Yesterday I downloaded a Radio 4 drama called War of the Worlds. When I looked in the download folder it wasn't there. I went back to search, tried again and was told it is in history and that i should use --force to over-ride. Where do I put in --force? I only every use the search box.

you should find "get_iplayer --pid=b08gw7md --force" will work to force recording of the episode (specifically "The War of the Worlds Episode 1.")

I don't use the Web PVR manager myself but I've just had a look for you.

On the Web PVR manager screen you have a number of tabs along the top (Search, Recordings, PVR List etc.). Below that you have the search box and to the right of that another group of tabs (Advanced Search, Display, Columns, Recording and Streaming). If you click the recording tab you will see a list of options and there is a radio button to select the Force option (on/off). Below that, you have two button to either apply the settings or save as default (which I'm guessing updates your options file for all future invocations of GIP).

So, to clarify, there's no equivalent of --force in the Web PVR manager, you will be using --force but just specifying it in a slightly different way to a command line.

Hope that helps.