I think an alternative for paying would be: 

- Discounts on publications in open access journals. BMC journals always grant a reviewer 15% reduction on article processing charges for each paper he reviews. Springer does better; reviewers may get 50% discount on any product to buy from them when a reviewer does 3 or more papers for them.

- Another possible option is Amazon gifts. Reviewers can be granted amazon gifts if they agreed to revise a paper for a journal.

- Journals can create an honorary position or a prize for reviewers who deliver a work of high quality standards.

I think these solutions are in the middle, not requiring direct payment and they are beyond virtual benefit. Therefore, i think they can be really effective.

Kind Regards

Dear Reza,

This is a good question, I think one solution could be if the reviewers get paid, only virtual rewards are not enough.

Cheers,

Alban

Journals can change their submission policy and ask for documents that shows the authors who are submitting their manuscript have done at least 1 or 2 reviews in recent year. Of course it needs an integrated database for potential referees and the authors must be asked to review any manuscript in that year.

I think the same as Mr Kuriqi that referees will be motivated to review papers faster if they will be paid for their work.I know that being an expert referee is an important contribution to the advancement of science, but any other aspect of paper publishing involves costs (processing costs and subscription costs), so why not the referees work ?

I don't believe that paying a referee will be the solution to the problem. In my opinion the main stumbling block is that making a good revision is not really regarded as something important for our career. It's a duty, and we generally do it, but sometimes it is regarded more like a pain in the neck. Editors must rank their referees in terms of rapidity and quality (this is very important) of their revisions. And a way must be found to take into account this ranking. I personally believe that this could be possibly more important and reliable than other stupid indicators such as h index that can  be manipulated so easily.

I totally agree with Marco. We all should have a commitment to advance the field in which we practice. That should be a enough virtual reward. One encouraging reward should be the inclusion of the peer reviewers at the end of the paper, a trend that is on the increase in many journals.

If any incentive is to be made by the international publishers to reviewers, it should be some form of credit points against which reviewers can use ANYTIME till they are used up in all their journals. for example, if you review a an article for a subscription only journal, you receive a number of credit points you can use against a set of articles say 3 articles access per 1 article reviewed.

The major challenge is the poor response rates to review articles to open access and emerging journals.

I think an alternative for paying would be: 

- Discounts on publications in open access journals. BMC journals always grant a reviewer 15% reduction on article processing charges for each paper he reviews. Springer does better; reviewers may get 50% discount on any product to buy from them when a reviewer does 3 or more papers for them.

- Another possible option is Amazon gifts. Reviewers can be granted amazon gifts if they agreed to revise a paper for a journal.

- Journals can create an honorary position or a prize for reviewers who deliver a work of high quality standards.

I think these solutions are in the middle, not requiring direct payment and they are beyond virtual benefit. Therefore, i think they can be really effective.

Kind Regards

Dear All, 

I am currently acting as the Managing Editor of Indian Journal of Sustainable Development. Sending and getting back a review report from the peer reviewers is a tedious tasks. We use to give around 21-30 days for completing the task of peer review. But usually we will not be hear from the peer reviewers, in most of the cases. 

Many of them don't take interest in the later stages as it is a voluntary assignment. 

We must understand the context of payment for the peer reviewers.

1. How can a journal pay to peer reviewers if it is a open access and doesn't charge from authors ?

they dont' have any such resources for paid peer review. 

2. Most of the journals which are not open access and charge from authors as publication charges also not paying for the peer reviewers.

   This is a mere injustice. 

I am wondering why many of the Journals charges from the authors?

I think the knowledge dissemination should not be charged. 

A n author  put his/her all efforts to produce a paper/knowledge base and again they have to pay for publishing it. 

is it justifiable?

We must have committed peer reviewers to complete the task on time. 

they must be paid wherever there is an option and peer reviewers must ready to volunteer wherever such resources are not available. 

Just would like to note that Elsevier has recently launched a somewhat similar to Publons service for referees for its own journals

https://www.reviewerrecognition.elsevier.com/

See also

https://www.elsevier.com/reviewers-update/story/peer-review/get-recognition-for-the-quality-of-your-reviews

https://www.elsevier.com/reviewers-update/story/peer-review/reviewer-badges

Dear Dr. Reza Barati,

In my opinion, we need to choose journal with aim and scope appropriate to the content of the article, with editors having same research interest as you. At the same time, the author also needs to propose 2 referees who are experts in the field and ensure quick comments on the article.