New Broadcasting Fees Rules

Summary#

The Broadcasting Fees Regulations: SOR/2024-46 are final rules made by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission that set annual fees for most broadcasting undertakings, including many online services. The rules took effect on April 1, 2024 and replace the Broadcasting Licence Fee Regulations, 1997.

What it does#

• Sets a system for annual fees that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission will calculate and invoice to broadcasting ownership groups.
• Groups must file a fee return each year if their fee revenue for the most recent return year exceeds an exemption level. Returns are due by November 30 for the return year that begins September 1 of the previous year.
• The fee a group pays is proportional to its fee revenue (gross revenue from broadcasting activity in Canada minus certain excluded revenue), compared to the total fee revenue of all liable groups. The Commission combines an initial charge and an annual adjustment.
• The rules define an exemption level that uses $2,000,000 and $25,000,000 in different parts of the calculation (for small stations within a group and for ownership groups generally).
• If fees are unpaid, interest and administrative charges apply. Fees must be paid no later than 30 days after the date on the Commission’s invoice.
• The regulations exclude some kinds of operations from paying fees, including campus, community, Indigenous and student broadcasters, broadcasting carried on by the Corporation (as named in the Act), and certain exempted services.
• Transitional rules cover how the 2024–2025 and 2025–2026 calculations are handled and how online undertakings’ revenues are to be treated for 2024–2025.
• Repeals the Broadcasting Licence Fee Regulations, 1997.

Who's affected#

• Broadcasting ownership groups — meaning companies or linked operators that run one or more broadcasting undertakings — are the primary payers.
• Traditional broadcasters and many online broadcasters (audiobook services, podcast services, video game services may be treated differently through excluded revenue rules).
• Excluded from the rules are campus, community, Indigenous and student broadcasting undertakings, broadcasting carried on by the Corporation, and some exempted services.
• Smaller stations within a larger ownership group may benefit from the exemption computation that uses $2,000,000 and $25,000,000 thresholds.
• It is not always clear from the text which specific online services will be treated as excluded revenue in every case; the Commission will calculate and verify revenues for online undertakings.

Why it matters#

• These regulations make the CRTC’s operating and regulatory costs for broadcasting funded by the sector through annual fees rather than only by government appropriation.
• Broadcasters with larger revenues will see a share of the Commission’s regulatory costs billed each year; that can affect their operating budgets and potentially influence prices or programming decisions.
• Smaller and community-oriented broadcasters are explicitly excluded, which focuses the fee burden on larger commercial owners and many online services.
• The change brings online broadcasting more fully into the fee system (with specific transitional rules), so some web-based services may start to receive invoices where they did not before.