TheMusicLicence for restaurant & bar groups: what you should be paying

Restaurants, bars and pubs are among the most music-heavy businesses there are — background music through the day, and often live acts, DJs or events at the weekend. That mix makes TheMusicLicence more expensive, and more prone to error, than for a typical shop or office.

What drives the fee in hospitality

• The customer-audible floor area of each venue — the single biggest factor.
• Whether you have live music, DJs, karaoke or dancing, versus background music only.
• Opening hours and days — late-night, seven-day venues pay more.
• The number of sites in your group, each assessed on its own details.

Where groups overpay

The classic hospitality errors are being billed for live-entertainment usage at venues that only play background music midweek, counting kitchens, cellars and staff areas as audible space, and never re-assessing sites after a refit or a change of format. Repeat any of these across ten or fifteen venues and the annual overcharge becomes substantial.

Why a portfolio view matters

Most groups pay each site’s invoice in isolation and never compare them. Reviewing the whole estate together is how we find the patterns — and the biggest recoveries.

Send us your group’s invoices and we’ll review them for free, site by site. No savings, no fee.

This guide is general information, not legal advice, and MLC is an independent consultancy — not affiliated with PPL PRS Ltd, PRS for Music or PPL.