AustriaAudiovisual Media Services Act, accessible crisis announcements and the accessibility action plans, annual reports and rising share of accessible programmes and catalogues of media service providers
Audiovisuelle Mediendienste-Gesetz (AMD-G) §§ 30a Abs. 1 und 2, 30b und 64 Abs. 2 Z 2, BGBl. I Nr. 84/2001 in der Fassung BGBl. I Nr. 150/2020
In force since .
An accessibility requirements rule binding private bodies.
What it requires
- If you are a media service provider (Mediendiensteanbieter) with television programmes or on-demand catalogues, make sure that each year, according to your economic capacity and taking account of public funding for such measures, the share of accessible programmes in all your programmes and catalogues rises continuously and step by step above the level of ; you may make justified exceptions for live content; this duty does not apply for as long as the turnover from your audiovisual media service in the previous year did not exceed EUR 500,000, nor, if you provide only locally or regionally directed television programmes, for the audiovisual media services you offer (AMD-G, s. 30b(1)).
- After hearing a representative organisation for people with visual or hearing impairments and one for people with intellectual impairments, prepare an action plan with a concrete three-year timetable for raising each year the share of accessible programmes other than live broadcasts, split by the categories of information, entertainment, education, art and culture, and sport; send it to the regulatory authority and publish it so that it is easily, directly and permanently accessible (AMD-G, s. 30b(2)).
- Report to the regulatory authority each year by 31 March, in the standardised form of its guidelines, on the implementation of the action plan and the rise in the shares in each category, and publish the report in the same way as the plan; if the measures or increases in the plan were not met, give the reasons and the steps planned to make up the shortfall by the end of the following year (AMD-G, s. 30b(3)).
- If you provide a media service, give the federal and Land authorities and the municipalities in your service area, free of charge, the means at any time to make calls in crises and disasters and other important announcements to the public, and supply that information so that it is accessible; the authority or private person that issues the call pays the extra cost of making it accessible (AMD-G, s. 30a(1) and (2)).
These lines are LexLint's reading of the law's text.
If you get it wrong
Penalty structure
Section 64(2), item 2 fines up to EUR 10,000 a media service provider that does not prepare the action plan under section 30b(2), does not send it to the regulatory authority or does not publish it.
- Rule
- Fixed only
- As of
- Currency
- EUR
- Fixed cap
- 10,000
Who enforces it
Enforcement body
The Kommunikationsbehörde Austria (KommAustria), which exercises legal supervision, including administrative penalty proceedings, under the AMD-G
What it reaches
Instrument type
an act of a legislature
Applicability criteria
- As of
- Combinator
- All of
- Criteria
- a media service provider whose turnover from its audiovisual media service in the previous year was more than EUR 500,000, for the duty to raise the share of accessible programmes and to prepare and publish an action plan under section 30b
- a media service provider that does not provide only locally or regionally directed television programmes, for the audiovisual media services it offers under section 30b
What this law does
Section 30b(1) of the AMD-G requires media service providers to see that, each year and according to their economic capacity, the share of accessible programmes in all their programmes and catalogues rises continuously and step by step above the level of . Section 30b(1) allows a media service provider to make justified exceptions for live content.
Section 30b(1) frees a media service provider from that duty for as long as the turnover from its audiovisual media service in the previous year did not exceed EUR 500,000. Section 30b(1) also exempts providers of only locally or regionally directed television programmes for the audiovisual media services they offer.
Section 30b(2) requires a media service provider to prepare an action plan with a concrete three-year timetable for raising the share of accessible programmes each year, split by the categories of information, entertainment, education, art and culture, and sport, after hearing representative organisations of people with visual or hearing impairments and of people with intellectual impairments.
Section 30b(2) requires the provider to send the action plan to the regulatory authority and to publish it so that it is easily, directly and permanently accessible. Section 30b(3) requires a media service provider to report to the regulatory authority each year by 31 March on the implementation of its action plan and the rise in the shares in the individual categories.
Section 30b(3) lets the regulatory authority open a supervisory procedure ex officio or on a complaint where the measures in the action plan are not met. Section 30a(1) requires a media service provider to give federal and Land authorities and the municipalities in its service area, free of charge, the means to make calls in crises and disasters and other important announcements to the public. Section 30a(1) requires the provider to supply that information so that it is accessible.
Section 30a(2) makes the authority or private person that issues such a call pay the extra cost that the provider incurs in making the information accessible. Section 64(2), item 2 fines a media service provider up to EUR 10,000 for not preparing the action plan under section 30b(2), not sending it to the regulatory authority or not publishing it. Sections 30a and 30b apply from .
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