Our Fees

Bellberry, the Company, has very carefully ensured it has no influence on the decision making of its Committees. The fees charged are for the review of a study, regardless of the outcome. Fees are determined by the Board and CEO and are managed separately to the Committees. The Committees do not see the financial statements of the Company and have no involvement in this facet of the business.

A fee is charged for providing a review of a research project. The review process starts when the investigator clicks ‘submit’.  The study review fee is therefore committed to at that time.

The new protocol review fee funds the cost of:

• Any pre-submission assistance
• The initial HREC review
• Post approval, the ongoing review of minor amendments and other reporting, including:
  • administrative changes (personnel updates, site name or address updates)
  • PICF amendments
  • updates to other participant documents such as recruitment and advertising material
  • safety reporting
  • serious breach notifications
  • progress and final reporting
  • site monitoring and desktop auditing

The following items incur fees post approval:

• Protocol amendment
• Investigator’s brochure amendment
• Substantial amendment
• Extension study

Review Outcomes

Fees are levied to cover the costs of providing the expert review, regardless of the outcome of that review. To be clear: Fees are charged for the review process, NOT the review decision. Fees remain payable in cases where a study has been rejected by the HREC.

Investigator-Initiated Studies

If you are an investigator funding your own research project that is considered greater than Low Risk, you may contact Bellberry to discuss fees that apply prior to your submission.

Complex Study Designs

In line with our commitment to providing a robust, high-quality, and efficient Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC) review, we allocate additional time for the Committee’s consideration of applications involving complex study designs, including master, umbrella, platform, basket, and adaptive designs.

When these complex design studies include multiple protocols and investigator brochures in a single submission, the Committee will review the application across multiple agenda items during the HREC meeting. Consequently, the review fee is determined based on the phase of the included protocols and the number of agenda items under consideration.

We encourage researchers and sponsors to discuss their complex design study applications ahead of submission whenever possible.

Further information on Fees can be found in BA G6 Application Fees

Applications made via REGIS must include the REGIS submission HREC fee form. Further information on REGIS submissions can be found here