Statutory remuneration rights (GVA)
Profile GVA
Short designation: GVA supplement
Distribution date: 1 April
Frequency of distribution: annually
Where the revenue comes from:
Central Organisation for Private Copying Rights (ZPÜ)
Central Organisation for Public Lending Rights (ZBT)
Central Organisation for Video Renting (ZVV)
Education, Science, Institutions (UWI)
What are statutory remuneration rights?
The German Act on Copyright and Related Rights specifies that creators should use collecting societies such as GEMA to assert the statutory remuneration rights for their works.
Statutory remuneration rights are entitlements of creators that are derived from a statutory regulation rather than a concrete licensing agreement. In respect of statutory remuneration rights, the legislator has ruled that the public interest in such use of works takes priority over the right of the creator to determine this use. This applies in particular in respect of private copies.
Private copying is therefore legal, with no need to acquire a licence. This also means that creators cannot prohibit private copying of their works. In return, a financial compensation for these permitted copyright infringements has been determined in the form of a statutory remuneration right (=GVA).
GEMA receives statutory remuneration rights for the following scenarios:
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Private reproduction or re-recording, e.g. via the duplication function on mobile phones, PCs, burners, etc.
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The lending of media such as CDs and DVDs by libraries and video rental shops
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The use of music and film in the context of educational, scientific or other institutions
To optimise our awareness of our members’ remuneration rights, we have joined forces with other collecting societies such as GVL and VG Wort to create entities known as Central Organisations. These Central Organisations collect licence fees and pass them on to GEMA and others, and we pay our members the relevant amounts in the form of supplements.
We currently receive collections for statutory remuneration rights via the following Central Organisations:
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Central Organisation for Private Copying Rights (ZPÜ)
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Central Organisation for Public Lending Rights (ZBT)
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Central Organisation for Video Renting (ZVV)
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Educational, Scientific or other Institutions (UWI)
Since neither these Central Organisations nor GEMA have access to precise data specifying the works used or reproduced, we distribute revenue for statutory remuneration rights to our members in the form of supplements.
To ensure a realistic reflection of usage behaviour, repertoire in all categories in respect of which usage in terms of statutory remuneration rights can be inferred is taken into consideration for the supplement. Since usage behaviour in this area is constantly changing, we regularly check the basis used for the supplementary distribution, adjusting it if necessary.
Important dates, periods and deadlines
Declare works promptly:
We recommend declaring works promptly via our Online Portal , but at the latest with the release. Only then, a work can be included in a distribution, according to the GEMA distribution plan. For reproductions of your works between 1 January and 30 June, the notification deadline is 31 July. For reproductions between 1 July and 31 December, the last possible day for notification in order to be included in the next distribution is 31 January of the following year.
Annual distribution cycle:
The main distributions for Phono VR and BT VR take place on 1 January and 1 July each year. Backlog distributions for Phono VR take place on 1 April and 1 October.
Make claims promptly:
You have three months time after a distribution date to submit a claim. To find out how to do and what you need to know about, see our claims page.
Payouts on 1 April 2025
In addition to regular collections for statutory remuneration rights, GEMA has received extraordinary revenue from Amazon in relation to financial years that have already concluded (2021 & 2022). This too will be paid out on 1 April 2025 in the form of a supplement.
Please consult overview (Excel-File for download) to find out for which categories this supplementary distribution is relevant. Here as well, the amounts are calculated as a rounded average supplement in percentage form.
All members receiving a GVA payout will find full information in their account statements under the following headings:
ZPÜ (financial year 2023) - using the example of the professional group of composers (K)
Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2023 K MOD S VR
Kostenabzug Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2023 MOD S VR
Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2023 K Phono VR
Kostenabzug Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2023 Phono VR
Zuschlag AR ZPÜ 2023 K FS
Kostenabzug Zuschlag AR ZPÜ 2023 FS
Extraordinary revenue (financial year 2022) - using the example of the professional group of lyricists (T)
Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2022 T MOD S VR
Kostenabzug Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2022 MOD S VR
Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2022 T Phono VR
Kostenabzug Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2022 Phono VR
Zuschlag AR ZPÜ 2022 T FS
Kostenabzug Zuschlag AR ZPÜ 2022 FS
Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2021 V MOD S VR
Kostenabzug Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2021 MOD S VR
Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2021 V Phono VR
Kostenabzug Zuschlag VR ZPÜ 2021 Phono VR
Zuschlag AR ZPÜ 2021 V FS
Kostenabzug Zuschlag AR ZPÜ 2021 FS
Please note that the private copying (ZPÜ) revenue from the 2023 financial year also includes collections relating to public lending (ZBT), video renting (ZVV) and educational, scientific or other institutions (UWI), since the same basic categories are involved (FS VR, TFS VR, R VR, Phono VR, MOD S, MOD S VR, VOD S, VOD S VR). Such revenue has therefore been consolidated into a single item on your account statement: ZPÜ.
Dear members,
In the course of creating the new topic page, we have removed the previously familiar accompanying letters, as from now on you will find all relevant information about the GVA distribution on this page.
If you would like to take a look at the information letters from previous years, we are happy to provide them again here:
