Terms of Service

1.The service

The service provides journal management and publishing tools: Submission Desk, Reviewer Match, AI Integrity Check, Editorial Board, Production Line, Journal Site and Citation Stats. Which tools a journal can use depends on its plan.

2.Accounts

The person who signs up for a journal becomes its first administrator and is responsible for the people they invite. Keep sign-in details private and tell us promptly if you believe an account has been misused.

3.The journal's responsibilities

• Setting and applying its own editorial, ethics and peer review policies.
• Making every editorial decision, including desk decisions, reviewer choices and final decisions.
• Holding the rights or permissions needed to publish the content it publishes.
• Telling authors and reviewers how their data is used in its editorial process.

4.AI-assisted tools

AI Integrity Check and Reviewer Match produce reports and suggestions to support editors. They can be wrong or incomplete. A flag is not proof of misconduct and must not be treated as one. AI-text indicators are uncertain signals and must not be the sole basis for rejecting a manuscript.

Journals agree to investigate flags under their own policies and recognised guidance, such as that of COPE, before taking action against an author.

5.Content ownership

Journals and authors keep all rights in the manuscripts, reviews and articles they provide. The journal grants us the limited permission needed to host, process, check, typeset and publish that content as the journal directs. We do not use unpublished manuscripts to train AI models.

6.Acceptable use

• Do not use the service to publish content that infringes others' rights or that you know to be fabricated or plagiarised.
• Do not attempt to access manuscripts, reviews or identities your role does not allow.
• Do not interfere with the security or operation of the service.
• Do not run paper mills, fake peer review or citation manipulation schemes through the service.

7.Plans, fees and the free allowance

Each new journal receives its first 50 submissions free. After that, fees follow the journal's plan: per submission, billed monthly in arrears, or as a yearly bundle paid in advance. Prices are listed on the Our Plans page in US dollars and exclude applicable taxes. DOI registration fees are passed through at cost.

8.Availability and support

We aim to keep the service available at all times and schedule maintenance outside common working hours where possible. Support levels depend on the plan, as listed on the Our Plans page.

9.Ending the service

A journal can close its account at any time. Before closing, administrators can export manuscripts, reviews, metadata and published articles. Published articles with registered DOIs can be moved to a new host, and we will help redirect existing article URLs.

We may suspend an account that seriously breaches these terms, after notice where the breach can be fixed.

10.Liability

The service is provided with reasonable skill and care. To the extent the law allows, our total liability in any 12-month period is limited to the fees the journal paid in that period, and we are not liable for indirect or consequential loss.

11.Changes to these terms

We will notify journal administrators by email at least 30 days before a material change takes effect. Continuing to use the service after that date means accepting the revised terms.