Established in 1990 the ERA Licensing Scheme permits staff at educational establishments to record, for non-commercial educational purposes, broadcast outputs of its Members.

The ERA Licence allows educational establishments to record for the purpose of education any broadcast from the following networks:

• BBC television and radio
• ITV Network services (including ITV2 and ITV3)
• Channel Four, E4, More 4 and Film 4
• Five Television
• S4C

What the ERA licence allows:

• Recordings to be made at the University or at home by staff or a designated third party on behalf of the establishment.

• Licensed recordings to be retained, stored and copied (in both analogue and digital formats). Recordings can be made on physical formats such as DVDs or stored in digital form on a secure server.

• Digital recordings stored on-site, e.g. on a central server, may only be accessed from on-site PC’s. An authentication system is required to ensure that recorded material is not accessed by students at home or anywhere off-site.

• Registered students, teachers or other employees directly involved in the students' education can watch or listen to broadcast recordings.

• Registered UK students (including distance learning students) can borrow licensed recordings but only for the purposes of education. ERA recommends that organisations request students to sign a declaration to confirm that the material will be used only for legitimate, non-commercial educational purposes.

• Duplicate copies may be made of existing recordings as long as they are used non-commercially and for educational purposes.

• Analogue recordings made under Licence may be transferred to digital formats for the educational use of licensed establishments, e.g. recordings currently on video may be digitised and stored on DVD or on the licensee's serve.

What the ERA licence does not allow:

• The copying of commercially produced videos, CDs, DVDs and audiotapes.

• The adaptation or alteration of a recording (including the addition of subtitles, separating the original soundtrack from the film, adding commentary etc).

• Recording may not be used for commercial purposes. The University must not charge a fee to audiences to see a performance of a broadcast.

• The recording of Open University programmes is not permitted. The Open University licenses their programmes separately; please see the OU website for more information.

• Supplying recordings to students based overseas is not permitted.

How long can recordings be kept under the ERA Licence?

• Programmes recorded after 30th May 1990 under the terms of an ERA Licence can be retained indefinitely by a licensed educational establishment whilst it continues to hold a valid ERA Licence.

• Programmes recorded prior to 1st August 1989 are governed by the terms of the licence under which they were recorded. Most licences did not permit the indefinite retention of recordings.

Recordings which are no longer needed or covered by a current Licence must be destroyed and may not be sold or otherwise dealt with.


ERA Plus Licence

The ERA Plus licence is an extension of the ERA Licence. It enables the institution to provide access to ERA Recordings by students and teachers on line whether they are on campus, at home or working elsewhere within the UK. To be eligible for the ERA Plus Licence you must first hold an ERA Licence.