Germany

[DE] Fees Charged for Providing Radio and Television in Hotels

IRIS 1998-2:1/27

Alexander Scheuer

Institute of European Media Law (EMR), Saarbrücken/Brussels

In order to provide radio and television in hotel rooms, hoteliers will now have to pay a lump-sum fee to the Company for Musical Performances and Mechanical Reproduction Rights (Gesellschaft für musikalische Aufführungs- und mechanische Vervielfältigungsrechte - GEMA).

GEMA will operate on the basis of the Assertion of Copyright Act, under the supervision of the Chairman of the German Patent Office. Its constitutional purpose as a performing rights society is to protect copyright-holders and assert their rights. In relations between persons who perform or reproduce works protected by copyright and the rights holders, GEMA operates on the basis of authorisation contracts with the latter, in order to have their claims satisfied.

The regulation decided recently within an overall contract between GEMA and the Federal Union of Music Organisers provides that companies which are members of the Union will be charged an annual fee of DEM 6 per room, back-dated to 1 January 1998. Companies which are not members of the Union will have to pay the performing rights society the sum of DEM 7,50 per room in payment of the copyright-holders' claims.