How to find your unclaimed PRS royalties

If you have written songs that have been played on radio, on TV, in a shop, in a pub, on a livestream or at your own gigs, there may be performance money sitting somewhere with your name only half attached to it. PRS for Music collects that money in the UK, but it can only pay it to you if your membership, your works and your performances are all registered and matched. This guide walks through the checks, in the order worth doing them.

Step 1: check you are actually a member

PRS collects performance royalties for songwriters, composers and publishers. PPL is the separate organisation that collects for recordings — performers and rights holders. They are two different memberships, and plenty of independent artists qualify for both while only having joined one.

Log in to the PRS Members' Portal. If you cannot log in, or you have never joined, that is your first answer: money earned before you joined is generally not something you can go back and collect, so joining sooner matters more than joining perfectly. If you release recordings as well as write, check PPL separately.

Step 2: check every song is registered as a work

Membership alone collects nothing. Each song must be registered as a work, with the writers named and the splits adding up to 100%. In the portal, list your registered works and compare that list against your actual catalogue — including:

• songs released under a different artist name or an old band name
• co-writes where you assumed the other writer registered it
• remixes, alternate versions and re-recordings
• songs written for other artists, sync, adverts or theatre
• tracks only released on YouTube, SoundCloud or Bandcamp

Unregistered works are the single most common reason an independent writer's PRS statement looks smaller than it should.

Step 3: check the splits and co-writer details match

Where two writers register the same song with different splits, or one writer's details do not match, the money can be held back until the conflict is resolved. If you have co-writes, ask the other writer what they registered and make sure the two registrations agree. Getting a signed split sheet — even a plain email confirming percentages — makes this far easier to fix later.

Step 4: submit your live performances

PRS pays for live performances of your own songs, but generally only when a setlist is submitted. If you have played gigs, festivals, support slots or headline shows and never submitted setlists, that is money you have simply not asked for. Check the current rules and time limits in the portal, gather your gig history, and submit what still falls inside the window.

Step 5: look at overseas income

When your song is played abroad, the local society collects it and passes it to PRS through a reciprocal agreement. This is slower and messier than UK income, and it depends on your works being registered and identifiable. If you know you have had airplay, sync or touring activity in another country and see nothing on your statements for it, raise it as a query rather than assuming it does not exist.

Step 6: check the plumbing around PRS

Performance royalties are only one pipe. Two others commonly leak for independent writers:

• Mechanical royalties in the US — collected by The MLC. If your songs are streamed in the US and you have never registered with the MLC, that share may be unmatched.
• YouTube — both the composition and the recording earn. Check your distributor is claiming through Content ID for the recording and that the work is registered on the publishing side.

Step 7: keep a single catalogue sheet

Build one spreadsheet listing every song, the writers, the splits, the release date, the ISRC, the ISWC, and whether it is registered with PRS, PPL, the MLC and your distributor. It sounds dull and it is the thing that turns "I think I'm missing money" into a specific list of fixes. It is also exactly what any buyer, publisher or administrator will ask for.

A realistic expectation

Chasing registrations will not usually turn a quiet catalogue into a loud one. What it does do is make sure the money your songs already earn actually reaches you, and it makes your catalogue worth more to anyone valuing it — because clean registrations mean income a buyer can see and trust rather than income they have to guess at.

Where a valuation fits in

If part of the reason you are digging through registrations is that you want to know what your songs are worth, you can start from the other end. Paste a Spotify link and we will give you a free, indicative range in about 30 seconds — no obligation, and no need to have your paperwork perfect first.

Get a free 30-second valuation of your song →

Related reading

• What is black-box money in music royalties?
• What is a royalty statement and where do I find mine?
• Full FAQ · How the process works