Jisc Collections, as the centralised negotiation and licensing service for UK higher and further education, provides publishers an efficient, cost-effective way to offer digital content to the academic and research communities.
Our service saves publishers time and effort, allowing more time to build relationships with librarians and users regarding content and resources.
All UK publicly funded higher education institutions are automatically members of Jisc Collections and are eligible to subscribe to the agreements we negotiate for them. Our expertise in negotiation and licensing means institutions can be confident that the terms and conditions of our agreements meet their requirements and can subscribe to your offer without delay.
We also serve as an entry route for new publishers and markets, and for establishing new products. If you are new to us, or would like an overview of how we benefit publishers, our Publisher Engagement Summary and Collections Management Development Policy outline our work with publishers, our content selection and our agreement processes. Publishers also have an access route to provide offers to our affiliate members, which are listed on our banding page.
We apply Jisc Model Licences to all agreements. The model was developed with publishers and provides our members with the assurance that the terms and conditions will meet their requirements. The model licence also details the general responsibilities of the publisher including:
The terms and conditions associated with transformative open access agreements are details in our requirements and reiterated in the final license agreement with the publisher.
Once the publisher agreement is finalised, it is made available via our licence subscriptions manager service.
The Jisc Model Licences are developed in collaboration with publishers and institutions to provide security on how content is accessed and used. We are responsible for informing institutions about any changes to the licences as agreed and after negotiation with the publisher.
For journal agreements, we often apply a contract and licence model where the contractual agreement is between a publisher and each institution signing up to one of our agreements. Institutions are required to sign only the Jisc Collections Licence.
Pricing for institutions is based on the Jisc Banding Model.
We work with publishers to implement a range of industry standards to support the promotion, management, preservation, access and use of e-resources. These standards are drafted and regularly updated in consultation with UK further and higher education libraries and international standards organisations. The standards, and information on the standards, are listed as a responsibility of the publisher within the Jisc Model Licences.
Our transnational education (TNE) licensing service provides an efficient way of managing the licensing of your resource to students overseas. The service reduces duplication of effort and minimises the time spend on negotiation. Please contact our helpdesk for further guidance.
We are negotiating to put in place transitional open access agreements with publishers and societies to ensure that researchers can continue to publish in hybrid journals and that the costs to institutions, of both publishing and reading, are affordable and controlled.
Our requirements for transitional agreements are informed by analysis of previous offsetting agreements and have been endorsed by our strategic groups, SCONUL, RLUK and UK universities. Publishers must meet these requirements for an agreement to be deemed transitional. Our Transitional agreements oversight group has been set up to monitor the progress and impact of these agreements.
There are currently several different models for transitional agreements. In our negotiations we work with publishers to determine the most suitable model for their agreement.
The Wellcome Trust and UKRI have issued guidance stating that UK institutions, in receipt of their block grants, may use these funds to contribute to the "publish" element of transitional agreements that fulfil our requirements up front. The cost charged to a block grant must be based on the institution's previous APC spend or funded article output.
This list includes models currently in use or in development. Our aim is to explore with publishers how these models can be applied to ensure a sustainable way to achieve full and immediate open access. Please see the options at the bottom of this page for more information
Transformative agreements (see 1-3)
At their most basic, transformative open access agreements should move funds previously paid for subscriptions to pay for OA publishing.
Other transitional models (see 4-5)
Several other models seek to make content openly available without moving the burden of payment to the "authors" or content creators.
Other compliant models (see 6-8)
Transformative agreements or other transitional models may not work for all publishers or be affordable for institutions. Other options allow for compliance with UK funder policies from January 2021.