Information Services

Requesting scans of journal articles and book chapters

You can request scans of articles and chapters not available online.

When you want to read content that isn't core content for your course, you may occasionally need to request materials. If the Library only has a book or journal in print then you can request a scan of an article or book chapter to be sent to you digitally. Alternatively, if the journal is not available at the University at all, you can request scans of papers from other libraries using the University's Interlibrary Loans service. 

Making a request

Please check DiscoverEd first. If the journal or book is available electronically, you should be able to get material online. If the item is in University of Edinburgh Library stock in print, then there is no fee for sending you a scan of an article or chapter.

DiscoverEd

Bear in mind that UK copyright law limits the amount of material that you can legally copy. There are copyright exceptions for students with disabilities.

Copyright information for students

If the article or chapter is not held by University of Edinburgh, then you can request up to an annual quota at no charge, and above the quota is a charge of £5 per request. Payment is made retrospectively through your Library Account.

Paying for Interlibrary Loans

Using the request system

If you have never used the interlibrary loans service before, you can read further information on the Interlibrary Loans web pages, including a guide to using DiscoverEd for requesting and tracking Interlibrary Loan materials using your Library Account.

Related Links

Interlibrary Loans