Finding a way to pay in the UK: methods and mechanisms for paying service users involved in research

Finding a way to pay service users for research involvement in the UK has become a topic of dispute and despair. By reviewing the available literature, this article aims to document the range of frustrations and to highlight this small area of policy as pivotal to improving research involvement for disabled people (and other service users). Policy papers, guidance notes, reports and papers on payment issues are summarised, examined and juxtaposed. We link the problems described to analytical debates about ethics, power, policy and emancipatory research. While resolution in all these areas is desirable, we show how pragmatic concerns are also important. Mechanisms for paying people are a core problem. They have been changed inconsistently and incrementally. An explicit focus on mechanisms would be a key next step towards improving opportunities for disabled people (and other service users) to be involved in research by, for and about themselves.