Canal+ could soon increase its prices and this is why

Within French taxation, streaming platforms like Netflix or Disney+ are taxed at 20% of VAT. Pay channels benefit from an exceptional reduction of 10%, like Canal+. However, this economic advantage will soon end.

Indeed, consumption patterns have changed and, now, the share of subscribers watching more video on demand has become much greater. This pushed the Paris Administrative Court of Appeal to reconsider their approach regarding OCS, a stakeholder in the case at the time of its establishment, and that it should now be taxed as a streaming platform, at 20% VAT. To support its decision, the court specifies that replay is no longer a secondary mode of consumption since 49% of viewing time is devoted to it and that certain programs are not even broadcast live before arriving in replay .

The decision taken concerning OCS therefore affects all professionals in the sector and especially the Canal group which bought the service last year. Currently, Canal+ differentiates between live television and replay (10%) and on-demand services (20%) in its billing method. But the low price of the latter (€2) suggests that it is above all an accounting maneuver and that this could soon make the tax administration cringe.

An inevitable increase in Canal+ prices?

In other words, if the Council of State validates the court’s decision, this means that Canal+, already financially strained in recent years, could go into cash. A prospect to which the managers would have responded by emphasizing that Canal could put less money into French film production in the future. We know this standoff by heart.

But behind all that, it is especially for subscribers that this increase in VAT could have repercussions. If Canal+ has always taken care to pay attention to its price increases to apply them sparingly, we suspect that if the channel is required to pay more, this cost will be reflected in its subscriptions. There is still time and legal recourse before the decision is implemented, but everything suggests that we must be prepared to see the bill increase.

Also read: