Some external funding organisations, such as the signatories of Plan S, have a condition in place that requires grant holders to publish their output immediately Open Access (OA) whilst retaining the rights to their work. Although, there is no requirement from REF for authors to retain the rights to their work it is strongly encouraged and retaining your rights enables compliance with the REF Open Access Policy. You can find more detail about funder requirements and the REF Open Access Policy on the tabs under this page title on the left.