This is a blanket, or comprehensive, authorisation granted to the licensee (currently only educational institutions) to copy from published editions under the control of the RRO.

In terms of an agreement which the institution concludes with DALRO, permission is granted in advance for copies as long as they comply with the terms and conditions of the licence agreement. What has been copied and the amount that has been copied are then reported retrospectively.

The term ‘blanket’ licence should not be taken to imply that it grants blanket permission to copy anything, whole books for instance. The terms of the blanket licence set a limit to the permissible length of extracts and the circumstances under which they may be made — on the licensed premises only, for instance.