Licensing blues

THE recent holiday it seems has put a spanner in the works of British Waterways licensing authority in Leeds.

Our Brian Holmes sent off for his licence renewal before Christmas, the cheque was quickly cashed, but alas the licence was not quickly sent—he is still waiting.

No paper?

As there has been somewhat of a paper shortage in the licence department, he wonders if this is the problem, not having the paper to print the licence.

His licence was to run from the 1st of January, so here he is with a licence-less boat, through no fault of his own—over a month after applying.

Too much

But then Brian decided to take to the Environment waters again this year so asked that he have a Gold Licence instead, offering the extra money, which seems rather too much for the licence department to cope with, for nothing heard whatsoever.

He hopes this little problem can be solved to the benefit of both parties without making waves and upsetting the system...

And another

Brian is not the only one having problems with his licence, for boater Roy Fawcett tells us:

"Just before Christmas I received my licence renewal notice as usual.

"I duly received my new licence in the New Year along with the invoice, only thing was the invoice was for £16.49 more than the renewal notice stated.

"I've written to BW asking for a refund of the £16.49 and an explanation as to why the price was different. Make sure you check yours!

Fiddling the VAT

It was our Allan Richards who told us he received a notice from British Waterways licensing department that implied it was charging VAT, during December, even before it increased.

The renewal document included the wording 'Your renewal notice includes VAT at the new 20% rate, but if your application and payment reaches us before 22 December—or you pay online on or before 4th January 2011—we will process it at 17.5%'.

So if it reached the licensing office after the 22nd, BW was illegally charging you the increased VAT that was not in force until the 4th of January!

So perhaps Roy had become a victim—hence the £16.49 extra. Anything is possible!