Nottingham community station Radio Faza has had a breach recorded on its licence by Ofcom for going 7 weeks without a live programme.
The terms of its licence require the station to have at least 8 hours per day of live programming on weekdays.
Ofcom wrote to the licensee, Radio Fiza Limited, in August following a complaint saying that only pre-recorded material was being broadcast.
The station accepted it was in breach and blamed the problem on a change of station manager. It said the link from studio to transmitter had been switched off due to the non-payment of the bill to the supplier. Between the end of June until 19 August archive programmes were broadcast. Six hours of live output a day were then broadcast from 20 August to 19 September, still short of the requirement of the community radio licence.
Radio Fiza Limited now says day-to-day station management has changed, the station‘s financial position has been strengthened, and governance procedures are being reviewed.
Ofcom says by failing to provide live output for eight hours per day on Radio Faza in the period from the end of June to 19 September 2010, Radio Fiza Limited was not providing the service as described in its key commitments, and therefore in breach of the licence condition referred to above. Ofcom has therefore formally recorded this breach by Radio Fiza Limited.