Reimbursement of recording cost

Reimbursements are offered for recording costs for music incurred in Iceland. Producers can apply for reimbursements from the State Treasury of 25% of the costs incurred in the recording of music in Iceland. When more than 80% of the total recording cost is incurred in Iceland, the reimbursement is calculated on the basis of the total recording cost incurred within the European Economic Area.

Recording costs refer to the costs enumerated in Article 6 of the Act on temporary reimbursement of recording costs. Hourly studio rates for recording, wage expenses incurred during the recording for hired performers, producers, engineers or studio personnel, post-production (including sound mixing and mastering), travel and transport costs for musical instruments and lead performers, own salary, c.f. Article 7 of Law No. 110/3016. To apply for reimbursement for the recording cost of phonograms, the phonograms have to contain 14 min of music, not more than 18 month passed between the release of the oldest phonogram and the release of the most recent phonogram, and no more than six months have elapsed since the release of the latest phonogram until the application was submitted to the Ministry. Hourly studio rates for recording.

Applications for reimbursement must meet the requirements of Act no. 110/2016, on Temporary Reimbursements for Recorded Music, and regulation no. 1271/2016, on reimbursements for recorded music. Applications and the accompanying documents should preferably be submitted electronically to [email protected].

If it is not possible to submit the applications and the accompanying documents electronically, applications can be submitted directly to the Ministry of Culture and Business Affairs.

The reimbursement is 25% of the eligible cost incurred in the European Economic Area when more than 80% of the total recording costs are incurred in Iceland.

Please note that to be eligible for reimbursement, the phonograms must have been released and made accessible to the general public. The combined playing time of the recorded music shall not be less than 14 minutes. All phonograms, for which a refund is requested, must have been released within a period of eighteen months, and applicants must submit their application no more than six months after the release of the latest phonogram.

Please also note that the presentation, or the quality, of the application and its accompanying documents can affect the application's processing time. Along with needing to provide the invoices for all cost items for which reimbursement is requested and matching payment confirmations as well, applicants must provide an organised overview of the cost items. Note that all foreign invoices must be translated into Icelandic króna using the exchange rate from when the invoice was issued. Please note that the invoices themselves do not need to be changed. It is sufficient to simply list the cost items in Icelandic króna on the cost item overview next to the foreign cost items. The official exchange rates (You will have to choose the date that the invoice was issued).

Here is a made-up example using Microsoft Excel:

The application for reimbursement should include the following information:

1. Applicant

1. Information on the applicant
2. Permanent residence

2. City and postal code
3. Country
4. Phone number
5. Email address

2. Information on the bank account that the applicant wishes to receive the refund

3. Proof of no indebtedness to STEF (or other affiliates) and the Treasury’s collector

1. Proof that the producer is not behind on royalties with STEF (or other affiliates) and/or other public dues and fees.
2. Note that on the application form there is a possibility to authorize the Ministry to access above information.
3. This does not apply to applicants who are paying mechanicals through another streaming distributor.

4. Information on the recordings

1. Information on how the recordings have been published and made available to the public
2. Track overview, ISCR-code, track durations
3. Information on the performers on the recordings, both lead performers and other performers.

5. Invoices and cost overview – reimbursable cost items

1. Studio cost
2. Invoices and proof of payment for studio cost. The invoice must be legally issued.
3. Wage expenses incurred during the recordings for hired performers, producers, engineers or studio personnel
4. Invoices and proof of payment for wage expenses for purchased performers or technicians (for performers other than the lead performers).
5. Post-production
6. Invoices and proof of payment for post-production cost
7. Travel Expenses
8. Invoices and proof of payment for travel expenses

2. Travel expenses include fares between countries and regions according to accompanying travel tickets (where the recording destination is Iceland).
3. Including: Incurred costs when transporting instruments to and from the recording studio. The cost of lead performers if they come a long way or costs of foreign main performers coming to Iceland to record music. Transport costs of instruments if needed, e.g. piano or grand piano.
4. Not including: Taxi costs or costs alike to and from the recording studio, nor daily gas costs for a performers own car during recording. Accomodation, food costs, rental car costs or other types of daily expenses. Travel costs of performers other than lead performers.

5. Salary of the applicant
6. If the same party is a producer, technician and/or performer they may be eligible for, as part of other eligible costs, partial reimbursement of an own salary equivalent to a single monthly salary for artists.

2. Applicant must demonstrate the costs incurred during the recording of the music for which reimbursement is applied for.
3. Here the committee bears the scale of the application, the costs incurred by the applicant and whether it serves the objective of Act no. 110/2016 and the regulations established on the basis of the law, in mind when assessing whether to agree to a partial reimbursement of an artists monthly salary.

A committee, appointed according to Article 4 of Act no. 110/2016, reviews applications that shall be in compliance with these instructions. If the committee is in doubt whether the conditions for reimbursement are met, the committee can ask for an opinion from expert parties cf. Article 4, paragraph 3 of Act no. 110/2016.

6. Other public grants
If an applicant has received a grant from public entities for the same recordings, the grant shall be deducted from the amount that is considered to be domestic reimbursable costs. Therefore, the applicant shall list such grants and their amount on the application form. It may affect the deduction if the grant was intended to cover more than the reimbursable cost items on account of Act no 110/2016. For the committee to be able to assess how much of the grant/grants should be deducted from the reimbursable cost items it is therefore important that the applicant provides adequate information about the grants awarded.

7. Supporting documents
The committee is authorized to ask the applicant to provide additional documents if it deems necessary. If the applicant fails to comply with the committee’s request within a reasonable time limit the application shall be considered invalid. On that same note, if the additional documents provided by the applicant turn out to be insufficient, despite the committee’s efforts to obtain sufficient documents, the committee may base its assessment on the documents on hand.