Put a television in a hotel guest room and a broadcast license fee arises for every room. The official guidance of Japan Broadcasting Corporation (NHK) explains that for business premises such as companies, hotels and ryokan, a reception contract is required for each “place of installation” of a receiver — in other words, for each room — so the number of guest rooms translates directly into the number of contracts. At the same time, a “business discount” (事業所割引) halves the fee from the second contract onward if every receiver on the same premises is contracted and paid for together. For a 100-room property this works out to about ¥620,000 a year under terrestrial contracts and about ¥1.10 million under satellite contracts, or ¥6,200 to ¥11,000 per room per year. This article first confirms the provisions of the Broadcast Act and NHK’s Reception Contract Terms against primary sources. It then estimates annual and per-room amounts for three property sizes (30, 100 and 200 rooms) and two contract types (terrestrial and satellite); calculates the share of rooms revenue in three markets with estimated settled ADRs in the ¥6,000s, ¥10,000s and ¥20,000s; measures the impact on NOI yield in basis points; and places this cost item in the same table as the per-room annual figures we have previously published for fixed asset tax, depreciable asset tax, business office tax, statutory inspections, waste disposal, water and sewer, and fire insurance.

Conclusions by Issue — ¥6,200–11,000 per Room per Year, 0.1–0.6% of Rooms Revenue

The Legal Framework — Article 64 of the Broadcast Act and the “Per Place of Installation” Rule in the Reception Contract Terms

Let us start with the statute. Article 64, Paragraph 1 of the Broadcast Act states that “a person who falls under any of the following items shall conclude a reception contract with the Corporation in accordance with the approved contract provisions,” listing in Item 1 “a person who has installed specified receiving equipment” and in Item 2 “a person who has begun receiving specified essential streaming” (e-Gov Law Search, accessed October 11, 2026). Item 2 was added by the amendment that took effect on October 1, 2025, making the start of internet-stream reception a basis for the contract alongside the installation of broadcast receiving equipment. Paragraph 8 of the same article excludes from “specified receiving equipment” any equipment capable of receiving only radio broadcasts and any receiving equipment not intended for receiving broadcasts.

The contract unit is set by the NHK Reception Contract Terms (effective October 1, 2025), approved by the Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications. Article 2 defines household contracts as “per household” (Paragraph 1), while contracts for business premises and other non-household locations (business contracts) are “per place of installation of the receiver” where a receiver has been installed, and, where reception of NHK streaming has begun, “per place of installation of the communication terminal, regardless of the number of communication terminals,” with “the principal base of streaming reception deemed to be the place of installation of the communication terminal” (Paragraph 2). The unit of a place of installation “shall be a room, an automobile or an equivalent thereof.” For business premises, NHK’s official guidance page “Contracts for Business Premises (Companies, Corporations, etc.)” explains that “a reception contract is required for each ‘place of installation’ (each room or vehicle) of a receiver such as a TV, or of a communication terminal used to receive streaming,” and expressly states that hotel and ryokan guest rooms each require a contract. If a room has a TV and also receives streaming, that is one contract; where several TVs are placed in an area equivalent to a room, such as a large hall, one contract is required for that area.

Fee amounts are set in Article 5 of the Terms, and since the October 2023 revision there is no difference by payment method. Terrestrial contracts cost ¥1,100 per month, ¥6,309 for 6-month prepayment and ¥12,276 for 12-month prepayment. Satellite contracts cost ¥1,950 per month, ¥11,186 for 6 months and ¥21,765 for 12 months. The 6-month prepayment equates to a 4.4% discount and the 12-month prepayment to 7.0%. Okinawa Prefecture has separate fee amounts, lower than the mainland at ¥10,778 terrestrial and ¥20,267 satellite on 12-month prepayment. All amounts include consumption tax.

Business Discount and Bulk-Contract Discount — Half Price from the Second Contract, a Further ¥300 a Month for 10+ Satellite Contracts

The business discount is set out in Article 5-5 of the Terms: “for each of the remaining reception contracts, excluding one, the amount payable shall be the license fee less half thereof.” According to NHK’s official guidance, there are three conditions: (1) the business premises hold two or more contracts for receivers or streaming-reception devices installed there; (2) all relevant devices on the same premises are covered by the necessary contracts according to contract type; and (3) all contracts share the same payment period and are paid together in a lump sum. The first contract receives no discount, and where satellite and terrestrial contracts are mixed, the base first contract is the satellite one. Applications are made by contacting the NHK Fureai Center.

This has one practical implication. Because condition (2) requires every device on the premises to be contracted, contracting only some of the guest rooms does not qualify for the discount. The scheme presumes this order: if TVs are placed in guest rooms, contract every room that has one, then apply for the discount.

The bulk-contract discount (多数一括割引), based on Article 5-2 of the Terms, deducts ¥300 per contract per month (¥90 for special contracts) when a single contracting party holds a total of 10 or more satellite or special contracts and pays them together for the same payment period. The official guidance explicitly states it can be combined with the business discount, and there is also a rule that when combined with the business discount, a holder of 7–9 satellite contracts pays the amount calculated as if they had 10. However, continuous payment by credit card and similar methods is excluded, and the group lump-sum discount must not already be applied.

Since October 2025 — Streaming Reception and Devices Without a Tuner

The amended Broadcast Act took effect on October 1, 2025, making NHK’s internet streaming a “mandatory service” on par with broadcasting. The Reception Contract Terms were revised on the same date: Article 1 now defines a terrestrial contract as “a reception contract for the reception of terrestrial television broadcasts or NHK streaming,” and a satellite contract as “a reception contract for the reception of satellite television broadcasts and of terrestrial television broadcasts or NHK streaming.” Using streaming only, without installing a TV or other receiver, falls under a terrestrial contract.

On the contract unit for businesses, NHK’s document “Reception Contracts for NHK ONE Used by Businesses (Companies, Corporations, etc.)” gives examples for identifying places of installation. Example 1 is the case of “a hotel receiving the service on tuner-less TVs in guest rooms for its guests,” with a diagram of four guest rooms marked “required contracts = 4.” In other words, even a display without a broadcast tuner requires a contract per guest room if it is used to receive NHK streaming in the room. The same document explains that no separate contract or additional charge is needed if a reception contract already exists for the same place of installation, and that merely owning a smartphone or PC does not trigger the obligation — the service begins only after certain steps are taken on the website or app.

The official guidance we reviewed does not directly address display devices that do not receive streaming (such as screens used only for mirroring guests’ own devices). This is not a matter on which our editorial team should offer an interpretation; it is reasonable to build it into the business plan on the assumption that it will be confirmed individually with the NHK Fureai Center when room specifications are decided. The same document also notes copyright-law considerations when catch-up streaming or program-related information is used on TVs placed where many people gather, which adds another dimension to streaming use in lobbies and waiting areas.

Estimate (a) — Annual and Per-Room Amounts for 30, 100 and 200 Rooms

Now to quantify. The model assumes one TV in every guest room, every receiver on the premises contracted with the business discount applied, and payment by 12-month prepayment. Places of installation other than guest rooms (lobby, office, staff break room, etc.) each add one contract, but this article shows guest rooms only. The formula is “12-month prepayment for the first contract + (number of rooms − 1) × 12-month prepayment for subsequent contracts,” and the per room-night figure is divided back using 80% year-round occupancy (292 nights per room per year).

The key point in reading these results is that the per-room amount barely depends on size. The undiscounted first contract accounts for roughly 3% of the total at 30 rooms and less than 1% at 200 rooms, so the terrestrial figure moves only from ¥6,343 to ¥6,169 and satellite from ¥11,245 to ¥10,936. This item is not a fixed cost that benefits from economies of scale; it can be treated as a fixed cost almost proportional to room count.

