What we do

PLS’ services and resources

Publishers’ Licensing Services (PLS) provides UK and international publishers with valuable collective licensing services. Our other services include support for their rights management and permissions. We were set up by publishers, for publishers, and are proud to have served the industry for more than four decades.

Collective licensing

PLS’ core purpose is to oversee collective licensing for the reuse of extracts of book, journal, magazine and website content across the public and private sectors. More than 4,000 publishers trust us to manage their collective licensing and ensure they receive the money they are entitled to when someone copies or otherwise reuses extracts of their content. Each year our convenient and efficient service distributes nearly £40m a year to publishers. Read how collective licensing works.

Help with permissions

Beyond collective licensing, we provide a range of rights management services including PLSclear, our award-winning tool to request and grant permission to use extracts of content, and promote the value of copyright and UK publishers’ world-class contributions. Read about our permissions services.

Rights management resources

We also provide extensive resources to help publishers improve the ways they manage the rights that they hold. A free online training course, professional guidance, case studies, career tips and much more are available at the Rights & Licensing Hub.

Access to Research

Our Access to Research service provides free and easy access to millions of academic articles via the UK’s public library network. It makes it easy for anyone to read publicly-funded research, and helps publishers share content with researchers, students and others who might benefit from it. Read about the Access to Research service.

Learn more and register

Take a look around our website to discover how we can help your business. If you like what you see, it’s quick and free to register with PLS for collective licensing, and easy to access our permissions and rights management support.