Article Processing Charges

An article processing charge (APC) is a fee paid to the publisher to make an article immediately available and openly accessible.  

Under the Gold open access model, APCs are paid to cover open access (OA) publishing costs. APCs support the publisher's business model where the cost of publication is moved from the reader (via subscriptions) to the author (via the APC). 

Do I need to pay an APC? 

The University of Queensland has several Read and Publish Agreements with publishers that may provide UQ corresponding authors with a pre-paid APC or discount on APCs.  

You can avoid paying any APCs by making the author accepted manuscript available via UQ eSpace, under the Green open access model.

Choosing Green OA will satisfy the mandates for open access as required by the Australian Research Council (ARC) and will result in your research being openly available, after any embargo periods, for the broader community. 

Note that some funders, e.g. NHMRC, require a rights retention strategy for Green OA to comply with immediate open access requirements. 

Before paying APCs 

 Before paying an APC, check:

  1. The publisher or journal is reputable. Authors should carefully evaluate the scholarly credibility of journals before submitting an article for publication. Unethical publishers can take advantage of authors with deceptive practices such as hidden fees, fake peer review, and aggressive marketing tactics.
  2. The publisher provides clear information about the application of APCs, including outlining expected costs and payment measures. 
  3. The journal is a fully (Gold) open access title to avoid supporting "double-dipping" by publishers receiving subscriptions from the University and charging authors for publishing. 
  4. The copyright and licensing options. Open access materials will generally carry a Creative Commons (CC) licence, and ideally you should be able to select the type of CC licence and retain the copyright for the material.
  5. Your funder policy regarding allocating some of your grant to cover APC costs. 
  6. If the publisher offers a discount you may be eligible for.

Journal considerations

Review some standard considerations, when choosing a journal to publish in, to help you decide whether to pay APCs.

Is the journal indexed in well-known scholarly databases?

You can check for journal titles in databases like Ulrichsweb, Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), Scopus and Web of Science.

Does the journal have robust peer review processes? 

Conducting simple checks before you pay can save your money and your reputation, if the journal is not credible.

Contact the Librarian Team for advice.