Combining the bulk-contract discount with satellite contracts adds a further ¥300 per contract per month, or ¥3,600 per year. For 100 rooms that is ¥360,000 a year, bringing the post-business-discount total of ¥1,099,083 down to ¥739,083, or ¥7,391 per room. However, while the official guidance states that the two can be combined, it gives no numerical example of the order in which the prepayment discount and the monthly discount are calculated. The combined figure in this article is therefore an estimate that simply deducts ¥300 × 12 months, and the actual amount should be confirmed at the time of application.

For reference, paying by 2-month installments for a full year costs ¥13,200 for the first terrestrial contract and ¥6,600 for subsequent ones, and ¥23,400 and ¥11,700 for satellite — a 7.0% difference from 12-month prepayment. Because the business discount requires that “all contracts share the same payment period and are paid in a lump sum,” prepaying for all guest rooms together is the approach consistent with the scheme.

Estimate (b) — What Share of Rooms Revenue in Markets with Estimated Settled ADRs in the ¥6,000s, ¥10,000s and ¥20,000s?

A fixed cost is easier to put into a business plan as a ratio to the market’s revenue than as an absolute amount. We therefore selected three markets where MetroEngines Research’s estimated settled ADR (12-month average for October 2025–September 2026, city-level median) falls in the ¥6,000s, ¥10,000s and ¥20,000s, and compared the license fee against rooms revenue in a 100-room, 80%-occupancy model. Kagoshima City is ¥6,746 (71–73 properties per month), Kanazawa City ¥10,352 (112–118 properties per month), and Atami City ¥24,711 (100–108 properties per month). Rooms revenue is estimated settled ADR × 292 nights and excludes F&B and other revenue.

In a market like Kagoshima City, where the estimated settled ADR is below ¥7,000, the satellite license fee reaches 0.56% of rooms revenue: ¥37.6 per room-night accounts for 0.56% of an ADR of ¥6,746. In a ¥20,000-plus market like Atami City, it stays at 0.15% — the same ¥37.6 is diluted to one-3.7th the ratio because ADR is 3.7 times higher. Because the absolute license fee is uniform nationwide (except Okinawa), the difference in ratio is simply the difference in ADR. The lower the rate level of a market, the relatively larger the effect of choosing terrestrial or satellite contracts on rooms-department margins. The approach of dividing a per-room fixed-cost increase by ADR and comparing it across markets as a pass-through rate is also used in our estimate converting the 2026 minimum wage increase into the ADR pass-through required in each of the 47 prefectures.

Note, however, that 80% occupancy is a year-round model assumption. In the Japan Tourism Agency’s Overnight Travel Statistics Survey (宿泊旅行統計調査), annual figures for 2025 (January–December 2025) put guest room occupancy at 38.2% for ryokan and 75.3% for business hotels. Dividing back at ryokan-type occupancy raises the per room-night cost to about ¥44 for terrestrial and about ¥79 for satellite. When viewed as a share of revenue, too, the license fee weighs more heavily on lower-occupancy property types.

To check how much the occupancy assumption matters, we built a grid crossing the three markets’ estimated settled ADRs (12-month average for October 2025–September 2026) with five year-round occupancy levels and calculated the share of rooms revenue (Table 3b). All occupancy rates are hypothetical assumptions for this estimate. The heaviest combination is Kagoshima City, satellite, 40% year-round occupancy at 1.12%; the lightest is Atami City, terrestrial, 80% at 0.09%. The lower the rate and occupancy in a plan, the more sense it makes to carry this item as its own line in the business plan.

Estimate (c) — Impact on NOI Yield: How Many Basis Points at ¥15 Million and ¥30 Million Total Investment per Room?

The impact of a fixed cost on NOI yield is “annual cost per room ÷ total investment per room.” As a guide to total investment, dividing acquisition prices by room count in the holdings of seven listed hotel REITs tracked by MetroEngines Research (as of October 11, 2026; N=300 properties, 52,024 rooms) gives a range from ¥16.14 million per room at Ichigo Hotel REIT Investment Corporation (いちごホテルリート投資法人) to ¥73.42 million at MORI TRUST REIT, Inc. (森トラストリート投資法人), and ¥35.20 million for the seven combined. This article models two levels: ¥15 million per room, a figure often used for newly built limited-service hotels or acquisitions in regional cities, and ¥30 million, assuming an urban midscale property (for the distribution of REIT acquisition prices, period-end appraisal values and cap rates, see Hotel REIT Appraisals Hit 1.25x Cost: Cap Rates Across 298 Assets).

