How licences benefit people within an organisation

For students, a licence facilitates easy access to a wide range of high-quality education material.

For teachers and lecturers, it avoids the need to go through what would otherwise be a complex process of obtaining permission to re-use material beyond the 3% limit in the Copyright Act for non-commercial education providers (commercial PTEs are not within the scope of 3% limit): understanding the 3% education exception, knowing whether the material they wish to use is covered by copyright, identifying the rightsholder for each work, being able to contact and obtain permission from the rightsholder in a timely fashion before the material is needed, paying any usage fee charged by the rightsholder, complying with conditions stipulated by the rightsholder, and ensuring that these are communicated to students, and recording these permissions and conditions in a suitable location, renewing permission as needed and removing material as needed where permission cannot be obtained, and finding alternatives where the rightsholder cannot be contacted or their permission is not given.

For staff at non-education organisations and attendees of services at church and non-profit religious organisations, the licence provides easy access to a wide range of copyright material without first needing to obtain permission from each rightsholder.

For managers, it provides a low-cost solution to otherwise complex compliance problems, including being indemnified against legal action by owners of material included in the licence. Licenceholders also have access to free copyright education material and our helpdesk.

For everyone, licence fees fund authors and publishers, including many teaching staff to continue to produce resources and materials needed to help to teach students.