A £200 ticket

[Jenks]

The Police are calling for a rise in the cost of the certificates. I wonder how many people who are at the moment struggling to meet the ever increasing costs of shooting will decide enough is enough and pack in their hobby/sport.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/ ... hiefs.html


Jenks

[Tower75]

With my "hate the world" hat on, who else thinks this is just an underhanded way of knocking people out of the sport altogether?

[techguy]

I'd be happy to pay it (and more!) if we could have a say in how it's run and implemented, however with my cynical hat on nothing would get better for us and we'd have to pay more for it!

[Gaz]

Perhaps this is something all the NGBs should get together on and vigorously oppose.

Hell, maybe the utterly pointless "British Shooting" body could actually do something useful here, rather than making natty Powerpoint decks about the meaningless targets they've set themselves over the next 5 years?

[Tower75]

£200.00? Ok, but the applications/administration of all firearm related documentation and certification goes to an outside company, that is actually ACCOUNTABLE for their service and administration processes.

Eveything will be done online or through applications form. 1-4-1s will be able to be switched online by us, and we can even renew and apply for variations online, too.

If it takes two months for an FAC to come back, then we get to complain and hold someone accountable, and even get the next two variations FoC as a gesture of goodwill to us, the customers. No more having to lump it simply because it's the police that does the admin.

At the moment, I refuse to believe there's more work then there is funding. There's over one million shooters in the UK, and at, what, £60.00 a pop? That's not an amount to sneeze at.

[dromia]

Perhaps this is something all the NGBs should get together on and vigorously oppose.

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

[Sim G]

At the moment, I refuse to believe there's more work then there is funding. There's over one million shooters in the UK, and at, what, £60.00 a pop? That's not an amount to sneeze at.

How long do you reckon it takes to process an application? Now when you consider a simple arrest will have four hours worth of paperwork, would it be fair to say six hours? That's just the paperwork. Checks with external agencies, verification of references and club membership. Then the vists. Out to a "permission", time and fuel. Out to the candidate, time and fuel. Paper, ink, envelopes, postage.... it all adds up.

So really, we could be talking 10 man hours from the application being received to certificate being posted out, then all of the other bits.

An FEO's salary? Around the £23K mark. about £10.50 an hour. Then the employers NI and pension contributions....

The 50 quid paid by the applicant doesn't even pay half of what it costs.

Chief Constables are currently struggling with 20% budget cuts. My own force is getting rid of 500 constables and 1000 civilian staff. Chiefs are looking to recoup or save money where ever they can. Firearms licensing is probably a role that they do not attach a great deal of importance to. It certainly isn't when you do have the officers to respond to calls....!!

All of the above said, is not my argument for increasing the fees, far from it. My stance is simply, Chief Constables need to manage the vastly reduced budgets they have been given. Eradicate the waste before anything else, is my position.

Personally, I believe that FAC's for all, should be free.

[dromia]

I don't mind there being a reasonable fee as it shows that you value the certificate.

How ever relating the cost of the exercise to the fee I do not agree with, yes it no doubt costs the police authority to do it but we are not buying a service we are suffering an imposition from government.

I never asked for the UK firearms licensing to evolve the way it has, it was the UK taxpayer who wanted it this way through the decisions of their elected members of parliament and the tax payer should be the ones to pay for it not the licensee it has been imposed upon.

if a more thought through, coherent and streamlined system that licensed the individual rather that the firearm was introduced I'm sure costs could be brought down.

[alextwogun]

Plod wants you to pay more for a ticket. Marvelous.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/ ... hiefs.html

Laws have not been updated in over a decade either. Let's hope they address that while they're at it.

[Thomas Turner]

Why don't they do something logical? Namely (I believe BASC and the NRA recommended this) and do away with the variations. You have a Section 1 permit, therefore you can buy what rifles you want as long as you can store them.

I have to say as a newbie it's certainly looks over complicated, quantities of ammunition, for example, if you have a firearm that shoots it providing it's stored securely (and I suppose safely if a house fire at your place could take out half the street) why fart about nit picking? if you can be trusted with an amount the average multi calibre shooter appears to have looking at other threads here, counting it at all for target shooters at any rate looks daft to me, I'm too new but as 3 from the same family joining one club, ammunition numbers could be an issue, after all where anyone has gone mad and shot innocent people, I'm doubting they got as many rounds off as the average member here holds in one calibre let alone the whole ticket, I think someone just wanted to make too much work out of it.
My take would be £ ?? whatever for the license and the first 8 guns maybe then a small fee to add each one after that and perhaps a per gun ammo sensible limit 1500-2000 for .22LR and 1200 for pretty much everything else, and moderators - why do they appear on the ticket as you have to ask for them? if you have them listing them is surely enough?