Many libraries and publishers negotiate agreements so that a researcher does not have to pay an article processing charge to get the final version of their work published Open Access.
June 15, 2022
Copenhagen
The agreements include transformative agreements, also referred to as transitional or Read & Publish agreements, as well as institutional agreements. This guide refers to all types of agreements as open access agreements.
But how can you know about the possibility of an agreement? Before submitting, authors can, for instance, use the Journal Checker Tool to see if there’s an agreement in place and if it’s funder compliant. At the American Chemical Society (ACS), authors can use the ACS ChronosHub Journal Finder to find all relevant information.
These steps are important in the journey toward a more 'open' world – still, a lot of articles are being published in closed access when they, ideally, should have been published OA. Why? Sometimes an author’s not aware of an OA agreement, the publisher’s workflow didn’t recognize the author, it’s not the right article type, the author didn’t choose the OA option, or maybe the journal is no longer included in the agreement.
It's important to be aware of these aspects and have the right tools and information at hand to make sure that you’re not missing out on an agreement that could potentially help you on your Open Access publishing journey.
Just like Open Access journal types and licenses, there is a variety of Open Access agreements to consider!
Usually, the agreements cover article processing charges, in full or partially, on behalf of the authors.
To create these agreements, the publisher and institution negotiate what is included, and this will normally include a subscription fee to access paywalled content, but also some Open Access publishing for researchers from that institution for free.
Open Access agreements can also include institutional membership and country waivers and discounts, and these allow authors to publish for a lower cost.
The type of agreement is negotiated by the author’s affiliated institution and sometimes their funder. Currently, we are seeing agreements negotiated at a national level, which allow all authors from a certain country to publish for free.
There can be a lot of variety within the agreements themselves, depending on what the institution negotiated with the funder. It is important to be aware that some agreements cover all publishing whereas others are limited to a quota (max number of articles per year) and some agreements will only cover certain article and journal types, such as hybrid journals.
Most agreements focus on hybrid journals, and these journals publish a combination of Open Access articles and subscription articles. The agreements for hybrid journals ensure that the institutions are not paying twice for an article, once for the subscription and then for Open Access publication, also known as ‘double dipping’.
The end goal is to increase Open Access output, making research widely available for researchers and readers! Now, more and more ‘read and publish’ type agreements are being signed. A direct result of the Open Access agreements is a positive impact on Open Access output, as the number of Open Access articles has steadily increased since the introduction of these agreements in 2018.
There can be a lot of variety within the agreements themselves, depending on what the institution negotiated with the funder. It is important to be aware that some agreements cover all publishing whereas others are limited to a quota (max number of articles per year) and some agreements will only cover certain article and journal types, such as hybrid journals.
We’ll look at an agreement recently signed between the Danish Royal Library and Wiley to get our heads around how agreements work. The agreement covers Danish universities and a list of other research institutions and is valid until the end of December 2025.
Interestingly, this specific agreement is that it does not cover unlimited open access publishing. There is a cap on the number of articles per year (1,100) that can be published without article processing charges. Any articles published after the quota is used up will be entitled to a 15% discount. The agreement only applies to hybrid journals, almost all the Wiley journals, and to original research and review articles. The CC BY license is preferred, but exceptions are allowed.
The Royal Danish Library and Wiley provide instructions for authors going through the process. It is always worth checking with your institutional library about the agreements they currently manage and double-check with the publisher’s website for more detailed instructions. Both the library and the publisher should have information about the agreement you can access.
A lot of the time, open access agreements are based around the corresponding author role, and this is something to pay extra attention to when going through the publication process.
The corresponding author is the main contact with the publisher if more than one author is working on an article. They are the author who receives email updates about the article’s process during the peer review and production process, the peer review decision on the article, the production proofs to check, and they are responsible for the payment of the article processing charge.
They are usually the author who will trigger a discount or waiver, or agreement recognition, as in most cases the publisher will recognize this author’s affiliation. Therefore, before submitting an article it is worth considering who the corresponding author will be to get free or discounted open access publishing.