Applying to SAMRO

I’ve been doing a bit of research on how one gets paid from samro membership. As part of that information finding, I asked around to find out how many artists I work with are samro members. For people who take their music quite seriously, very few of them have registered and even fewer have phoned in to check their membership status.

Note that if your music isn’t registered with samro, you may as well perform from in your bedroom because you aren’t going to earn anything in terms of royalties. The process isn’t the most difficult one to complete. I just think musicians and artists get scared by the forms and registration process. Educate yourself, minimise the fear.

When you register, that’s not the end of the road. They don’t send you a certificate to say you are a full member. The different levels are as follows:

I’ve taken the info straight off the samro website. How many of you have actually gone there to see what’s up?

Don’t worry…

I’ll wait…

…

Okay. So…

Prospective Membership
Applicant Membership
Nominee Interim Membership
Elected Ordinary Membership
Full Membership

Prospective membership is what you get while the people at samro are still registering your forms. If your forms aren’t complete, you will stay here and you won’t earn a cent. How do you find out if you’re still on this level you may ask? My answer is give them a call. They can pull up your file on their system and tell you what’s missing.
I had this problem because I printed out my id document too dark. I registered in 2008, I only found our about the problem with my id when I was supposed to start earning this year (2014). How did I find out? I called.

Once those forms are done then you’ll get pushed up to applicant membership. These are the requirements:

Completed Application for Membership
Copy of Identity Document
Signed declaration
Notification of Works Form
Proof of Copyright
Must have a Correspondence Address
Must have a Residential Address
Must have a Next of Kin
Members account cannot be cross referenced

All the forms are on the website and as if they couldn’t make it any simpler, this is the step by step registration process as is on the website. The next time I get asked about joining samro, I’m sending artists here.

Applying for SAMRO Membership
Here’s a play-by-play walk-through of what’s required to apply for SAMRO membership.

Download and complete the membership application form.
Complete the Notification of Works form that lets us know which works you’re claiming ownership of.
Provide us with the Deed of Assignment.
Give us a copy of the recording you wish to claim ownership of.
Give us proof of identity in the form of a certified copy of your ID document.

Next is Nominee Interim Membership. You get this when your song has played enough times and you’ve earned enough royalties. I phoned in to find out what “enough” was and they couldn’t tell me.

Once your application to Nominee Interim Membership is accepted, you get bumped up to Elected Ordinary Membership. Here, your benefits are:

Participate fully and equally in royalty distributions
Participate in Non-Royalty Revenue distributions to the extent of a pre allocation subject to royalties having been earned in the previous distribution (R500)
Will receive our Directors’ and Financial reports each year as well as regular correspondence
Have the right to attend and vote at General Meetings
Have one vote on a show of hands or, on a poll, one vote for every Rand of South African Royalties earned attributable to works of Southern African origin in the immediately preceding distribution, subject to a minimum of 2% of the total votes

The last level is full membership. You get this after serving samro for 10 years as well as a few other requirements. I wont go into full membership here.

So there it is. If my info still confuses you then I rate you phone them and ask for a sit-down consultation. I was going to put the forms up on my site for download but that would just be spoon feeding. All documents can be found on www.samro.org.za