Skip to Main Content

Subject guides

Open Access: Article Processing Charges (APCs)

A guide to Open Access at the University of Huddersfield

What is an Article Processing Charge (APC)?

An APC is the fee charged by a publisher for making an article Open Access at the time of publication

  • Such fees are usually charged per article
  • The cost of APC fees may be included in research grants
  • In some circumstances your School may pay for an APC
  • Very few academic authors will pay APCs themselves

A BPC (Book Processing Charge) relates to Open Access books

How do I request payment from the UKRI/RCUK block grant?

  • Complete the article process charge request form (opens in Word) 
  • Send the completed form to the Open Access Manager via oa@hud.ac.uk
  • Important: Wait for a notification that the request has been approved before signing any publisher agreements
  • Please note: Only once approval has been granted, should authors request invoices.
  • Approved applicants will be informed where to send invoices.

University of Huddersfield UKRI OA Block Grant

Research, Innovation and Knowledge Exchange manage the processing of APC payments for the Research Council’s block grant to support Gold Open Access compliancy for Research Council funded project outputs.

For UKRI funded articles, please will authors notify the Pure Team in R&E of a request for an APC at the point of article acceptance (not submission) to check if UKRI OA Block Grant funds are available and the journal is funder-compliant. Please send details of the article and the grant ID to oa@hud.ac.uk.

Please note : Article processing charges only apply to authors who are affiliated to the University of Huddersfield. 

Further information can be found here Research Councils Open Access Block Grant - University of Huddersfield

What this means for academics

For UKRI funded research, authors should contact oa@hud.ac.uk at the point at which their article is accepted for publication. The team will then advise on the route to comply with the mandate, and make any payments where applicable from the UKRI block grant.

For non UKRI funded research, authors should deposit the final author manuscript in Pure at the point at which it is accepted for publication, or not later than 3 months after this date.

For non UKRI funded research that the author wishes to publish in a journal that only has a Gold Open Access option, or it is felt there is a benefit from publishing as Gold Open Access, they should apply to their School for payment.  Schools will need to have a process in place to approve or reject such requests, and if rejected authors will need to find an alternative publication route, such as Green Open Access.

APCs at the University of Huddersfield

Please check with the School Director of Research whether there are guidelines on APC payment in your School or department.

The Library may have access to APC discounts, which are not available to individuals. Please try our new Journal search tool to identify journals that allow you to publish your articles Open Access without requiring further payment

Please contact the Library Subscriptions and Access Team on openaccess@hud.ac.uk if you have any queries about articles that will be sent to these publishers