65 minute slot duration - C4 @ 10pm & ITV with IACGMOOH

Does any body know the reason for Broadcasters to have a 65 minute slot. Channel4 often do this with 10pm shows and ITV have done this a few night this week with I am a Celeb finish at 10.05. Ive had a look on Ofcom and scheduled slots of 55-65 mins still have the same number of breaks. I assume it a reason to do with getting more adverts in the hour with smoke and mirrors rather then we have such a great show, have more.

In the case of Channel 4 - at least - it's because their programmes of a 60 mins slot last slightly longer than around 42 mins (which, when you add some mins of a maximum of 12 mins of adverts per hour - promos, bumpers etc., fits in a "proper" EPG 60 mins slot); around 46 mins

Similarly, the programmes squashed in a 30 mins slot, last longer than around 22 mins long - 25/26 mins long

If you add two of these blocks of programme+adverts+bumpers etc. together, they end up not in proper 30 mins - 60 mins blocks, but 30 mins (more like 32 mins, but of course they round it up on the EPG; e.g. ever noticed the 10pm show starting a bit late?) + 35 mins + 30 mins + 35 mins (and so on) slots, plus 60 mins (more like 62 mins, but of course they round it up on the EPG) + 65 mins + 60 mins + 65 mins slot

Take a look at More4 in particular, which, has this scheduling during most of the day; seeing that Channel 4 is more restricted with the average number of adverts per hour, this is less noticeable there

Now you'll ask, why are the length of Channel 4 programmes so strange?
And again, the answer is also a bit technical

1) Adverts over time getting more frequent per hour but Channel 4 choosing to have the same length for its shows they used to have, rather than reducing it
2) The fact that again, Channel 4 (but not its "digital" channels), along with other public channels, as dictated by OFCOM, has to have internal breaks long 3.50mins only (3.30 of adverts + 20 mins of promos). This potentially makes the self-produced shows longer than the stuff on non-public channels, with the programmes still fitting in "regular" 30 mins/60 mins slots. ,most of the time

It is to do with ads, not running time. C4 traditionally have an 11.05pm end time for the 10pm hour as they can only air 40 minutes of ads between 6-11pm, so pushing that start time back by 5 minutes means they can use some of their overnight quota for the ads that follow the 10pm show.

Similarly ITV obviously packing as many ads around their highest rated show of the year as possible - they are limited to 12 mins per hour so pushing News at Ten back by 5 mins means the ads that follow the show come out of the 10pm hour rather than 9pm hour (although in fact they come from earlier in the evening as often ITV will hardly air ads in the 10pm hour).

You are right that is ALSO that, but it's not the only explanation

Nothing would explain the apparently strange More4 scheduling (and of course, More4 programmes come from Channel 4, for the most part), or take a look at The Inbetweeners

It has also to do with running times, being longer with many Channel 4 shows

Thank you for the detailed responses, one more quick question I see there is different rules for adverts in films on TV. I know alot of digital channels are now inserting a short after 60 minutes, ITV with FYI. Does that mean the first 60 minutes of the film is treated like a traditional drama hour with 3 -parts is this how they get the additional ad break in?

So many ingenious people working behind the scenes reading the ofcom rules and finding the loopholes.

In history have there been any Loopholes exploited by channels that ofcom have closed ?

You can't treat movies like dramas, movies remain movies, and no loophole can change that

However, by splitting the movie in two, you gain an extra ad break, seeing that OFCOM (and EU) laws restrict ad breaks during movies: one every 30 minutes

I don't think so; there's little you can do about loopholes, seeing that channels technically respect the rules

One very frequent loophole is found on kids' contents by now: new EU laws say that you can only insert an internal ad break during kids programmes if the programme is longer than 30 minutes (and one every 30 minute if longer than 30 minutes).
That's the reasoning behind kids channels by now have frequent 31/32 mins EPG slots, they can have an internal break on them this way

I've always assumed this is the reason behind Channel 4 News rarely having any ads in its centre break.

Its not the programme content itself that has to be 30 minutes long (hell, anything shown on Nickelodeon or Disney Channel is lucky to get to 22 minutes), just the EPG slot entry. That's not a loophole, that's just bending the rules.

Obviously not a problem after March.

Really?
You might want to swot up on the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018.

Not so. There's no EU laws that are directly applicable to the UK. Instead they have to be passed as UK laws by Parliament.


Therefore if the UK does leave the EU in March then all the laws that originated in the EU Parliament will still apply. Of course some might get replaced or repealed by Parliament over time


This is specified in the EU Withdrawal Act. It had to be otherwise the potential for all EU originated laws to suddenly become void would have caused a whole load of issues.... even more chaos then we're looking at now