Due to the various institutional subscriptions we have with academic publishers, several offsetting deals are now available to OU researchers who wish to publish Gold Open Access (where the final journal article is immediately freely available to read and download on the publisher website). Offsetting deals are exploratory models in the shift from paying to read (the journal subscription) to paying to publish.
The three largest deals we currently have in place are with Springer, Sage and Wiley. However, there are many other publishers that offer reduced or waived article processing charges (APCs). Have a look at the Library Research Support Team’s webpages for full details, to see if you could benefit.
The deal we have in place with Sage now allows any article in one of their hybrid journals which was accepted for publication on or after 1st January 2020 to be made Gold Open Access at no cost. This deal applies to the corresponding author on the paper. Some researchers will have already received an email from the publisher asking them if they would like to take advantage of this deal, so keep an eye on your inbox as you need to reply within 5 days. If you publish in one of Sage’s fully open access journals you can receive a 20% discount on the APCs.
The deal we have with Wiley applies to both their hybrid and fully open access journals and covers original research and review articles. To benefit from this deal, you need to be the corresponding author and must indicate your affiliation with the OU’s Wiley Open Access Account in the payment question during manuscript submission. Please note that the Wiley Open Access Account cannot be used to cover page charges. There is a cap on the number of publications that are covered by this deal, so we are operating it on a first come, first served basis.
The deal we have with Springer applies to original papers, review papers, brief communications or continuing education published in a Springer Open Choice journal. Again, you have to be the corresponding author and a researcher affiliated to the OU.
It’s a good idea to keep up to date with these publishing agreements via our web pages, as new deals are being negotiated all the time and they can change at short notice.
Please note that the Open University has a preference for a CC BY license to be applied to any outputs that are published under these negotiated deals, in order to maximise possibilities for re-use.
If you have any questions, please get in touch: library-research-support@open.ac.uk