Psychic Readings Live

Handling

Psychic Readings Live is a live, two-hour phone-in television programme first aired on Ireland's TV3 network at midnight from 16 June to 3 December 2012. Just over two years after TV3 removed Play TV from its schedule, the network began airing Psychic Readings Live in the programme's time slot. Newspaper reports compared the controversy generated by Psychic Readings Live to the scandal caused by Play TV: "It will remind TV3 of a past life".

Produced by Eso.tv, the programme invited viewers to dial a premium-rate telephone line costing €2.44 per minute. The line gave them a chance to communicate with a team of in-studio psychics who offered predictions of future events. Psychic Readings Live attracted criticism for the number of hoax calls from viewers and its use of seemingly-stock photographs of its psychics. Concerns were also expressed about the nature of some predictions, including one in which a woman was told her property would catch fire.

On 17 July 2012, the Irish Examiner reported that the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland had the programme "on their radar" following a number of complaints to TV3. Four complaints were upheld against the programme on 9 November 2012. The show was cancelled on 3 December 2012, with its final broadcast airing in that day's overnight slot.