PPL PRS Ltd Reviews 

The worst legitimate organisation I've ever had to deal with. PPL PRS insist on creating invoices and accounts without permission in order to extort money without good reason. Their approach is sneaky and they phone out of the blue and try and trap you into agreeing to a contract.

If you are thinking of playing music at your business AVOID paying these people and choose a ROYALTY FREE music service instead. (In contrast Background Sounds are excellent by the way.)

These people are awful.

Edit (after their response below): So PPL PRS think the issue 'seems to have been resolved'? If by that they mean they have successfully bullied an underfunded local playgroup into overpaying for a service that we neither need or want with the threat of debt enforcement/legal action, then sure, it's been resolved. Well done PPL PRS, you must be really proud of your work.

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My friend and I started a small local children's event thing based around car toys - Hot Wheel, Scalextric, that sort of thing - really just as a bit of fun for our own kids. Unexpectedly it became moderately popular, particularly with SEN kids who didn't enjoy traditional children's activities like soft play and the like, but for some reason felt very at home with us, SO we kept it up, even though we didn't really make any money from it.

As we would have music playing in the background (the kids seemed to like that) I got in touch with PPLPRS of my own accord to check we didn't need anything from them, as we would happily play royalty free music. However, I was told that as we had played non-royalty-free music at one of our events already, we would need to buy a licence for a whole year, at a cost of £250ish, or they would take us to court.

It gets better. At no point was it mentioned that this was in fact a rolling yearly contract (I guess it's buried in the T&C's somewhere). So a year os so later they sent us another invoice, demanding the same amount, even though I had made it clear that we would use royalty free music going forward. I got in touch to say we do not need the Music Licence, however they said that I had missed the notice period for informing them. In fact, they sent their invoice after the notice period had expired. When i queried this, they said (this is a quote) - 'Unfortunately as a business we don't send renewal invoices out as a reminder that the licence is coming up for renewal.'

Nice.

I was told that there was a minimum fee attached to their tariffs (again, this was news to me) of approximately half the yearly cost. For a service I had made clear I did not need or want a year previously. I pointed out the unfairness of this repeatedly, but was just told to pay or get taken to court.

If you can, avoid contact with these people at all costs. If you need background music, use Pixabay or some equivalent to get it royalty free.

I’m on bereavement leave and this company sends emails adding on surcharges as the payment hasn’t been made . Money grabbing company only think of themselves

This company needs investigating …. totally lost for words as to how to describe my experience with them…. My mental health has very much been affected by this and they should not be allowed to treat people in such a manner.

A simple online search shows that even some of their own members/musicians that they claim to represent have considerable grievances against them.

The stress and fear they’ve caused me even though I’ve told them that my small business is nigh on bankrupt is atrocious ….they’re devoid of empathy, care and considerations of any kind.

How any of their customer services can come on here and try to defend them is unbelievable.

I applied for a music licence because I was planning playing music in my small shop.

I requested that the licence start from the date of the first invoice, as I was holding off playing music until the licence was in place.

So, on the 30th of September I get an email at 4:14 in the afternoon, containing the invoice for a licence starting on 26 September.

So, I didn't pay and I'm not playing music. If you idiots can't invoice me properly then we don't have a contract and you better tell your debt collection agency to stop harassing me.

Overcharging, taking misinformation from the internet I have rung and given correct information, received a smaller quote, which fits with my business. then another for 2 1/2 more.
The initial contact agents are harassing and intimidating, I am told they get the information from their 'spotters' who trawl Google !!!
After weeks of calling I am still facing yet another huge invoice.The whole experience is making me ill.
Their fees are not transparent and they still do not send out a breakdown on tariff of fees after continued requesting.
I really don't know where to turn for help, I have again called today and been told someone will call me back, but this clearly gets me nowhere. If you are reading this PPL/PRS perhaps you can give me the details for
Complaint/Compliance Manager or better still the CEO
Greg Aiello

Totally unscrupulous company! We decided to stop playing the radio in our café as the fees were too high. Cancelling has been a nightmare and they keep contradicting themselves. Firstly, I was told I would have to pay 1 years fees to cancel, then 1 months fees so I agreed and when i called in to make the payment it became way more as they said there was an admin fee to pay making the total nearly 1 years fees! Do not deal with this company!

PPL are no more than bullies pretending to be a professional company. They came into my shop, filmed & took photos which are forbidden. Rather than talk to you they did all this on the sly but still cannot confirm what I was playing that demands payment. They ignored my complaint and still the letters are sent demanding payment. Trading Standards need to look at how this company operates.

As a small business owner, I want to share my recent experience with PPL PRS regarding their cancellation policy. I attempted to cancel my music license but missed their one-month notice period by only two days. Despite this, they enforced the cancellation fee without flexibility or empathy, even though I acted promptly once I realized my mistake.

I felt pressured into paying the fee and was met with poor communication throughout the process, including a representative leaving a voicemail while on annual leave, making it impossible to resolve matters quickly.

This rigid application of their policy, combined with a lack of customer care, has left me frustrated. I want to raise awareness for other business owners who may be considering using PPL PRS or dealing with similar issues.

