1. About MCI Research
MCI Research is the medical research platform of MCI Group. It is operated by MedConsult International, a limited liability company registered in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. In these Terms, "MCI Research", "we" and "us" mean MedConsult International acting through MCI Research.
MCI Research is a managed research-delivery service. We accept your research project, match it with a vetted independent researcher, manage delivery and quality, and provide you with one accountable point of contact. Your agreement is with MCI Research. MCI Research engages the researcher as a subcontractor. You do not contract directly with the researcher.
2. Services and Dashboard
MCI Research provides research support services in four stages: Plan your study (research consultation, protocol and ethics preparation, sample size calculation, grant and proposal preparation); Collect and analyse (data management and visualization, statistical analysis, systematic review and meta-analysis); Write and publish (manuscript and publication support, scientific and English editing, figures, posters and presentations, journal selection and submission); and Learn and grow (research courses and workshops, mentorship and collaboration). If your need is not listed, you can describe it and MCI Research will tell you which service fits.
You will have access to a client dashboard showing your project status, your quotes, invoices and deliveries, and your messages with MCI Research. Messages go both ways through MCI Research. MCI Research's operations team is your single point of contact and provides status updates at each stage of delivery.
3. Quotes and Pricing
Every project is priced individually. Your quote card states the scope, the deliverables, the delivery time and one total price for the agreed scope, including VAT where VAT applies. Your tax invoice shows the VAT amount separately. Quotes are valid for seven days from issue. Clients who live in Saudi Arabia pay in Saudi riyals (SAR); clients who live elsewhere pay in US dollars (USD).
If you ask to change the scope before you pay, MCI Research sends you an updated quote that replaces the earlier one. Large projects may be divided into stages. Each stage has its own price, delivery time and invoice, is paid before it starts, and is delivered and accepted separately. Coupon and referral codes must be entered before you accept a quote, and one code applies per project.
You can ask for up to three services in one request. Usually one researcher does the whole request, and you receive one quote and one invoice that list all the services. If no single researcher can do all the services well, MCI Research may divide your request into parts and will tell you when it does this. Each part has its own quote, invoice, payment, delivery time and acceptance. A part that needs the results of an earlier part starts after that part is delivered, and its delivery time counts from the day it starts. If you cancel a part before its work starts, only that part is cancelled, and the other parts continue.
4. Payment
You pay the full quoted amount (or, for a staged project or a request divided into parts, the price of each stage or part) in cleared funds before work begins, unless your request is billed to an institution that pays by monthly statement (see section 5). Payment is an advance for MCI Research's contracted service. It is not an escrow arrangement, and MCI Research does not hold funds on your behalf. Except as set out in section 5, work begins only after cleared payment is received in full.
If payment is declined, reversed before work begins, or not received, neither MCI Research nor the researcher begins work. After a properly accepted deliverable has been paid out, any later chargeback is MCI Research's client-credit issue unless the researcher committed fraud or material breach.
Card payments are processed through a licensed payment service provider, and MCI Research does not store card data. You may also pay by bank transfer to the bank account shown on your invoice; a transfer is confirmed after MCI Research checks your receipt. On international transfers, each side pays its own bank charges.
5. Institution Accounts
If your university, hospital or other organisation has an institution account with MCI Research, you can send requests as a member of that institution. Requests you send as a member are billed to your institution under its Institution Agreement with MCI Research.
If your institution pays by monthly statement, work on your request, and on its parts, stages and change orders, starts once you accept the quote, without payment first, and your institution pays for it on its monthly statement. If your institution pays before work starts, section 4 applies.
Other members of your institution can see the requests you send under the institution account, with their status, quotes and invoices. Members with the role "See statements and pay" can also see its monthly statements. The researcher is never told the name of your institution.
These Terms apply to every request you send as a member. If the Institution Agreement says something different about billing or payment, the Institution Agreement applies.
6. Scope and Changes
Every project has a written quote (the quote card) defining deliverables, deadlines, revision rounds, and acceptance criteria. New work, changed hypotheses, new datasets, or additional analysis constitute a paid change order, not a free revision. Client-caused delays and new data requirements also require a written change order. A change order has its own price and invoice, and work on it starts once it is paid.
