Music At Work In Your Business & SOCAN

Value, accessibility and convenience

The most immediate way to sense the value of music to your business is to imagine your business without it. And SOCAN customers, tens of thousands across Canada, consider music so integral to their business that it’s part of their brand – as important as décor. Here is a brief explanation of why you, as an owner or operator, require a performing rights licence when you use copyright-protected music in your facility. That’s where SOCAN comes in.

SOCAN stands for Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada. It ensures that music creators and their publishers get paid for the communication to the public and public performance of their music. SOCAN does this by granting performing rights licences to businesses and individuals publicly playing or broadcasting live or recorded music.

SOCAN will grant such a licence, allowing you access to virtually the world’s entire repertoire of copyright-protected music, when the applicable licence fees are paid. These fees are based on tariff rates set by the Copyright Board of Canada.

There are more than 21 different SOCAN tariffs to accommodate the many different uses of music. Some of the most common ones for Recreational Facilities are:

Skating Rinks – Tariff 7
Where admission is charged annual fee is 1.2% of gross receipts. Where no admission is charged annual fee is $104.31.

Rental Functions where either live or recorded music is used – Tariff 8
This tariff pertains to banquet facilities, meeting rooms, reception areas, etc. This is NOT an annual fee tariff, but rather is charged per event, and the fee is calculated based on the capacity of the room and whether or not dancing is part of the function.

Sports Events – Tariff 9
Fee per event is .09% of gross receipts from ticket sales or, where no admission is charged, $5 per event.

Recorded Background Music (not for dancing) – Tariff 15.A
If you use recorded music in your dining area(s), bar(s), or lobby area, the annual fee is 11.46 cents per square foot of the public area (customer-used, not kitchen or storage).

Music on Hold over your telephone system – Tariff 15.B
The annual fee is $94.51 for your initial trunk line and $2.09 for each additional trunk line. A trunk line is a line that connects to the public/outside phone system.

*For Tariffs 15.A and 15.B, if you contract with a music supplier that is licensed by SOCAN, the licence fee for that use is covered in what you pay for the service.

Fitness Activities – Tariff 19
The annual fee is based on the average number of participants per week per room multiplied by $2.14.

Recreational Facilities – Tariff 21
The licence fee for 2009 is $185.07 as long as the gross revenues from events covered by this tariff do not exceed $15, 422.88 in 2008.

For full details on these and other SOCAN tariffs, or to find out more about SOCAN, visit www.socan.ca.

You can also call SOCAN:

For new customers, call 1-866-944-6210

For existing customer queries, please call 1-866-944-6223