See Best Practices for Decision Pages and Tags for groups
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Executive Summary
Problem Statement
Patrons are given a false expectation that they have the ability to pick up material through a Resource Sharing request at time of requesting, only to discover they have a block at the point of checkout (at the final step of the resource sharing process).
From our (Fulfillment) perspective, patrons should be notified that a block on their account may not prevent them from requesting a particular item, but it could prevent them from check out.
Recommendations
We recommend modifying the On Hold Shelf letter text to include the following text after “This material may be picked up at…” but before “The material will be held for….”.
| Code Block |
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<div style="border:1px solid black"><i><b><u>Please Note:</u></b> You will not be able to borrow the item if you have any active fines/fees at any UC Campus.
<p>You can verify the status of your account online by logging in to your institution's library account and reviewing the Fines + Fees tab for each campus listed.</p>
</i></div> |
This code snippet includes a block-level element that will add a visual box around the text in the email. The box does not cause a problem with accessibility or screen readers.
Impact
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Stakeholder group
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Impact
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Resource Sharing OST
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Fulfillment OST
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SILS OT
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All UC Library Resource Sharing Staff
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All UC Library Circulation Staff
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SILS Operations Center at CDL
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Patrons
Reasoning
As a consortium, patrons should have the same expectation of services (including suspension of privileges) across the UCs. Patrons should not be given inaccurate information that they have access to material through request when they are blocked at the point of loan. Additionally, library collections throughout the UC should be considered equally important. Thus, adding this unified text to all On Hold Shelf letters will help keep messaging between campuses consistent and deliver a uniform message to all UC patronsIn an attempt to provide as clear and consistent of a message as possible to our patrons around the UC system, we’re proposing a minor addition of code and text to the On Hold Shelf letter. This letter is automatically sent to patrons when an ILL item is ready to be checked out after being received by the patron’s home campus from the lending institution. Until such time that Ex Libris institutes AFN Consortia Blocks at each campus, these modifications to the On Hold Shelf letter will serve as a short term stop gap.
Problem Statement
Patrons are given a false expectation that they have the ability to pick up material through a Resource Sharing request at time of requesting, only to discover they have a block at the point of checkout (at the final step of the resource sharing process).
From our (Fulfillment) perspective, patrons should be notified that a block on their account may not prevent them from requesting a particular item, but it could prevent them from check out.
Recommendations
We recommend modifying the On Hold Shelf letter text to include the following text after “This material may be picked up at…” but before “The material will be held for….”.
| Code Block |
|---|
<div style="border:1px solid black"><i><b><u>Please Note:</u></b> You will not be able to borrow the item if you have any active fines/fees at any UC Campus.
<p>You can verify the status of your account online by logging in to your institution's library account and reviewing the Fines + Fees tab for each campus listed.</p>
</i></div> |
This code snippet includes a block-level element that will add a visual box around the text in the email. The box does not cause a problem with accessibility or screen readers. Below is a screenshot example of the above code element as it would display in an email:
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Impact
Stakeholder group | Impact |
|---|---|
Resource Sharing OST | |
Fulfillment OST | |
SILS OT | |
All UC Library Resource Sharing Staff | |
All UC Library Circulation Staff | |
SILS Operations Center at CDL | |
Patrons |
Reasoning
As a consortium, patrons should have the same expectation of services (including suspension of privileges) across the UCs. Patrons should not be given inaccurate information that they have access to material through request when they are blocked at the point of loan. Additionally, library collections throughout the UC should be considered equally important. Thus, adding this unified text to all On Hold Shelf letters will help keep messaging between campuses consistent and deliver a uniform message to all UC patrons.
We’ve tested the AFN “notify user” cancellation feature, however this unfortunately doesn’t notify the patron as the request will continue to the next campus in the queue. Other options considered include leaving the situation as-is and relying on good communication at each campus circulation desk to inform the patron they have an active fine and can’t take the item with them. Lastly, we’ve considered the lending institution cancelling the request and allowing it to continue along the rota for another campus to fulfill but without any type of automation this is a non-starter.
Therefore, we believe modifying the On Hold Shelf letter to help patrons understand the limitations of the system as a temporary measure until a solution is developed by Ex Libris, is the best course of action at this time.
Background
Copied from the Consortia Blocks Decision Page.
