Thank you all for your messages - whilst we can't respond to each one individually, we welcome your feedback and take all comments very seriously.
Just to remind you, UKTV History has not gone off air but is now transmitting its schedule during the day between 7am and 6pm on Freeview, where you can continue to enjoy its quality output. We will seek to extend our hours at some point in the future.
Thanks again,
The UKTV Team

Listen up!! Forget this. We want proper reasons as to why UKTV has been taken off. Forget about this bull you're spouting about the channel being available from 7-6 for freeview users. Look at the flaming messages. Can't you get the idea. Many people are not in during those times due to work or whatever. Why don't you just tell us the real reason i.e. you're a moneygrabbing company who don't care about the users, just about their profits. Look at the messages. No one likes the decision. Drop Dave immediately and get back to normal. Remember we don't all start work at 6pm.

Dear Jane H, thank you for replying to the multitude of unhappy users on these boards. I'm sure you realised in advance, that this move would not be popular with the core UKTV History audience. Clearly Dave is targeted at a different sector of the poulation, and the History audience feel cheated by the removal of the only factual / documentary channel available to them. However I hope you have been suprised and shocked by the strength of feeling and the number of users who have registered with this site solely to berate UKTV for this very poor decision. In terms of advertising revenue, I would imagine that there is a perfect opportunity for another channel to seize the disposable income of the UKTV History audience, because they will now be searching for a new home. If UKTV History does not return to evening broadcasting, I feel sure that another channel will fulfill that role and you may find it very difficult to win back that audience. (For example, since the BBC will now be showing more repeats, perhaps BBC4 will become more like UKTV History was. Finally you say that the UKTV History schedule is now transmitting its schedule between 7am and 6pm, but not everything that is shown in the evening is on during the day. Enemy At The Gates was on at the weekend after 9pm but couldn't be shown earlier due to its content. Similarly the history of pornography series can't be shown during the day either. Either there will be more of these conflicts in the future or UKTV History will be forced to show a sanitised, child-friendly version of its output which may compromise the programmes which are aimed primarily at an adult audience.
I have written to my MP, Ofcom and the Dept of C, M & S, to complain about your actions, and I hope that you will receive communication from these bodies about this damaging change to the choice of output on Freeview.
However I would like to thank you Jane for coming onto the message boards and responding to your ex-audience, and giving us a tiny glimmer of hope in the final sentence of your post.

"...where you can continue to enjoy its quality output."

That's the whole point, we can't! Didn't you read any of the posts !?

It really annoys me when we get this corporate speak such as "where you can continue to enjoy its quality output". If Jane indeed actually exists as a person, can't you at least acknowledge that you might have got it wrong? You are NOT LISTENING to your viewers - look at all the evidence on this board - don't you hear?

As for 2true, you must be very young if you think that "at some time in the future" means that they will get it increased. First thing that actually means "We're not going to do anything about it, we're happy and don't care that you're not. But we're too chicken to actually tell you what the true picture is", second if they actually do get the time increased. It'll be extremely limited. Either to a couple of hours, or only on a couple of days a week. Then they'll expect you to thank them profusely for getting the problem sorted. Well sorry, the problem ain't sorted until the timing goes back to normal. You might have got rid of Bright Ideas due to low ratings, just don't think you'll do a similar (though albeit a less extreme) thing to UKTV History. The users on this channel and many and extremely angry.

As a previously regular view of UKTV History I am very angry at being shut out from viewing the channel. I do not get home from work until 6 p.m. just as you are shutting down!! The Dave Channel is pathetic and certainly not aimed at the same sort of viewing audience. I hate the feeling of being treated with such contempt by the programmers.

If you actually think writing to your local MP is actually going to do something, you are an extemely naive person - they have much more important issues to deal with, and could not care about a stupid squabble over two channels that will probably be forgotten in one months time.

As for Jane saying "We will seek to extend our hours at some point in the future" - do not bother. Some of these 'die-hard' UKTV History fans have been very rude to you - do not give in to their bullying. I have nothing against the channel myself (I have even watched a couple of programmes on it), but frankly, as some of their viewers are so rude and obnoxious , they do not deserve to have their channel going back to 07:00-01:00. Long live 07:00-18:00!

Ok, its obvious, WORLD_RULER must be a memeber of the UKTV History staff.


"We will seek to extend our hours at some point in the future"

That line is straight out of the politicians hand book.