If anyone else has had a similar experience or advice on handling situations like this, I’d appreciate your input.

A thoroughly unpleasant experience dealing with this bunch of unaccountable scam artists . Despite many attempts to reason with them they are still charging me £50 per day for my events and still want more on top . They do not allow foe unavoidable expenses such as ticket fees and door costs ie security . They charge you for what you might sell not what you actually sell . This organisation seems to wish to destroy small venues with greed and overcharging and are more interested in lining there own pockets than helping music . They are beyond reason do not have a clear and coherent pricing structure and seem to think the performers have no responsibility just the promoters . It is a truly shameful situation that such a bullying and seemingly corrupt organisation is allowed to operate without any hinderance . £50 per day FFS

Received a letter in the post today threatening us with legal action if we continued to ignore this companies various attempts at communicating with us. When I called them and asked how they had to tried to communicate with us they said by telephone. No email and no letters despite them having our company email on their system. Turns out they hadn’t tried contacting us at all and the business address they had for us was spelt incorrectly. Imagine them forcing a £600+ license on us and not communicating it to us in advance? In 2024 in the UK it’s truly unbelievable that gangster organisations like this are permitted to operate .Absolute scammers.

Warning! Avoid registering with this company at all costs.
Once you’re in, it’s like falling into a rabbit hole—you’ll struggle to get out. We hold a different license that explicitly states we do not need a PPL PRS license to play music. Despite this, I was charged over £700 last year, even though we don’t play licensed music. I requested to be unregistered, but this year they’ve sent me another invoice for over £700 and are now threatening legal action. This company is an absolute joke.

Try to scam me every year. Once a year i have to ring them because the letter they send, has a massivly increased fee on the previous year. Sometimes 6 times higher. Even when i complain that nothing has changed with my business they want to haggle until i start losing patience. It's stressfull. The price should increase slightly like normals companies do. Why isn't the government clamping down on these criminals. It's a complete scam and the whole system needs reviewing.
Fees of any small business should not be above £600 per year.

I was wrongly sold a policy with this company. I was told that my payments were going to be £66 a month which turned out to me £830 one off payment. I have spoke to them on the phone twice and they have tried to blame me and that I now need to pay for the month I have used and a month's notice TOTAL JOKE. The guy on the phone kept blaming me and it was all my fault which in fact if I had known it was going to be that a month I would have never agreed to this.
They just want your money customer service is awful 45 minutes and not got anywhere other than being upset which they didn't care about either.
Please don't touch this company with a barge pole total scammers!!!

Oh my god how they get a way with this.

We had Different music license for our business however
The rep walked in one day and just spoke to a waitress and send a bill
We did try few times to sort it out but they didn’t care.

Dear god

Definitely thought we had more rights in this country 🥲🤦🏻

There should be an option for zero stars.
We have reported to Trading Standards and have taken legal advice giving them seven days to send a credit note or we will commence action with Trading Standards and legal support.
We are a small store and received an 'estimate' for apparent previous use and the forthcoming year for nearly £900.
We confirmed no radio on premises and we would not be playing music. No reply. We then received an invoice for the amount and correspondence stating Urgent - legal action may follow. They create an account for you even when you have advised not necessary. We emailed again advising reply had not been received to our email, to be told they had made 'an offer' for a reduced amount but as we had not responded the full amount would be payable or legal action would be commenced! We had not received their so called 'offer' or any written correspondence via email or at our registered address. We emailed a number of times in response including noting referral to Trading Standards; their representative was unable to help, could not supply us with any proof for their claim and was not authorised to forward any of the supposed copy correspondence or withdrawn offer as under data protection! The only way to raise a query is to go through their long complaints procedure, during which time they may still take legal action. This company hides behind government regulation and knows small businesses don't have time to go through this procedure so many just pay to keep them off their back even when licence not required. We are all too busy being sales/HR/warehouse/accountants/
website admin/cleaners etc and from the reviews you can see the worry and distress they are causing.
We have been advised to only contact them by email and include delivered and read receipts.
The reviews for this company are appalling ... the trouble seems to escalate for those that enter into licences where their charges increase or they receive penalties for closing account even when they are no longer trading.
Recommend reporting problems to Trading Standards .. this is the only way to avoid being remotely bullied!

Rip off fraudsters.
Royalties are paid to musicians by CD sales, streaming services, radios, etc.
These people are vile fraudsters.

Do not use this company! I have paid yearly for over 10 years. I received an invoice for the following year and I rang them to say not renewing for financial reasons. They said I had not given a months notice and there were still charges.
They sent the invoice deliberately too late for that very reason.
The people that work here must be soulless, I would be embarrassed to work for an organisation that is basically ripping people off and hitting small businesses hard.
Having read all the other poor reviews I wished I had know what a con they are and not given them my money over the past decade.

This company acting like gangsters
We don’t listen music but they want to pay

Hateful company
Please do your homework before agreeing to their demands I’ve paid these licences for 20 odd years and now ceased trading - I have phoned and emailed this information but apparently I haven’t closed in line with their entrapment policy - STAY AWAY IF LEGALLY POSSIBLE