What happens to a book you funded, what your research office gets from us, and what we will and will not accept in exchange for support.
Compliance, Confirmed in Writing
We publish the version of record openly on the day of publication, under a Creative Commons licence, with no embargo of any length. That satisfies the strictest open-access condition in force for long-form outputs rather than the most lenient, which means a book published with us complies with UKRI, Wellcome, Horizon Europe and ERC requirements, and with funders whose terms are equivalent, without a repository workaround, an accepted-manuscript deposit, or an embargo to track.
Before an author signs, we read the terms of their specific award and confirm compliance in writing. Where a funder's terms are unusual, we would rather hear about it at proposal stage than at publication.
The REF 2029 open-access policy applies to journal articles and conference contributions with an ISSN. It does not apply to monographs, book chapters or scholarly editions. The REF's initial decisions provide for a long-form requirement in the exercise after REF 2029, implemented from 1 January 2029.
Reporting and Metadata
We register and supply metadata in the forms research offices and reporting systems use.
- Funder and grant identifiers registered through Crossref's Open Funder Registry, so the output appears against the award without anyone chasing the author for a reference number.
- ORCID iDs for every author, editor and contributor.
- ROR identifiers for institutional affiliations.
- DOIs at book and chapter level, registered with Crossref.
- Open ONIX metadata for import into your CRIS or repository.
- Usage reports twice a year for the life of the book (downloads and views by format, chapter-level breakdown, geographic distribution) on a COUNTER-conformant basis where applicable.
Formal quotations, VAT documentation and compliance statements are supplied to finance and research offices.
Working with Institutional Open-Access Funds
Many universities hold central open-access funds, block grants or library publishing budgets that cover books. Where such a fund is in place:
- We invoice the institution directly, in any currency.
- A charge can be split across more than one payer, which is common for edited volumes where contributors hold different awards.
- We invoice on acceptance of the complete manuscript rather than at contract.
Supporting a Subject Area or a Series
We are open to funders and institutions supporting a series, a subject area, or a defined number of titles, particularly in fields where open-access book publishing is least developed and where the readers who most need the work are least able to buy it.
The terms on which we would do that are short and non-negotiable:
- No editorial conditions. Support may not carry any influence over which books are published, who reviews them, or what they conclude. The Advisory Board decides, and it is not told who paid.
- Full disclosure. Any subvention supporting a book is stated in the book.
- No right of review before publication. A funder does not see a manuscript before its readers do.
- No exclusivity over the subject. Supporting a series does not buy the right to be the only voice in it.
Why we are inflexible about this
A press whose funders can shape its list is not a press, and every author it publishes carries that doubt into every citation. The value of the imprint to the people we publish depends on it being obviously impossible for us to be bought, which means declining money that comes with conditions, and saying publicly that we do.
What the Evidence Looks Like
If you fund research, the argument for funding its open publication is the reach. Springer Nature's 2017 comparison of its own open and non-open books found open titles received roughly seven times more chapter downloads in the first year, 50 per cent more citations over four years, and ten times more online mentions over three. It is publisher-produced and correlational, and we say so wherever we cite it; the effect is nonetheless large and consistent with findings elsewhere.
The geographic breakdown in the usage reports shows where a book is read, including countries whose libraries would not have bought a closed edition.
Talk to Us
Research offices, library open-access teams, funding bodies and institutions considering supporting a list: queries@bassi.foundation.