RE: Holds Questions

[Weinberg <mweinber at suffolk dot lib dot ny dot us>]

Hi Laurie,

Hope all is well with you! Would you like to get together during IUG?
Also, what's the name of the program you referred to below? We are 
eagerly awaiting Release 2005 for the changes you described below!

Marilyn Weinberg
Suffolk Cooperative Library System

On Tue, 15 Mar 2005, Laurie Shedrick wrote:

> Brenda-There is good news on the horizon for consortia!
> 
> We are a consortia of 70 public library sites, who have grappled with the
> same issues regarding holds.  It started with best sellers and has now
> become a DVD issue.  We have a pretty good capacity for sharing, but on
> occassion we have had to call administrators to "remind" them to share.
> 
> Since you can't see where your title level holds are, it does make it
> difficult to police, but our members are quick to rat each other out when
> they know something that is available has not been put into transit.
> 
> On the plus side, the next release of Millennium will include an option
> which is now being called "priority paging".  What this does is allow you to
> set up a paging priority for each pickup location.  Each pickup location can
> be its own highest level of priority, which essentially means that they are
> paged first, if they own the title.  From there you can model your
> priorities based on proximity or a delivery schedule.  You can also assign
> the same priority level to more than one location.  If the priority is the
> same, the paging order is randomized among that group.  We begin beta
> testing for this tomorrow, but we hope that it will decrease delivery and
> turn around time.  There will be an IUG Program on this in San Francisco.
> 
> One thing that we would love to see an improvement on is the "give
> precedence to local holds" circulation option.  The current form of this
> recalls items to the home library to fill holds after they have been put in
> transit to other pickup agencies.  Our patrons have become too savvy and
> could tell from the OPAC when something was on its way, only to find it had
> been sent back.  I believe the hold was then stuck at the item level, as
> well.  Also, our delivery is bursting at the seams, with 5 full time trucks
> going out daily.  We can't move items around unnecessarily.  We would like
> to have the hold follow through for the patron and then return to the home
> patron.
> 
> If I can answer anything more specific for you let me know.
> 
> Laurie
> 
>  .,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,
> Laurie Shedrick, Automated Systems Manager
> Mid-Hudson Library System
> 103 Market St
> Poughkeepsie, NY 12601
> 845.471.6060 x21
> lshedrick at midhudson dot org
> .,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: innopac-bounces at innopacusers dot org
> [mailto:innopac-bounces at innopacusers dot org]On Behalf Of Brenda K.
> Giovanneillo
> Sent: Tuesday, March 15, 2005 12:06 PM
> To: innopac at innopacusers dot org
> Subject: Holds Questions
> 
> 
> Good afternoon all:
> 
> The biggest indoor sport in play among the consortium member
> libraries of ALIS in Nassau County, New York is holds.
> 
> We have been live on Millennium for nearly a year, and we
> need to turn our attention from "shakedown cruise" midset
> to "system development" mindset.
> 
> One of the biggest complaints we hear from libraries is that
> when they place holds, and the system creates a title paging
> list based on the holdings on the system and available at
> the time, often none of the libraries on that paging list
> fill the hold, and ultimately the system cancels it.  This
> is a particular frustration since with more than 50 members,
> by the time the system cyecles through the original set of
> libraries on the paging list, more libraries have added
> items, but the system merrily cancels the hold anyway.
> 
> I understand that at least at this moment this is a fact of
> life, but I am hoping against hope that some of you may have
> some advice or a workaround that might help to address this
> frustration.
> 
> On a related question, are any consortia using Page Pickup
> Location First?  If so, has it pisitively impacted the
> filling of holds?
> 
> Thank you for any insight.
> 
> Brenda
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> Brenda K. Giovanneillo
> ALIS Consortium Director
> Nassau County, Long Island, New York
> 516.292.8920  ext. 241
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
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