Bullying?! Hmm...I actually think people have been very restrained given that UKTV History has been replaced by possibly the most gormless channel going. I think UKTV have dumbed down, and then started digging.

Like many others I have just registered to state my disgust at the demise of the UKTV History channel. Surely one channel for history lovers to watch in the evening was not too much to ask for and would have allowed advertisers the rare opportunity to target a large audience with IQs significantly higher than those found on the majority of channels increasingly being dumbed down. Even UKTV History was not entirely immune from this process.Why are we suddenly getting all these dubious historical dramas ?

I just want to add my protest to this thread. Corporate speak is just another term for cold indifference. terminology instead of truth.

May the viewers win this fight.

D.P. in Lincolnshire.

I just joined up to register my dissatisfaction with the changes at UK History. DAVE is just like BBC 3..... its now a repeats channel ( of some quality). I would rather see repeats of older history programmes than 'repeats' of 'repeats' from light entertainment shows from BBC 3.

UK History channel was one of the main reasons I got Freeview.... DAVE is not offering us choice, come on...give us quality documentaries not 'more of the same' from other channels already on Freeview.

Surely UKTV has other channels to put this stuff on. Please raise the standards and levels of choice for viewers.

Watching UKTV history in the evening was one of my favourite channels too. Dave? why?

Like so many others, UK TV History was the programme we watched when the other channels were full of rubbish. Now we sometimes wonder why we have a TV at all. Please bring it back. Dave is certainly not worth watching.

I am just registering my disgust like so many others that UKTVHistory has stopped transmitting after 7pm. And why are they still advertising programmes for evening viewing when they are not transmitting them.

I am absolutely appalled that UKTV History has decided to close its door in the evening on the viewing public. Like many of the posters I am getting home just as the channel stops broadcasting on Freeview ( I believe it is still available on subscription services). UKTV History has been my favourite channel for a number of years, it has been a double blow that the channel has gone onto restricted hours with the onset of winter. Very poor service. Mediocrity reigns!

I agree, there seems little point continuing to transmit on Freeview at all.

started another thread by mistake

I too am annoyed that they have stopped broadcasting in the evening, it's also very annoying for my wife, who adored the channel, I don't understand why they have decided to stop broadcasting, surely advertising is more lucrative at peak hours? just play it 7pm to 7am, rather than throughout the day when viewing figures are lowest, it is just a crackpot decision.

I agree. UKTV History was often the only channel worth watching. I couldn't believe it when I saw the change. It seemed to me that you had plenty of sponsors so why the change?

P.S. Dave is RUBBISH

Has UKTV actually given an explanation why they have taken History off air ( forget the daytime excuse ) or is it all speculation as it happen the same time as bringing on another channel ?

I've always watched it ad hoc, so there's no way I'm going to be videoing it during the day.

If this is the way channels treat their viewer, isn't it time we demand that the government don't turn off analogue TV !!.

Also surely the "D@v£" channel is aimed at people who have already got half a dozen satellite dishes plastered to the side of their house already !!!, so why does it need to be on freeview ?

I only purchased freeview for UKTVH, have I now got to get a Sky package? Like most of the responses on this site, I viewed after 6PM.

I did not really mind the endless repeats, at least they represented quality in the main. You have stuffed up my evenings now!

I too am registering my complaint like the majority of the above.

My gripe isn't that I purchased freeview solely to view UKTV History - as like all the others, I would have had to purchase the aforementioned to comply with the switchover which is due in my area in 2009.

However, it seems that the programmers yet again think all viewers are only interested in soaps, repeats and reality tv. When are they going to get the message that tv is a medium primarily for entertainment and that encompasses educational programmes. We don't all want to 'dumb down' when we switch on the box. We're being treated yet again like idiots who obviously have no brain and no voice!

Dave is ok but it's hardly educational - with the exception of QI (repeats again).

Bring back previous transmission times and keep us lot of moaners happy!

Just adding another comment.
I emailed programming at UKTV and so far I have not had a reply.
Keep badgering these people by posting messages and emailing those at the top (if they read them at all).
I can't help but spot a big professional blunder. The next UKTV program starts at 18:00 just for a few seconds and then drops into Richard Bransons programs. VERY un professional linking.
Also, regarding advertising revenue, surley WE who are out at work during the day, watch the adverts and some of us might just part with some of that disposable income on their products, if we were allowed the luxury of actually watching the programming shedules.

D.P. in Lincolnshire