For a deal with a 5% NOI yield, the satellite contract’s 7.3bp equals 1.5% of the yield and the terrestrial contract’s 4.1bp equals 0.8%. Capitalized at a 5% cap rate, ¥6,199 per room per year is worth ¥124,000 and ¥10,991 is worth ¥220,000 — a value difference of ¥12.4 million and ¥22.0 million respectively for 100 rooms. This item will rarely move yield by more than 0.1pt during loan underwriting or due diligence, but because whether the discount is applied can double the annual amount, it is worth adding “are all guest rooms contracted and is the business discount applied?” to the checklist when acquiring an existing property.

Estimate (d) — Placing It in the Same Table as Previously Published Holding Costs

This article is part of HotelBank’s series on individual holding-cost items. Lining it up against the per-room annual amounts calculated in earlier articles shows where license fees sit.

Against fixed asset tax at ¥155,000–241,000 per room per year, water and sewer at ¥70,000–149,000 and electricity at ¥96,000, license fees at ¥6,199–10,991 are an order of magnitude smaller. In the same band are statutory inspections (¥3,400–12,600), business office tax (¥5,900–22,500) and waste disposal (¥9,811–24,937), all of which share the character of “small fixed costs for keeping a building lawful and operable.” The difference is that license fees are almost unaffected by location (except in Okinawa) and are determined solely by the choice of contract type and whether the discount is applied. Unlike water and sewer or waste disposal, which vary more than twofold between municipalities, this is an item that does not move with site selection but with room specifications and contract procedures.

Estimate (e) — Design Choices for New Builds, and How Much Guests Talk About TVs

When room specifications are being decided, license fees become a dependent variable of design choices. Taking four options for a 100-room model, the annual amount changes as follows.

The difference between A and B is ¥479,145 a year, or ¥16.4 per room-night. The difference between B and D is ¥607,662 a year, or ¥20.8 per night. Both fall within 0.1–0.3% of estimated settled ADR, not large enough to determine room specifications on license fees alone. It is more natural to center the decision on how guests value TVs. For another example of how new-build design choices move per-room costs, see our earlier estimate of energy-code compliance costs at ¥100,000–710,000 per room.

So we ran NLP analysis on 8,519,971 guest reviews compiled by the HotelBank Editorial Team over the most recent 24 months (October 2024–September 2026) and extracted mentions of “TV and video equipment.” Even among the top 50 properties with the most favorable TV mentions, there were only 2,684 mentions in 137,315 reviews, a mention rate of just 1.95%. Applying the same method to “bed and bedding comfort” gives 15,140 mentions in 220,549 reviews at the top 50 properties, a 6.86% mention rate — TVs come in at less than one-third of bedding. “Power outlets” scored 1,264 mentions in 137,603 reviews (0.92%) and “in-room Wi-Fi” 734 in 182,241 (0.40%), so TVs rank above these. Negative mentions at the top 50 properties totaled 1,545 in 148,273 reviews (1.04%).

There are two ways to read these numbers. First, TVs are a facility rarely mentioned in the guest experience, and whether one is installed affects overall ratings less than bedding or views. Second, when TVs are mentioned, what is praised is an environment where the TV can be used as a streaming device, as in “big screen” or “free streaming.” The latter ties directly to the post-October 2025 framework, under which devices receiving streaming are included in the reception contract unit. A design with large, streaming-capable screens may lead to better guest ratings, while the reception contracts still remain per room. The design choice is not a binary between “removing TVs to cut license fees” and “installing streaming-capable TVs to win ratings”; it fits the logic of a business plan better to treat it as part of product design — which experience to place in which room type.

