What is the legal deposit?
The legal deposit is a legal procedure by which one or more copies of all works produced for the purpose of public dissemination must be compulsorily deposited in a public registry in order to guarantee their conservation and access for statistical and research purposes of the country's cultural heritage.
The processing of the legal deposit is mandatory for all publications. The entity that manages the legal deposit in Catalonia is the Legal Deposit Office, which is part of the Biblioteca de Catalunya (Library of Catalonia). When the procedure is carried out, the legal deposit center assigns each publication a code that identifies the product. This code consists of the initials DL, followed by the initials of the depository center (B in the case of Barcelona) and a sequential number that is assigned in order of application. Finally, the year of edition is also added (for example, DL: B. 10.000-2015).
To know more details about the works that must be compulsorily deposited in the Legal Deposit consult the link: Legal Deposit.
Who must process the legal deposit of a publication?
The legal deposit of printed works is the responsibility of the publisher of the publication. It may also be requested by printers, especially when there is no commercial publisher. If the author publishes their own work without the intervention of a commercial publisher, institutional publisher or printer, then they must apply directly for the legal deposit number.
The UAB Publications Service processes the legal deposit for its publications, i.e., those books and journals that are part of its editorial collection and for which it holds the publishing and distribution rights. Doctoral theses in digital format, which are published in the TDX repository (Tesis Doctorals en Xarxa) of the Consortium of University Libraries of Catalonia, are included in this category. It also processes the legal deposit for the books it produces on behalf of other UAB centers.
In addition, the Publications Service can manage the processing of the legal deposit for those publications that have an official center of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona —central services, departments, institutes or research groups formally recognized— as the publishing entity of the publication. In these cases, the legal responsible for all purposes will be the center that entrusts the Publications Service with the management of the publication.
If the publication is a co-publication between different institutions or entities, then the institution or entity that is in charge of producing or managing the production of the publication is responsible for the legal deposit.
If the publishing entity of the publication is not strictly an official center of the UAB (i.e. it has its own NIF), even if it is linked to the UAB, then the legal deposit procedure must be handled directly by the publishing entity.
If the publication is made by an author in their personal capacity, whether or not they are a member of the UAB, the legal deposit must be processed by the same person.
How is the legal deposit processed?
To process the legal deposit of a publication, the publisher or printer must contact the Legal Deposit Office and follow the established procedure.
The Publications Service will process the legal deposit only and exclusively for those publications that have an official UAB center —central service, faculty, department, institute or research group formally recognized— as the publishing entity of the publication.
If an official UAB center, publisher of a publication, wants the Publications Service to manage the application for legal deposit, it will have to:
- Access the Publications Service website and fill in the corresponding electronic form with all the necessary data.
- Attach, preferably in pdf format, an authorization signed by the head of the center making the request, stating that the publication rights are available and indicating the number of the cost center or project where the costs of managing and sending the corresponding copies to the Legal Deposit Office are to be charged.
It is common for publications to have both ISBN and legal deposit; therefore, in these cases, a joint request can be made to the Publications Service, which will process the request for each code with the corresponding entity in each case.
Once the complete documentation is available, the Publications Service will process the application to the Legal Deposit Office. Provided that the documentation is correct and complete, the response time should be approximately one week.
In the event that the documentation is not complete or contains errors or omissions, the signed authorization is missing or the corresponding managing center is not indicated, the applicant will be informed of this eventuality, but the process will not proceed until all the information is complete.
What to do next?
On the credits page, the name of the publisher must be specified, followed by the pre-assigned legal deposit number. Once the book is printed, the necessary copies must be sent to the Legal Deposit Office.
If the procedure has been done through the Publications Service, the credits page must indicate that it is a Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona edition, with the name of the corresponding publishing center, and the pre-assigned legal deposit number must be indicated. In addition, the official UAB logo must appear prominently on the cover of the book, with the name of the publishing center underneath, in accordance with the UAB Identity and Corporate Image Manual.
When the book is printed, eight copies must be sent to the UAB Publications Service for protocol needs (archiving, libraries and mandatory sending of copies to the Legal Deposit Office). If the procedure has been done together with the ISBN, these copies only have to be sent once.
If it is an electronic publication that can be downloaded form a web page, then it is only necessary to send an e-mail indicating the permanent URL where the book will be located. It should be remembered that the processing of the legal deposit is mandatory for any publication with a commercial purpose.
If the required copies are not delivered to the Publications Service within one month of the publication's release, the pre-assigned legal deposit number will be cancelled for all purposes and will no longer be legally valid. It should be taken into account that the publication of a book or journal without completing the legal deposit procedure may be sanctioned as established in this law: Llei 23/2011, de 29 de juliol, de dipòsit legal.