Researchfish is the system used by many funders (including the UK Research Councils, Arthritis Research UK, Cancer Research UK, NIHR and Wellcome) to collect and evaluate the outputs and outcomes of your research projects. You are able to tell funders about the activities, impact and publications that have come from your research.
All PIs on active Research Council or Cancer Research UK grants and students funded by any of these organisations are expected to complete Researchfish on an annual basis. Other funders will have their own requirements for submission; make sure you are aware of your funder’s requirements when you are awarded a grant. A response is expected for all current grants and those which have ended in the past five years.
Your funder uses the information to inform stakeholders of the great research being undertaken in UK Universities. Funders produce reports to government and other organisations outlining what has been achieved through their funding, using case studies from Researchfish as examples of excellence. By using Researchfish you’ll be feeding into important reports such as this, potentially raising your research profile in the process.
How the information submitted via Researchfish is used by your funders
Information from Researchfish is also exposed through the Gateway to Research website. This site has been developed by UKRI to enable the dissemination of publicly funded research outcomes.
The University also gets to see the information that you have submitted. We find this really useful to inform our work on research and development at the University; using it directly to inform development of impact case studies, to identify effective pathways to impact and identifying areas of good practice where we can offer additional support for further funding.
The short answer is Yes! UKRI have announced that sanctions will apply to UKRI-funded researchers who do not make a submission each year during the data submission period, even if this is a nil- submission (e.g. because it is too early for any outcomes to have emerged from the research yet).
For this year UKRI funded students are expected to use the system but no sanctions are to be applied.
Cancer Research UK also requires a submission during this period, although sanctions may be applied to the whole University if the rate of submission is lower than required.
Other funders may also have requirements for submission, make sure you are up to date with your funders expectations for reporting research outcomes through Researchfish.
Find out more at: https://intranet.birmingham.ac.uk/planning/rpt/ResearchFish/
Email: researchfishsupport@contacts.bham.ac.uk
Your funder will email you directly about joining Researchfish with a link to create your account and associate an award with it.
Check to see if the email is in your spam folder. If not, contact your funder to ensure that they have the correct email address for you. Researchfish also have a support email address and should be able to help. Please contact support@Researchfish.com
Go to https://www.Researchfish.com/ and use your log in details at the top of the page. Check that all your awards are linked to you.
You can log into Researchfish and record outcomes at any time throughout the year but the submission period is a fixed time each year. Within this period each PI has to log in to Researchfish and when all information is complete press the Submit button. Until you have done this you have not complied with the funder requirements.
Researchfish is about more than just reporting outcomes and publications; the Research Councils want to know about a variety of different activities you have undertaken as part of your research project. Therefore it is likely that, even if you are at the beginning of your project, you’ll have something to report. However, if you are not returning anything make sure you: 1. Add “not applicable this year” for all the mandatory questions required by their funders on each grant 2. Press Submit within the submission period.
Add as much information as possible, omitting any information that may be covered by a confidentiality agreement.
For RCUK, Students and PIs are asked to provide an annual update during the period of the awards and usually for five years after their awards have finished. Other funders may have different policies.
Where there are no new outcomes to submit, you can indicate this using the process noted above.
Researchers also have the opportunity to discuss with UKRI when they feel that no further outcomes will arise from an award and request that the award is ‘closed’ in Researchfish. If you think this is the case, please let us know.
The University has a responsibility to confirm annually with the Research Councils which grants are expected to complete an annual outcomes submission and for ensuring compliance of grant holders at their organisation. If there are reasons why this is not possible or appropriate, the University is able to flag an award accordingly. Please contact researchfishsupport@contacts.bham.ac.uk if you think this applies to you.
If you have moved or are moving to a new institution, make sure you have updated yoUR details on Je-s (https://je-s.rcuk.ac.uk/JeS2WebLoginSite/Login.aspx)
Awards are added to Researchfish when your funder supplies them with the required information. RCUK updates the Researchfish system with details of new RCUK awards each quarter. This process should trigger system-generated invitations to new RCUK grant holders to register with the system, and to existing users to register new awards. Depending how frequently your funder supplies this information, a new award may not appear in the system immediately. Alternatively, your award may be listed against a different individual (e.g. a previous PI).
If you have queries related to an UKRI award, please contact researchoutcomes@funding.ukri.org
For other awards, please contact your funder or researchfishsupport@contacts.bham.ac.uk.
Only students in the third or later year of their studies will be asked to submit their outcomes.
Whilst the sanctions policy does not apply to students, overall institutional compliance may be considered in making future doctoral training awards and students should be encouraged to submit within the submission period.
Please note Research Councils may publish details of the outcomes that students enter through various channels including http://gtr.rcuk.ac.uk/
Although there is no link between the systems, you can copy and paste any information you have in Pure by extracting the data as a Word document.
1. Select, e.g. ‘Activities’ from the left-hand navigation menu;
2. Select ‘Word’ from the download list options at the bottom of the screen;
3. Select render style ‘Long’;
4. Copy and paste any information from the Word document in to your Researchfish entry
You are able to set up delegates on your account in Researchfish so that others can help to add information to your records. However, as PI the submission is your responsibility so you need to make sure that the details that others have added are correct before submitting your return. Delegates are not able to submit your report once completed, this can only be done by the PI on the grant.
When logged into Researchfish you’ll find a link to create delegates on the home page.
Drop in sessions will run throughout the submission period. You can come along to the session to complete your submission in a supported environment, with people on hand to answer any questions you have.
Further information can be found on our Guidance and FAQs page.