Licensing: CCLI & TONO
One honest line: Sunday Suite helps you keep licence information in order, but the responsibility for correct reporting to TONO and CCLI always stays with the church. The tools make it easier — they don't take over the obligation.
Most churches sing and stream songs that are protected by copyright, and cover this through licences — internationally often CCLI, and in Norway and the Nordics through TONO. Sunday Suite is built with both in mind from day one, with TONO as a first-class citizen rather than an afterthought.
What Sunday Suite is designed to keep track of
Across the suite's data models, your church's licence information is designed in as proper, first-class fields: TONO customer ID and licence status, your denomination, and your CCLI licence number. The goal is that the suite always knows whether your licences are in order — instead of the numbers living in someone's old email.
Where the numbers will live
The licence fields have their home in SundayPlan, the suite's planning tool — which is still on the drawing board. Until it opens, keep your TONO customer ID and CCLI licence number somewhere safe (they're on your agreements or invoices), and know that a first-class home for them is part of the plan.
Why TONO matters — and why we emphasise it
The big international church tools are built around American CCLI, and TONO — which is what actually applies for Norwegian rights holders — is usually missing entirely. Sunday Suite is designed the other way around: TONO fields from the first row of the database, including the distinction between songs used in the room and songs that were streamed, which TONO treats as a separate royalty pool.
What works today, and what is coming
The first piece has shipped. The SundayStage beta keeps a song usage log, and it writes itself: every song that actually reached the congregation screen is recorded — a song that was only previewed, or that sat in the plan without being shown, does not count, and neither does a quick flick past. The rehearsal and the service on the same day share one row; next Sunday gets its own.
Each row is a snapshot: title, CCLI number, TONO id, copyright and author are copied in, so a January report can still be sent in April even if the song was deleted in February. A separate Missing column names what the row does not know, so you can see what needs filling in before you submit. Export it as CSV for the period you need, under Settings → Advanced. The log is local, you can delete it yourself, and it clears automatically after two years.
Still ahead: the same automatic logging across the rest of the suite, and the licence numbers themselves living in SundaySong and SundayPlan. If licensing is what your church needs most, say so: [email protected].