18 March 2026

Included in this update

Currency relief - minimum EPIC invoice exchange rates set for 2026-2027
Change of vendor for Infobase & Credo products
EPIC support over the next few weeks

Currency relief - minimum EPIC invoice exchange rates set for 2026-2027

As is outlined in The annual invoicing process section of EPIC – a guide for member libraries, EPIC’s standard practice is to advertise EPIC subscription options to members in the currencies that EPIC is invoiced in by the EPIC vendors. EPIC then invoices EPIC members for their total subscription costs in NZD (plus GST) based on the exchange rates that applied at the time EPIC pays invoices to the EPIC vendors.

However, in recent years, in response to ongoing economic uncertainty, EPIC has provided currency relief by setting minimum exchange rates (in advance) that will be applied to the NZD conversions of the foreign currency elements of EPIC member invoices. EPIC did this for the 2024–2025 and 2025–2026 subscription years and is able to do so again for 2026–2027 (although, this is likely to be the last subscription year that EPIC will be able to do this).

For the period 1 July 2026 to 30 June 2027, the minimum exchange rates will be:

USD: 0.60
AUD: 0.88
GBP: 0.48

With the NZD currently weaker against the currencies EPIC pay vendors in, it hasn’t been possible to keep these rates at the same favourable level as the 2 previous subscription years. However, I hope this still offers some relief and provides greater certainty for budgeting.

As in previous years, if exchange rates improve before EPIC pays vendor invoices, the more favourable rate will be applied to your NZD invoices through EPC.

Change of vendor for Infobase & Credo products

There has recently been a change to the vendor that supplies Infobase and Credo Reference products to Australasian libraries. The new vendor for these products is an existing EPIC vendor - iGroup Australasia.

iGroup has therefore taken over providing consortium discounted pricing through EPIC for these products. Use this link to access a filtered view of all iGroup subscription options (including Infobase and Credo Reference products) available through EPIC in 2026-2027.

I have already added the public library subscription pricing options to the iGroup EPIC Public Library subscription pricing options 2026-2027 pdf from the secure section of the EPIC pricing and sub-licence agreements page of the website. Tertiary library options will be added by the end of next week.

EPIC support over the next few weeks

I am going to be on annual leave from tomorrow (Thursday 19 March) through to the end of Easter. I will be back in the office from Wednesday 8 April (when I will be gearing up to officially seek your EPIC subscription confirmations for 2026-2027).

While I am away, the lovely Michael Fauchelle from Te Puna Services has kindly agreed to cover the EPIC in-box for me. So, please continue to send queries through to epic@dia.govt.nz while I’m away, but please also be aware that complicated queries might have a delayed response, and some queries may be forwarded to individual EPIC vendors to respond to.

Alternatively, the EPIC Vendors page of the website lists contact details for all current EPIC vendors.

And finally, as a reminder, If you experience technical difficulties accessing EPIC resources that can’t be resolved by referring to the Troubleshooting EPIC resources page of the website, please contact the EPIC vendor’s technical support contact listed from the EPIC Vendors page of the website.

Hei konā mai

Paula Banks - EPIC Manager