Patron barcode changes
Question: We have a patron who had to get a new card for some reason (old one was lost, stolen, whatever). He had placed 10-15 requests on the old card. Because that card is no longer valid in our ILS, it doesn’t validate in MnLINK. His new card validates, but there are no requests attached to it. What happens to his requests that are still in process in MnLINK? Will they ever arrive? Will we be able to connect them to him?
Response: Good question. The requests previously placed are still active. Those requests have the name and barcode used for requesting attached in the Borrower Details. You can do a Client Barcode search for that user in VDX to locate all of the requests if your user contacts you about their status, but the user can not access the account via ZPortal. On your circulation system’s end, if you remove the barcode from the user account you will only be able to match the MnLINK request up with the patron by looking at the Borrower Details. If your library leaves old barcodes attached to the patron circulation record and somehow denotes that it is invalid, you may still be able to search by the barcode on the bottom of the Pick slip depending on your system’s capabilities.
To search in VDX for Client Barcode, you can either do a Simple Search or Advanced Search, and format the search with your 3 letter code, hyphen, patron barcode (e.g. cce-22086000000000).