Adopted by TONO’s Annual General Meeting 8 June 2022.
TONO deducts an amount from the collected consideration to cover its administrative costs. Pursuant to the Norwegian Collective Rights Management Act, the deduction cannot exceed TONO’s justified and documented costs in connection with rights management.
These costs include TONO’s overall rights management activities, including licensing, settlement, documentation of works, staff functions and day-to-day operations.
The use of resources for each area and the associated processing must be in reasonable proportion to the income in each area or the specific performances.
Administrative costs are different for the different revenue areas. To reflect this, TONO can differentiate the deduction of administrative costs for different types of use and settlement areas, according to the cost level for the individual areas. This is stated in TONO’s annual transparency report.
a. Deductions for cultural funds
TONO deducts an amount from the collected consideration for cultural funds.
Article 58(1) of TONO’s Articles of Association state that the cultural funds are arrived at as follows:
“a) For each rights holder with a management contract with TONO, up to 1/10 of the amount payable in settlement shall be deducted before the total net amount is distributed.
b) In accordance with reciprocal agreements with other societies, TONO withholds up to 1/10 of the settlement amounts payable to these societies’ rights holders.”
Deductions for cultural funds are not made for income from abroad, mechanical rights or private copying fees.
b. Distribution of the funds
Article 58(1) of TONO’s Articles of Association state that the cultural funds are to be used as follows:
“a) Two-thirds are to be spent on promoting national music-culture objectives through the group associations. In order to carry out tasks to promote Norwegian creative music and Norwegian musical works, as well as for other special objectives, the funds are to be distributed according to the following ratio: The Norwegian Society of Composers and Lyricists (NOPA) 45% – The Norwegian Society of Composers (Norsk Komponistforening) 35% – The Norwegian Music Publishers’ Association (Norsk Musikkforleggerforening) 20%.
Before the amount is paid out, the associations must provide a written account of the main features of what the funds will be used for and enclose their financial statements and directors’ report for the previous year. The Board may ask for additional information before payment takes place.
Control of the use of the funds falls to the Control Committee, see Article 53(5)(c).