PPL music licence/barclay collections

Jelly1725

Hello, I have a small business which opened a year ago. I run a hair salon. I have a prs music licence and did not know I also need a ppl licence. I have been billed £285.31 for a years licence and £142.66 for not having a ppl licence. My business is small and cannot afford to pay this in one lump sum, I have spoken to ppl who refuse to accept monthly payments and have now passed my account over to Barclay Collections, North Harbour, Portsmouth for recovery of payment, should I contact Barclays and offer monthly instalments, I am worried about getting fined whilst I try to resolve this. I have read about Barclays Collections and people having bad dealings with them. Can Barclays Collections add interest to this amount, because i am curious about the legalities of this company.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Horace

If you cannot afford to pay a lump sum then Barclays Collections will, I would have thought, charge you interest.

What would PPL do if you say just pay the fine and then not have a licence for 12 months meaning that you must not play a radio or have CDs etc in your salon?

paulwf

OP lets start at the beginning...are you sure your fee is correct? The PPL site suggests your fee should be £121 ex VAT. Obviously their charging structure is complex but download their tariffs from their website and do your research. £285 does not sound right for a small business.

Rather than getting into the legal and financial complexities of the situation I would be asking myself "what can I do to get 10 clients through the door right now?" The best way to sort out bills is to raise more money to pay them...there is usually a promo or offer or incentive that you and your staff can do to raise some quick cash. If cashflow really can't stretch to this minor bill then what happens when the council rates are due and then the rent and then the PAYE contributions etc etc?

jexygirl

Hey Jelly
whilst Paul is absolutely right as usual, we had this with our first pub and i was furious lol!
Customers could pull up in their car, listening to the radio station I was playing, but licensing meant that although they had paid to hear it privately, and the station pay prs to play it, I couldnt actually play it in the pub without paying again.
And, despite skys monstrous fees, i couldnt play the music channel I was paying sky extortionate amounts for, even if i was paying to have a commercial tv licence...which i was on top of sky commercial fees.
As a side note as well, the karaoke guys pay for rights to play the tracks in public, yet I still had to pay on top of their fee the prs... despite them being licensed to play the track!!! - PRS and I dont have a good relationship!!! and when i asked if the artists actually get the money, the answer was no, it goes into a pot - so radio pay, tv pay, I pay sky, yet we pay again... and no artist is directly paid unless a set list is produced.
There was however something fairly recent regarding PRS and the system being overhauled so maybe contest the fee and what you are doing. We actually booked alot of orignal bands, so no prs as we arent reproducing, also there is another link somewhere, think it was sue, that linked PRS free music on a charity shop link. PRS tend to charge in advance, at least ours did, so we were able to look at what we had booked and change or alter, perhaps you can too, and get a CD of prs free music, which means or should mean no fees.
Still take the advice paul gave. Its "sound" excuse pun.
good luck
jex

paulwf

Jex...don't you love the way they add a 50% surcharge if you don't inform them? You can't even keep a low profile and hope to stay off their radar as there's always the risk of getting the 50% "fine"

jexygirl

Don't get me started, you know i can't shut up at the best of times, but can feel my blood boiling at the mere mention!!!

kered1952

Jelly1725 wrote: »

Hello, I have a small business which opened a year ago. I run a hair salon. I have a prs music licence and did not know I also need a ppl licence. I have been billed £285.31 for a years licence and £142.66 for not having a ppl licence. My business is small and cannot afford to pay this in one lump sum, I have spoken to ppl who refuse to accept monthly payments and have now passed my account over to Barclay Collections, North Harbour, Portsmouth for recovery of payment, should I contact Barclays and offer monthly instalments, I am worried about getting fined whilst I try to resolve this. I have read about Barclays Collections and people having bad dealings with them. Can Barclays Collections add interest to this amount, because i am curious about the legalities of this company.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Hello, I have just come across your problem with PPL and like yourself I have had my hairdressing business for over twenty years and had never heard of PPL. Like you I was invoiced for exactly the same amounts `out of the blue` and they were very persistent and, I started getting hand delivered letters from Barclay Collections so, I reluctantly paid the invoice. I was not a happy camper so I got in contact with the Citizens Advice Centre (as PPL say that they endorsed them) and their advice was quote” Basically if you play a radio you only need a PRS licence. If you play CDs, etc. you need both a PRS and a PPL licence. PPL can go back up to 6 years. If you only use a radio you need to complete a formal declaration confirming to PPL that no recorded music is being used. If recorded music was used in the past, a fee will still be payable for that past year.” As I only play a radio in the salon I have been trying to get my monies returned but, to date they have been ignoring my correspondence. I hope if you are still having problems... this might help....

amadiro

I have an Internet Cafe I do not however play music recorded or otherwise. I have been informed by the PPL that I need a license if people use Youtube to listen to music. The music on Youtube should be copyright free or paid by click throughs. I can't see how I need a license for this.

Advice would be appreciated.

texranger

this is the same as https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3415511

amadiro

Not exactly

I know if I play music I would need a license, but it's not me that's playing the music, it's people coming in and using the cafe's pc's to listen to Youtube, which dosen't/shouldn't have copyrighted music on it in the first place. The PPL have phoned me up and said that I need a music license for Youtube and are sending me a invoice for last year.

Now when we asked the PRS sometime last year we were told that we didn't need a license for Youtube.

I also get kids in who play music on their Iphones at full volume, which can be heard by other people. It is a rather grey area of licensing. Who is responsible for the music me or the customer. In 2009 the PPL generated £111 million in license fees and the PRS £545 million in 2006. I think they are just being greedy and trying to exploit this grey area of music licensing.

sizzler78

hiya, i have also had this problem - i had a bill for £398! Never heard of PPL before but it appears if i play music i am responsible for knowing i need 2 licenses!! I was only playing a tiny radio in the kitchen of my cafe! Its really not fair but i have paid it in the end as i was getting letters from the solicitors. It is worth looking at the amount though as i have only paid half of the bill they sent as they had estimated my cafe at 4 times the actual size!! Amazing how they can measure somewhere without even entering the premises!!
This is probably way too late to post but i'd be interested to know how you got on with it? Its amazing how many people have had the exact same experience with this company - robbing gits!!