Prices and billing

Research Services is a revenue-funded company, meaning that we charge for the time spent providing our services.

This means that we must recover the costs of the services we provide. For public institutions, some of these services are covered by the Coordinating Body for Registry Research, but the rest must be paid by the individual research institution applying to access data for research projects.

Research Services charges for both time spent processing an application and time spent afterwards on advising, updating data, and similar services. That is, you will also be billed for advice and guidance provided to you once you have obtained data access. This also applies if you contact us after the data delivery for your project has been completed.

The project will be billed at the end of each month. If the invoice comprises several projects, the invoice will detail the number of hours spent on each project. The invoice will include payment for the time Research Services has spent on your project during the month. Depending on the project, this will include the following:

  • Processing of application
  • Programming of access to data on The Secure Research Platform
  • Extraction/programming of data for delivery to another data processing site
  • Advising and support for inquiries to Research Services after the data delivery
  • Updating of data and changes to data access
  • Fees for projects on The Secure Research Platform

Prices for data on The Secure Research Platform

The price of a project on The Secure Research Platform covers, among other things, time spent processing your application, advising, and programming your project. In addition, there are ongoing costs charged for active users, disk usage, and Stata license, if applicable.

Research Services charges for all time spent on your project. That is, we also invoice any advice that takes place once your project has been set up. If you wish to make changes to an ongoing project, you will be invoiced for time spent implementing the changes.

Before your project is programmed, we will enter an 'Agreement on data access'. This agreement will contain an estimate of how many hours we plan to use on the processing of your application and the programming of your data access. Please note that this is an estimate. We will continually record hours during the application process. If the task turns out to be significantly larger than the estimate given, we will contact you again. 

Unless otherwise agreed, billing will be made to the authorised research environment. Billing occurs on a monthly basis at the current hourly rate. The invoice will state the number of hours spent on each project. It is possible to link different payers to projects under the same authorisation. However, billing of user fees and disk usage on The Secure Research Platform will be continuously invoiced to the authorised research environment.

Prices for delivery to other data processing sites 

The price of having data delivered to another data processing site covers time spent processing your application, advising, and programming your extraction. Research Services charges for all time spent on your project, meaning that we also invoice for any advice given after the data has been delivered.

Before your extraction is programmed, you will receive a data access agreement. This will contain an estimate of how many hours we plan to use on the processing of your application and the programming of your data access. Please note that this is an estimate. We will continually record hours during the application process. If the task turns out to be significantly larger than the estimate given, we will contact you again.

Billing occurs monthly at the current hourly rate. The invoice will state the number of hours spent on your project during the month.