The size distribution of properties is also a premise for design choices. Of the properties tracked by MetroEngines Research, 27,162 properties with 1,266,907 rooms are confirmed as operating (based on listings on major booking sites). Split by room-count band, properties with fewer than 30 rooms account for 17,479 properties (64.4%), while by room count, the 3,935 properties with 100 or more rooms hold 760,688 rooms (60.0%). The 30-room model’s annual ¥190,000–340,000 is typical of the small properties that make up over 60% of all properties, and the 100- and 200-room models are typical of the mid-to-large properties that account for 60% of the market by rooms.

Putting It into Practice — Three Lines for the Business Plan

Summing up, three lines in the business plan are enough. First, number of contracts = number of guest rooms with a TV or streaming-reception device + number of common-area places of installation. Second, annual amount = 12-month prepayment for the first contract + (number of contracts − 1) × half that amount, with a note on the possibility of combining the bulk discount if there are 10 or more satellite contracts. Third, the annual cost per room is about ¥6,200 for terrestrial and about ¥11,000 for satellite, with only a few percent difference by size.

When acquiring an existing property or designing master-lease terms, add the name on the reception contracts and the status of discount application to the checklist. Where the operator is the contracting party, this item appears as an operator-side SG&A expense, separate from the owner’s fixed asset tax. As with depreciable asset tax, stating explicitly in the contract who bears the cost reduces oversights at handover. Also, since streaming-reception devices have been included in the contract unit since October 2025, a renovation plan that replaces guest-room TVs with tuner-less models may not change the assumed number of contracts — a point worth building into the plan on the premise of confirming with NHK.

Summary — Treat License Fees as “a Small Fixed Cost Proportional to Room Count”

Under Article 64 of the Broadcast Act and the Reception Contract Terms, hotel license fees arise per guest room, and the business discount halves the fee from the second contract onward. In the 100-room model, terrestrial contracts cost ¥619,938 a year and satellite contracts ¥1,099,083 a year — ¥6,199 and ¥10,991 per room, or ¥21–38 per sold room-night. They account for 0.31–0.56% of rooms revenue in Kagoshima City (estimated settled ADR ¥6,746) and 0.09–0.15% in Atami City (¥24,711), and move NOI yield by 4.1–7.3bp at a total investment of ¥15 million per room and 2.1–3.7bp at ¥30 million. They are an order of magnitude smaller than fixed asset tax or water and sewer, in the same band as statutory inspections and business office tax. This is an item that moves not with location but with room specifications and contract procedures. While design decisions are best left to guest evaluation and product design, it is sensible to include it in the business plan from the outset as a fixed cost proportional to room count.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q. How many reception contracts does a hotel need for guest-room TVs?
A. According to NHK’s official guidance, business reception contracts are required for each place of installation (each room) of a receiver such as a TV or a streaming-reception device, and hotels and ryokan need a contract for each guest room. A room with a TV that also receives streaming counts as one contract.

Q. With the business discount, what is the annual cost per room?
A. On 12-month prepayment, terrestrial is ¥12,276 for the first contract and ¥6,138 for each subsequent one; satellite is ¥21,765 and ¥10,882. For 100 rooms this is about ¥6,200 per room for terrestrial and about ¥11,000 for satellite, with only a few percent difference by size.

Q. If I place TVs without a tuner in guest rooms, is a reception contract unnecessary?
A. NHK’s materials give the example that a per-room contract is required when NHK streaming is received on tuner-less TVs in guest rooms. The treatment of display devices that do not receive streaming is not covered in the official guidance we reviewed, and we recommend confirming individually with the NHK Fureai Center.

Q. Roughly what percentage of rooms revenue do license fees represent?
A. In a 100-room, 80%-occupancy model, they are 0.31–0.56% in Kagoshima City (estimated settled ADR ¥6,746), 0.21–0.36% in Kanazawa City (¥10,352) and 0.09–0.15% in Atami City (¥24,711).

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