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Open Access requirement

The Wellcome Trust grant conditions stipulate that papers accepted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal, that are funded wholly or partially by a Wellcome Trust grant, must be made freely available online through PubMed Central and Europe PubMed Central as soon as possible, and at any event within six months of publication. The policy does not apply to book chapters, editorials, reviews or conference proceedings.

Compliant journals

Papers funded by the Wellcome Trust must be submitted to journals with Wellcome Trust-compliant publishing policies. Authors should ensure that the journal to which they plan to submit has an Open Access option that is compliant with their funder’s policy. SHERPA/FACT and SHERPA/ROMEO contain information about publishers’ compliance with the Wellcome Trust policy, but it is advisable to check the journal’s webpages, too. A publisher’s paid Open Access option is only compliant with the Wellcome Trust’s policy if the publisher undertakes to deposit the article in Europe PubMed Central on behalf of the author.

Publishers’ policies concerning paid Open Access, licences (including the mandated CC BY licence for Wellcome Trust authors) and self-deposit in Europe PubMed Central can be confusing. Please contact open-access-funding@ucl.ac.uk if you need assistance.

Methods of complying

If a journal offers a Gold (author pays) option that is sanctioned by the Wellcome Trust, authors should choose this option. If the journal does not have an author pays option, or its author pays arrangements do not meet the requirements of the Trust, the author can still comply if the journal allows self-deposit of the author’s final version in Europe PMC within six months of publication. Some publishers deposit in Europe PMC without charge; there is more information in SHERPA/FACT and SHERPA/ROMEO.

Gold Open Access (author pays)

When a Wellcome-funded article is accepted in a journal with a Gold (paid) Open Access option, the publisher will normally invite the corresponding author to select this publication route. To do so, you will usually need to complete the publisher’s paid Open Access request form.

Unless UCL has an Open Access membership arrangement with your publisher (see below), the publisher will ask for a billing address or credit card details, and other financial information. See the FAQs for help with this.

Open Access fees (article processing charges) can be paid from UCL’s Wellcome Open Access funds. Other publication costs, such as page and colour charges, are not covered. See the FAQs for more information.

Payment

UCL Library Services will pay invoices directly, and handle all payment administration on your behalf.

UCL has special arrangements with certain publishers for administering and paying article processing charges (APCs). These publisher schemes provide discounts on APCs. In most cases, they involve payment from prepaid funds held by the publisher on UCL’s behalf, with no invoicing, making the payment process simpler and quicker. Please check UCL’s Open Access membership schemes to see whether your publisher is one of those with which UCL has a membership, and follow the appropriate guidelines. In most cases you will not need to complete UCL’s Open Access submission procedure.

If payment is by invoice, when you receive the invoice, claim funds using UCL’s Open Access submission procedure. See the FAQs for more information about the payment process, and about checking that the article is made Open Access afterwards.

Where invoices need to be paid swiftly to avoid publication or Open Access delays, authors can pay on a departmental credit card and request reimbursement from UCL Library Services. See the Open Access FAQs for more information.

Last modified 25 April 2013