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Date | Notes |
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10/6/2023 | Originated as conversation about adding transit slips/notes on account for patrons who have fines or fees. haven’t talked about what we should do? could we have a conversation about what the best practices are? We’ll get a paging slip for a patron that owes money, so they likely won’t be able to loan it. At the same time we don’t want to not send the item because they might clear their account up. What’s the best route? UCSD: pull item out of stream, billing dept notifies patron about the fine. 7 days to clear, otherwise we send it back. → You could create a new cancelation reason to notify the patron. If your reason is clear (we can’t lend due to fines owed) that might be “good enough”? Having consistent language systemwide for canceling would be good. Want to catch this at the point of paging, not at the circulation desk. This is the direction we’ll go until the blocks are in place. Sahra: I found this page on modifying and/or adding new request cancellation reasons in Alma. I propose we add a new reason referencing fines/fees on the user's account and use the Cancellation Note open text field when cancelling the request to include more details, such as what the user needs to do (i.e. clear the fine and re-request). I'm totally open to the Cancellation Reason Code. Maybe something like "Blocked Due To Fines/Fees" or "Patron Owes Fines/Fees"?? Can we discuss at an upcoming meeting? Ingred: Question about cancelling requests due to fines: If UCSD cancels a request because the user owes us $100, would that request then move to the next UC with an available copy, or will it be cancelled entirely? Does either outcome figure into what information we might want to include in the request cancellation note? Actions Draft language for cancellation reason to notify the patron? Should be able to differentiate text because of the cancellation reason. Develop in tandem with Disco OST?
Request can be canceled from the patron’s home institution and it will stop all forward movement. → Sahra will add a new cancelation reason on her end and do some testing with Ross. |
10/9/2023 | Sahra added cancelation reason on UCR sandbox and we tested for requests placed by me which were canceled on her end. Because no emails are send within the sandbox we don’t know if I would have been notified -OR- if the request was pushed to the next campus in line. next steps: add another member (Ingred) and continue to test, but this time in the live environment. We’ll be able to test emails that are (or aren’t sent) and test if canceling the request pushes it to another campus. Depending on those results, we’ll have to make a determination on if there’s a better process for cancelling a request so it wouldn’t be pushed to another campus (e.g. contacting patron’s home institution and asking for it to be cancelled at the source). |
10/17/2023 | Testing between UCM, UCI and UCR. UCM placed request, UCI cancelled, automatically went to UCR without notifying user and without forwarding any information about cancellation reason. If a campus receives a paging slip and the patron owes fines, the goal would be for the cancellation to stop the entire request and not push it to the next campus in the rota. decision/questions:
This is a (hopefully) temporary solution for when ExL eventually adds automated 04/05 blocks - which they say is on the roadmap (with no ETA). |
10/23/2023 | Discussion on bulleted options listed above. Suggestion to submit ticket to ExL to fix notify patron problem, and still use status quo for allowing patrons to resolve any problems within the 7 day window. Further testing is needed (see action items). Do we know if any letters are being sent for each reason? action items: -test cancellation reasons to see if the notify user option works. maybe start with “cannot be fulfilled”. test w/ Mark. if we need a 3rd Sahra can assist. -(eventually?) submit ticket to ExL to investigate why the “notify user” box isn’t working with AFN patrons |
10/25/2023 | Testing with Merced, Berkeley and Riverside. Tested two existing cancelation reasons and selected option for “notify user”. User was not notified across AFN. User was only notified when home institution cancelled the request (which is what we saw in prior testing). Still left with these options:
Food for thought: → how to we get our users to pay attention to the letters/notices/emails that they receive, and how to we educate them to look at the “my library account”? -education is important because otherwise patrons won’t understand how it works. and who else are they going to learn from and/or how else would they figure it out? → is our responsibility to cancel the request ASAP to get the request to the next campus? or to get them to take care of the fines first. → patrons might not have the same experience at each campus, but maybe they can hear the same messaging. (i.e. maybe as an OST we develop language to share amongst each other and repeat to patrons). |
2/12/2024 | Discussed methods for notifying our patrons and developed the following boiler plate to the “On Hold Shelf” letter: You may not be able to pick up your item(s) if you have active fines/fees at any UC campus. Please verify the status of your account online by logging into your home institution Library Account and reviewing the Fine + Fees tab for each campus listed. To do: determine best placement for text in the letter. Perhaps after “The library material you recently requested has been delivered and is ready for pickup” but before “This material may be picked up at…” |
2/26/2024 | Finalized text above but modified the location. It will go after the first two sentences (“The library material you recently requested has been delivered and is ready for pickup. This material may be picked up at…”) Mark will look into best practices for screen readers/accessibility in how to display this text. |
2/27/2024 | Mark got some info for email based accessibility and shared with the group. Tony did more testing with the <pullquote> command and wasn’t able to get the border to appear in the email. It’s possible that element is intended for webpages vs. emails. He was able to find success using a block-level element to wrap the test and that shouldn’t cause a problem with accessibility. |
3/11/2024 | Generated decision page. |