Frequently asked
questions

Yes. Serbia offers a 20% cash rebate on commercials and TVCs, with a minimum qualifying spend of €150,000. Serbia is the only one of our three core jurisdictions whose incentive covers advertising work — Romania and Hungary cover feature, episodic and documentary formats only, not commercials. (Montenegro, handled by the same team, runs its own 25% rebate on feature, TV and documentary work, not commercials.) Family Film is the exclusive PSN partner in Serbia and files the full rebate application for you.

For commercials, Serbia is the only one of Romania, Hungary and Serbia & Montenegro that offers a rebate, at 20% cash back on qualifying spend above a €150,000 minimum. Crew day rates also run roughly 25–35% of UK equivalents before the rebate, so the cost base and the incentive compound. A €500k commercial shot in the UK typically lands near €234k net when produced in Serbia.

Family Film is the exclusive Production Service Network (PSN) partner for Romania. There is no competing PSN company in Romania. Family Film is also the exclusive PSN partner for Serbia. PSN is the global vetting standard that major studios and agencies use to qualify production service companies abroad.

Local crew, equipment and services in Romania, Hungary and Serbia typically cost 30–60% less than UK or German equivalents before any incentive. The up-to-37.5% cash rebate then compounds that saving rather than replacing it. In practice a production budgeted at €2M in Western Europe usually reaches the same on-screen value for under €1M net of rebate in Eastern Europe.

Family Film operates from three offices — Bucharest (Romania), Budapest (Hungary) and Belgrade (Serbia) — and produces across Eastern Europe: Romania, Hungary and Serbia & Montenegro as core jurisdictions, plus partner companies in Georgia and Azerbaijan. One contact and one production company handle crew, permits and incentive filing across all of them, so producers do not need separate local partners in each country.

No. Romania's 30% cash rebate covers feature films, documentaries, animations and short films, but not commercials or TV adverts. Among Family Film's three core jurisdictions, only Serbia's incentive covers commercials. Producers wanting a rebate on a commercial should shoot in Serbia.

A production service company (PSC) is a local production partner that handles all below-the-line operations for international productions shooting in another country. When a UK or US producer wants to shoot in Romania, they hire a PSC like Family Film to manage crew, locations, permits, equipment, casting, and incentive filing. You provide the creative direction; we provide everything it takes to put the camera on set.

You handle: director, DOP, agency team, client liaison, and the creative. We handle: line producing, location scouting and permits, full local crew, equipment sourcing, casting, accommodation and transport logistics, catering, on-set production management, dailies workflow, and tax incentive application. We can also advise on the best country for your budget and format.

We have produced projects ranging from a €150k TVC with a 15-person crew to multi-million international co-productions with crews of 80+. We have no minimum budget requirement. For very small productions we operate a lean model; for large-scale productions we bring in additional coordination and production management resources.

We commit to a preliminary response within 24 hours of receiving a brief: feasibility, recommended country, and first-look budget shape. A full budget and schedule takes 5 business days. Location scouts can begin within 2 days of brief approval.

Yes. We have managed multi-country productions shooting across Romania and Serbia & Montenegro in a single schedule. Our three-office structure, plus partner companies in Georgia and Azerbaijan, means a single brief to us can cover multiple Eastern European territories without you needing separate PSC relationships in each country.

Romania offers a 30% cash rebate on qualifying Romanian expenditure. Eligible spend includes local crew wages, local equipment rental, accommodation, catering, and set construction. The production must pass a cultural points test administered by the Romanian Film Centre (CNC). We handle the entire application: registration, cultural test, quarterly expenditure reporting, and the final subsidy request. The cash is paid directly to the production entity registered in Romania.

The minimum qualifying expenditure in Romania is €15,000 for short films and €100,000 for feature films, documentaries, and animations. These are minimums for total qualifying Romanian spend, not the total production budget. A production with a €2M total budget of which €200k is spent in Romania would qualify on the Romanian-spend threshold.

Romania's incentive covers feature films, documentaries, animations, and short films. Commercials are not eligible under Romania's scheme. Of our three core jurisdictions, only Serbia's incentive covers commercials.

Hungary rebates 30% of qualifying spend, and up to 25% of that qualifying spend can be non-Hungarian (above-the-line and other foreign costs) — which lifts the effective rebate to up to 37.5% of your Hungarian spend. Feature films, TV films and series, documentaries and short films qualify; 50% of non-Hungarian cast and crew costs taxable in Hungary also count as Hungarian spend. There is no stated cap and the scheme is extended through 2030.

Both Romania and Serbia require productions to earn a minimum number of "cultural points" to qualify for the rebate. Points are earned for factors including: story set in Romania, Romanian language, Romanian historical or cultural content, use of Romanian cast, use of Romanian crew, and post-production in Romania. We assess your production against the test criteria before you commit to a country.

Processing time varies by country and application volume at the relevant authority. We file the application as soon as the production closes its final expenditure, and we follow up with the relevant authority on your behalf. Contact us for current processing timelines: they change and we track them closely.

A Romanian-registered production entity is required to receive the rebate. We can advise on the most efficient structure: some international productions register a Romanian LLC specifically for the production, others use an existing European entity. We work with local tax advisors on these questions and can make introductions.

A tax rebate (used by Romania, Hungary and Serbia) is a cash payment from the state directly to the production. It is not conditional on having a Romanian tax liability. A tax credit offsets tax owed instead. The rebate model is more straightforward for foreign productions with no local tax history, which is why Eastern Europe is attractive versus some other incentive regimes.

For a standard brief with clear visual references, we can deliver an initial location options package (photographs, basic logistics assessment, permit complexity) within 48 hours of brief approval. Full recce with shortlisted locations and on-the-ground access typically takes 3–5 days.

Romania has an exceptional range: pre-war European architecture in Bucharest's 1st District doubles for Paris, Vienna, and London interiors; the Saxon villages of Transylvania pass for medieval German and English countryside; the Black Sea coast doubles for Mediterranean resort settings; and the Carpathian mountains cover alpine and rugged wilderness looks. Bucharest's Communist-era districts are increasingly in demand for Cold War and Eastern Bloc settings.

Yes. We hold the necessary relationships with Romanian, Hungarian, and Serbian civil aviation authorities to obtain drone permits efficiently. All our aerial operators are EASA-certified. Permits typically take 5–7 working days; we can sometimes expedite for tight schedules.

Family Film holds exclusive Production Service Network (PSN) membership for Romania and Serbia. PSN is the global standard for vetted PSCs: membership requires passing a rigorous assessment of crew networks, financial stability, production track record, and infrastructure. International studios and agencies that specify PSN partners use it as their primary quality filter. There is no competing PSN company in either Romania or Serbia.