcement officers with magnetic field detection devices. The way they track you down is by getting shops to rat you out.
Now, I don't mind paying the TV license. I think it's good value for what we receive. In addition, the TV license for our place was already paid (though not in my name).
What I'm not a fan of is my details being handed around without my knowledge or permission. If you're going to make use of my details, and if I'm losing a bit of my privacy in doing so, at least give me some respect by informing me what's going on.
-30-
Asda did this to me as well recently when I purchased a freeview box - they at least had the decency to tell me why they were doing it though.
You have just reminded me with a cool video about the possible privacy loss in the future, I hope we will never reach that level.
The joys of the Brittish licensing scheme!
I can see why the choice was made to enforce collection of this information at the point of purchase. What’s inexcusable is the sales assistant not being able to tell you exactly why the data was being requested, who it would be given to and how it would be used. That’s just moronic.
That said, I think you’d be surprised at how many Mr M. Mouse records TV Licensing have in their database ;-)
I bought a tv from amazon and as such they had my postcode from my delivery address. I already had a tv licence, but had amazon deliver the tv to my office (as they deliver during the day). Not impressed, a week later, to get a warning letter threatening my employers with court action if a tv licence wasn’t purchased!
“What’s inexcusable is the sales assistant not being able to tell you exactly why the data was being requested, who it would be given to and how it would be used. That’s just moronic.”
Isn’t it not only moronic, but also highly illegal? I thought under the Data Protection Act, companies weren’t allowed to collect your personal data without telling you exactly what it’s for and aren’t allowed to pass your personal data on to a third party without your explicit written permission?