7. Delivery and Acceptance
Before you receive a deliverable, MCI Research checks it against the agreed scope, and a qualified reviewer selected by MCI Research reviews it independently. Deliverables are released as downloads in your dashboard, not by email. You have seven days from release to accept the deliverable or to ask for changes, stating which agreed deliverable is missing or not as described. If you do not respond within seven days, the deliverable is automatically accepted; MCI Research reminds you the day before. A general change of mind is not a rejection.
8. Revisions
Your project includes two consolidated revision rounds within the approved scope. Additional revisions are handled as a separate paid change order.
9. Replacement and Refunds
If the assigned researcher cannot complete the work, MCI Research moves the work to another suitable researcher at no extra charge, and the new work is reviewed in the same way. Paid amounts are not refundable, except where Saudi law requires a refund.
10. Intellectual Property
Upon full payment, you receive ownership and assignment of the bespoke final deliverable and project-specific work product, to the fullest extent permitted by law. MCI Research and the researcher retain their pre-existing methods, templates, know-how, and software. Third-party and licensed material remains subject to its own licences.
For a request billed to an institution, ownership passes when the invoice for that request is paid in full, to you or to your institution as your institution's own rules provide.
11. Authorship, Publication and Journal Submission
Authorship is never guaranteed. For publication projects, the scope states the proposed contribution, publication plan, and authorship decision-maker before work begins. A researcher who meets the applicable journal's authorship standard (per ICMJE criteria) should be listed as an author. MCI Research does not guarantee publication, journal acceptance, or any specific academic outcome.
For journal submission support, MCI Research prepares the submission package and guides you through the submission. You remain the corresponding author and submit the manuscript from your own journal account. Article processing charges and other fees charged by journals are paid by you directly to the journal and are not included in MCI Research's price unless your quote card says so. Responses to reviewers' comments are quoted separately unless your quote card includes them.
12. Confidentiality
Your project, research question, data, and identity are treated as confidential. The researcher is never told your identity or the name of your institution during the project, and the researcher's identity is not shared with you. All files and messages pass through MCI Research. Confidentiality obligations survive the end of the engagement.
13. Data Protection
You own the raw data you provide. MCI Research and the researcher receive only the minimum access needed to perform the agreed scope. Your project files stay in your dashboard for twelve months after the project is completed, so you can download them again; you can ask MCI Research to delete them earlier or to keep them longer. After that, they are securely deleted, unless a documented legal, audit, or dispute-related retention need applies. The researcher deletes their working copies within thirty days after acceptance.
Files and messages are kept in the MCI Research portal, which uses encrypted connections, role-based access and access logs. Do not submit identifiable patient information, protected health information, or confidential institutional data through forms, files, messages, email, or AI prompts unless a specific approved process is in place.
How MCI Research handles personal data is explained in the MCI Research Privacy Policy.
14. Dispute Resolution and Governing Law
Concerns are escalated to MCI Research in good faith within ten business days. If unresolved, the matter proceeds to mediation at the Saudi Center for Commercial Arbitration (SCCA). If mediation fails, disputes are resolved by binding arbitration administered by SCCA under its current rules, seated in Riyadh, in Arabic or English as expressly selected. This agreement is governed by the laws of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
15. Entire Agreement
These Terms, together with your accepted quote card, any accepted change order, the MCI Research Privacy Policy, the Institution Agreement where your request is billed to an institution, and any documents referenced within them, constitute the entire agreement between the parties and supersede any prior discussions or representations.
16. Limitations
MCI Research does not provide escrow services, legal, medical, financial, or investment advice, or guarantees of publication, funding, or regulatory approval. MCI Research does not operate clinical trials or collect human-subject data.
17. Accepting these Terms
You accept these Terms by ticking the acceptance box when you send a request or create your account. When MCI Research publishes a new version, you are asked to accept it at your next sign-in. Each quote card you accept confirms these Terms for that project. MCI Research keeps a record of each acceptance, with the version, date and time.