Licence to play audio CD's in a business?

PHARR

HI MSE,

Just a quick one as I have never come across this before:

My partner has just started work in a Nursery. The Nursery receive multiple calls a week stating that if they play any music cd's or even the radio then they need to pay £96 (thereabouts) for a specific licence to cover them for copyright?

I have never come across this, could anybody give me any more details if this is true?

unforeseen

https://www.prsformusic.com/Pages/default.aspx

agrinnall

Who are the calls coming from? As stated they probably do need to pay for a PRS licence, but I wouldn't just be paying some random caller.

engineer_amy

If you are playing audio cds that more than one member of staff can hear, or the children and parents can hear (ie not just for personal use) you will need to have both a PRS licence and a PPL licence.
PPL is for the record companies and performers, PRS is for the songwriters, composers and publishers.
The fees are based on the area of the nursery that the music that can be heard in, how many days it is open in a year and how many people can hear it.
They can do random inspections and if found to be playing music without a licence, they can impose a penalty of 50% of the fee due on top of the fee. So you can take a risk and not pay it (we had one random inspection in 8 years), pay it, or simply not play music on the premises. it includes audio cds, mp3s, radio, even if you have music on hold on the phone system


it bugs me every year having to pay these for our business

HiToAll

dont pay to those on the phone, tell those on the phone to gtf

Undervalued

engineer_amy wrote: »

If you are playing audio cds that more than one member of staff can hear, or the children and parents can hear (ie not just for personal use) you will need to have both a PRS licence and a PPL licence.
PPL is for the record companies and performers, PRS is for the songwriters, composers and publishers.
The fees are based on the area of the nursery that the music that can be heard in, how many days it is open in a year and how many people can hear it.
They can do random inspections and if found to be playing music without a licence, they can impose a penalty of 50% of the fee due on top of the fee. So you can take a risk and not pay it (we had one random inspection in 8 years), pay it, or simply not play music on the premises. it includes audio cds, mp3s, radio, even if you have music on hold on the phone system


it bugs me every year having to pay these for our business

Why?

You no doubt run your business to make money. Why shouldn't musicians and music publishers make money from running theirs?

There is a limited amount of royalty free music available which you can lawfully play without a licence if you really feel strongly about it.

Malthusian

engineer_amy wrote: »

They can do random inspections and if found to be playing music without a licence, they can impose a penalty of 50% of the fee due on top of the fee.

As I understand it the PRS and PPL are private organisations. While I'm not advocating copyright infringement, the "inspector" presumably has no more right to enter the building, or to impose "penalties", than any other random stranger.

Presumably if someone from the PRS arrives at your nursery to do an "inspection" and you decline to let them in, the next stage would be for them to sue you for copyright infringement. But I'm intrigued to know how likely they would be to succeed if they brought a civil suit based on the fact that one of their employees stood outside your nursery and could hear music coming from inside.

Anyway, this is probably academic, as if you are using someone else's music in your business then you should pay for it. But not to random people over the phone.

googler

engineer_amy wrote: »

it bugs me every year having to pay these for our business

Why?

Walk into a record/CD store, pick up an LP, CD, whatever, and walk out without paying. Let's see how far you get.

Radio stations pay a royalty for using music. Advertisers pay royalties for using it. Film producers, too.

Why should you be allowed to use it for free? You had to pay for everything else that you need or want to run your business, why not this? Why should you get this for free, and not your (say) printer paper, computers, pens, pencils, etc.?

Undervalued

Malthusian wrote: »

As I understand it the PRS and PPL are private organisations. While I'm not advocating copyright infringement, the "inspector" presumably has no more right to enter the building, or to impose "penalties", than any other random stranger.

Presumably if someone from the PRS arrives at your nursery to do an "inspection" and you decline to let them in, the next stage would be for them to sue you for copyright infringement. But I'm intrigued to know how likely they would be to succeed if they brought a civil suit based on the fact that one of their employees stood outside your nursery and could hear music coming from inside.

Anyway, this is probably academic, as if you are using someone else's music in your business then you should pay for it. But not to random people over the phone.

They are a very large organisation with substantial resources and do manage protect artists' and publishers' quite effectively!

Yes, certainly check carefully that the phone calls are not a scam then get the business a proper licence.

engineer_amy

googler wrote: »

Why?

Walk into a record/CD store, pick up an LP, CD, whatever, and walk out without paying. Let's see how far you get.

Radio stations pay a royalty for using music. Advertisers pay royalties for using it. Film producers, too.

Why should you be allowed to use it for free? You had to pay for everything else that you need or want to run your business, why not this? Why should you get this for free, and not your (say) printer paper, computers, pens, pencils, etc.?

The CDs we are playing have already been purchased, so the artists etc will already have received the royalty for that, same with music bought on iTunes etc. What is the difference between the purchaser playing his CD at home with 5 friends in his living room and playing it in front of 5 colleagues in an office?

Undervalued

engineer_amy wrote: »

The CDs we are playing have already been purchased, so the artists etc will already have received the royalty for that, same with music bought on iTunes etc. What is the difference between the purchaser playing his CD at home with 5 friends in his living room and playing it in front of 5 colleagues in an office?

In buying a CD you have bought the physical media plus a licence to do certain things with the music on it. Any form of commercial use is not normally included.

You now want to use the music for a business purpose for which there is a separate fee.