RSP lost the case to the Russian office of Dell regarding the payment of 1% for the import of corporate equipment

According to the Banker, today the Moscow Arbitration Court rejected the claims of the Russian Union of copyright holders against Dell. Earlier, the RSP, headed by President Nikita Mikhalkov, filed a lawsuit to the designated authority, according to which the Russian representative office of Dell was obliged to pay 1% of the customs value not only from consumer equipment, which makes it possible to record and rewrite multimedia content, but also from specialized equipment designed for corporate use at the enterprises of various scale.

An important decision for the Russian IT business was made after listening to both sides and analysis by independent experts, one of whom was a well-known blogger and journalist Sergey Vilyanov. However, the Russian Union of Rights Holders is unlikely to be content with the decision of the Arbitration Court and will certainly try to challenge the loss of the case in higher instances.

Recall that according to government decree number 829 of 10/14/2010, all companies that import consumer equipment with the ability to record / rewrite multimedia content (by and large, it’s about music and video) are required to pay 1% to the brainchild of famous filmmaker Nikita Mikhalkov. As of now, RSP has agreements with about a hundred large importers, of which the Russian representative offices of Dell and Hewlett Packard deserve special attention.
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Earlier, the Dell office, in cooperation with the Russian Union of Rights Holders, approved a list of products from which the same 1% fee would be paid, excluding devices for enterprises (workstations, servers, data warehouses, etc.). However, from February 2015, invoices began to arrive in the domestic division of the American company, in which absolutely all imported equipment was taken into account, and not just the previously discussed categories of goods. New payment documents continued to arrive during the first half of last year, and in August, RSP filed the first official lawsuit against Dell in the amount of 84 million rubles, which has undergone some changes over the past few months. As a result, the Russian Union of copyright holders requested 90 million rubles from an American company. Of course, Dell refused to pay new bills for products that are not used by ordinary users at home, and today the Moscow Arbitration Court upheld the company's position.

It is noteworthy that a similar lawsuit in respect of non-payment of the levy of 1% of the RSP filed against the Russian representative office of the company Hewlett Packard, however, a larger sum appears here - 113.9 million rubles. Also, the project of Nikita Mikhalkov has similar claims against other large importers of equipment, in particular, against the company OCS Distribution.

It should be noted that at least 1000 companies are engaged in the import of various equipment to Russia, while the RSP has entered into an agreement with only 100 enterprises. Thus, the Russian Union of Rights Holders prefers to receive as much money as possible on strange charges from law-abiding importers, who consistently pay a fixed 1% levy instead of establishing cooperation with the other 900 companies.