For academic publishers, peer review and branding are critical issues. At ePress provision is made for editing and proofreading to avoid problems such as plagiarism, libel and inconsistency. Furthermore, experts in their respective areas review ePress titles. ePress its focus on the following concerns:

  • quality of content
  • quality of accessibility
  • quality of editorial processes
  • quality of presentation
  • user-friendly web site
  • financial control at all stages of production
  • sustainability
  • stability
  • long-term access and archival preservation.

In addition the ePress Management Teams has the authority to accept or decline a proposal.

All ePress publications and processes are held to the same set of policies and standards as outlined below.

ADVERTISING

ePress and its publications do not contain advertising. Any perceived relationship with a product or brand is purely coincidental.

ANIMAL RESEARCH

All research involving animals must meet the Unitec Research Ethics Committee (UREC) standard of ethics. For animal research projects, application must be made to an accredited animal or regional Health and Disability Ethics Committee, details of which can be obtained from the UREC Secretary . Where there is any doubt regarding the need for ethical approval it is the responsibility of the researcher and/or the research supervisor to consult with UREC in the first instance.

BACKUPS

In the event that ePress ceased to operate a copy of all pdf based publications can be located at the National Library of New Zealand and at Research Bank if the author is employed at Unitec. Any websites published by ePress are hosted separately from the ePress site and will remain operational unless Unitec Institute of Technology permanently closes. In this instance steps will be taken to hand over the operation of web hosting and the domain name to the author as copyright holder, including annual fees and content management.

The backup of websites managed by ePress is the responsibility of the website host.

COMPLAINTS

To make a complaint please email your concern to the Editor at epress@unitec.ac.nz  You will be contacted upon receipt of your email and advised of the proceeding steps.

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST

Any conflicts of interest between an author/s, reviewer/s and/or the editor/s are to be immediately declared and will be reviewed by the ePress Management Team. If a conflict exists between the ePress Management Team and the author/s, reviewer/s and editor/s then the Editorial Committee or the Advisory Committee will receive the declaration.

A conflict of interest can be personal or professional, financial or non-financial, or between a person and an entity.

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSING

Copyright is a protection of a person’s expression of a creative skill or idea. The idea itself is not protected, rather the form in which it is expressed, for example, a musical composition, a book, a drawing, or a photograph. All ePress publications are automatically assigned the Attribution-Noncommercial license which lets others remix, tweak, and build upon the authors work non-commercially, with credit to the author (their new works must also be non-commercial).

DATA AVAILABILITY

All data from a publication must be made publically available and be de-identified where applicable, unless otherwise agreed upon with the Editor.

ETHICS

Publishing with ePress assumes that all authors agree to, and have abided by, the best ethical research practices as championed by the Unitec Research Ethics Committee (UREC) and/or other ethics committees. ePress supports and operates by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) Code of Conduct. We aspire to meet COPE’s Best Practice Guidelines and are working towards COPE membership.

FEES

Publishing at ePress is free. Authors do not pay to submit a manuscript, reviewers are not paid for reviews and ePress is not paid to publish specific works.

FUNDING EPRESS

The Unitec Tuapapa Rangahau, Research and Post Graduate Centre fund ePress annually. The funding covers the annual employment of one full time staff member and individual contractors for design and/or copyediting as each publication requires. It also covers web hosting fees, domain names and organisation memberships.

FUNDING SOURCES FOR AUTHORS

Submissions to ePress must contain a declaration outlining all financial support received by the author/s to complete their manuscript. If the funder played a role in the research, this must be outlined.

HUMAN SUBJECT RESEARCH

All research involving humans must meet the Unitec standard of ethics, including approval by the Unitec Research Ethics Committee (UREC). UREC emphasises eight guiding ethical principles governing research and teaching activities using humans. These are: 

  • Informed and voluntary consent.
  • Respect for rights and confidentiality and preservation of anonymity.
  • Minimisation of harm.
  • Cultural and social sensitivity.
  • Imitation of deception.
  • Respect for intellectual and cultural property ownership.
  • Avoidance of conflict of interest.
  • Research design adequacy.

Click here for the Unitec Human Research Ethics Guidelines.

PEER REVIEWS

ePress is looking into a transparent peer review process, more inline with the spirit of Open Access. Until we have a transparent model that works for us, we will continue using the traditional academic method of double and single blind peer reviews. ePress makes every effort to maintain anonymity between the reviewers and authors during the submission and peer review process.