Interpreting serial holdings

["Anne Myers" <amyers@xxxxxxxxxx>]

We have noticed a change in the way our patrons and public services staff
interpret serial holdings when they base their information on the webpac
rather than character based system.

There are 4 libraries sharing our system. None of us has chosen to be
comprehensive in attaching item records for every serial piece in our
collections. Items are created when things circulate, not just because they
exist. This hasn't been a problem in the old system -- patrons would
initially see the check record display, with accurate summary holdings, and
then could choose to view items if they wanted to.

Now, however, patrons see item record displays immediately after the check
record information, and are assuming that only those items that display are
in the collection. Which is seriously wrong.

Even if we wanted to start a project to create items for everything (which
we don't), it would take a lot of time to get the information entered
accurately.

Has anyone else encountered this?  How have you dealt with it?  A colleague
who used to work at Harvard said they had a 'disclaimer" message that
displayed in their system alerting patrons that circulation info didn't
necessarily reflect what was on the shelf.  Is there a way to do anything
like that in Innopac?

Hope this makes sense.  If not, let me know, and I'll try and clarify.

Anne
-------
Anne Myers
Head of Technical Services
Boston University Law Library
765 Commonwealth Ave., Boston, MA  02215
Ph:  617-353-8877      Fax:  617-353-5995
Email:  amyers@xxxxxxxxxx

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