Mandatory Contributions to Art Funds

Before the payment, the online monthly is obliged to reduce the remuneration by two percent (e.g.. EUR 2) and send this contribution to the Literary Fund.

1) When is the contribution paid?

The compulsory contribution is deducted from any remuneration for the creation of a copyright work and/or artistic performance and any remuneration for the granting of a licence in relation to the following copyright works and/or artistic performances:

• artistic literary works (e.g. books, scenarios, translations and processing of texts in foreign languages), with the exception of related artworks and musical works without a text,
• written professional works (e.g. a lecture given by a lecturer at a professional seminar on marketing), written scientific works (e.g. a remunerated contribution at a scientific conference), and computer programmes,
• works used in journalism (contributions to periodicals, radio and television), including journalist photographs,
• artistic performances performed during the presentation of artistic literary works, artistic performances performed during the presentation of musical works with a text and theatre works (such as an actor’s performance), during the creation of film works (such as an actor’s performance) and works designated for radio or television broadcasting (such as an actor’s performance or dubbing), with the exception of performances performed during the presentation of musical works without a text which are connected to a film work or to a work designated for radio or television broadcasting.

2) When is the contribution not paid?

The contributions to art funds are not paid if

• the remuneration for the creation of the work is included in the author’s income from dependent work (e.g. the monthly wage of employees),
• the artist is a foreign citizen, since the duty to pay these contributions only applies to artists with permanent residence in the Slovak Republic.
• The amount and due dates of contributions to art funds

The contribution to an art fund equals two percent of an artist’s remuneration. The remuneration usually consists of active and passive components. The active component is made up by remuneration for an artistic performance or the creation of a copyright work. The passive component is made up by remuneration for the granting of a licence to exploit the artistic performance or the copyright work. It is worth mentioning that, according to some experts, the contributions are paid only from “royalties” (the remuneration for the creation of a work), and not from licence fees (this issue is not therefore entirely unambiguous).

The contribution to an art fund is deducted from the artist’s remuneration by the person that pays out the remuneration (the user or the client, i.e. for instance the publisher, producer, etc.). This means that the artist will not be paid the entire remuneration, but the remuneration less the contribution to the art fund.

The artist has no obligation towards the art fund. Obligations towards the art fund are always on the part of the person that pays out the remuneration. The person obliged to pay the contributions must not avoid his/her obligations (for example, by delegating them to the artist). These obligations are the following:

• to send the contribution to the art fund, marking the payment by the corresponding variable symbol,
• to send a notice form the art fund, in which the contributions are sorted into individual categories (there are 50 categories for the 2-percent contributions) within which the particular work or performance falls, and other required information.

The contributions to the art fund are payable for each calendar month in which the remuneration was paid out. Section 6 (1) of the Art Fund Act stipulates that the deducted contributions must be charged (the notice form must be sent) and paid (to a bank account) for a calendar month always by the 20th day of the following month.

Each category is assigned a numeric code, which also serves as a variable symbol when the payment is sent to the art fund’s account. For this reason, it is necessary to make as many separate payments as the number of categories within which the remunerations, from which the 2-percent contributions are deducted, fall. In the notice form, the art fund can see the total amount of the contributions deducted and the amount of contributions in each category. The person that pays out remunerations to artists is not obliged to get registered with the art fund.