Britain’s biggest bill? UK digital switchover to cost consumers £2.2bn

As the countdown to the digital switchover gathers pace, nearly half (46%) of UK consumers remain blissfully unaware that their home video recorder will not work in the same way once they have ‘gone digital’, reveals independent comparison and switching service uSwitch.com.

5 million TV sets will not work unless they are ‘digitally-enabled’ and the bill faced by the nation to complete the switchover is set to exceed £2.2 billion.

With just four months to go until the first UK TV region loses its analogue TV signal to digital, there are still 21 million VCRs in use across the nation. Yet, come the switchover, they will lose a significant level of functionality as they rely on receiving an analogue signal. When this is switched off, consumers will no longer be able to watch one channel while recording another. Nearly half (46%) of households are unaware of this conundrum and 4 out of 10 (38%) have no idea how they will deal with it. While a quarter (25%) plan to purchase Sky +, V+ or an alternative digital video recorder, 19% plan to simply throw away their devices and not replace them.

Steve Weller, Head of Communication Services at uSwitch.com, comments: “VCRs won’t work in the same way after the switchover. They will not be capable of recording anything other than the channel you are watching. If you go out, or even go on holiday, you would have to leave your digital receiver switched on and set to the channel that you want – hardly in line with the drive to improve household energy efficiency. With 21 million video recorders in use across the UK – or about 1 per household – isn’t this something that perhaps we should have been warned about?”

In the meantime, major retailers including Argos, Comet and Dixons continue to sell VCR video recorders and 80% of households continue to rely on them to record their favourite programmes. uSwitch.com estimates the cost of replacing them with an alternative digital video recorder to exceed £1.1 billion.

And what about TV sets?

4 million TV sets are also earmarked for the dump straightaway. Of the 58 million TV’s in the UK, 45 million have a SCART connection – the 21 pin ‘honeycomb’ style sockets on the back of the set – meaning that they are capable of receiving a digital signal immediately. However, the uSwitch.com survey reveals that, of the 13 million TV sets without a SCART connection, 4 million – nearly a third - will be got rid of when the nation switches to digital. 2 million TVs will be ‘saved’ by using an RF modulator connected either directly into the TV or via a Freeview box to enable the digital signal. Alarmingly, over 36% of households don’t know what to do with their old non-SCART TVs after the switchover.

Weller continues: “On the plus side, over 33 million TVs in the UK are already receiving a digital signal and 90% of people are watching programmes on a digital signal on at least one TV set in their home. But, with nearly 25 million TVs yet to be ‘switched over’ and an alarming proportion of these heading for the scrapheap, the authorities need to speed up their act. The fact that 1 in 3 people don’t know what they will do with their redundant TV set indicates a significant awareness gap. Communities need to be educated on the implications of the switchover. Collection and recycling schemes need to be set up fast to tackle the mountains of equipment that will be thrown out.”

uSwitch.com is calling for:

Guidance for all households on the disposal of old TVs and VCRs

Local council plans to tackle the potential ‘digital rubbish dump’

Warnings on the VCRs still being sold about their reduced functionality after the switchover – either on packaging or at point of sale.

Weller concludes: “The digital switchover is going to affect the country in more ways than we know. The Government has spent millions of pounds attempting to boost consumer awareness, yet it’s clear that there’s more to be done. Not only is the switchover costing the nation significantly more than the low cost of a Freeview box, but the potential environmental impact of the discarded VCRs and TVs is shattering.”