MnLINK VDX Blog

Conditional requests can be helpful in getting a request filled with the correct material or to check if an alternate version is OK. As a Lender when you choose the Answer Conditional option there are a couple of important things to remember to make the process work correctly.

First, it is important to clearly state what your conditional question is. There is a list of Reasons in a drop-down menu when you select Answer Conditional, but it is better to add a note. You can do both. When you add a note, leave the New Note Type as ToCurrnt Lndr.

Second, your conditional request will expire the next day if you do not change the Answer Date. I would suggest that you add 14 days to the Answer Date. 2 weeks should be enough time for the end user to be contacted and the Borrower to respond. If the Conditional expires the request will move on to the next lender in the rota. The Borrower will see the Answer Date information in the Audit Answer Details and also in the Service tab it will display as Date in Answer.

Posted by Nick at 12:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I hear from some of you from time to time about the wrong item being sent with a request. You ask, what can we do to eliminate these errors.

The Pick slips generally have all of the information that we should need to identify a specific item that is being requested. The information that is on the Pick slip comes from the bibliographic record chosen by the end user. This can be found by looking at the Database/# line on the Pick slip. The Title line should display the title and the subtitle and series information. The rest of the information on the Pick slips is fairly self explanatory. Remember to look at the Request notes to see what special instructions have been provided to assist in filling the request with the correct item. Occasionally with compact discs your catalog will have more than one title match for classical music and other CDs. Look at the Publisher Info to make sure that you have the correct item. Look at the Description to make sure the item has the correct number of discs. The Database/# line will also have a publisher number for the requested item. All of these together will help you supply the correct item.

Sometimes there just isn't enough information on the Pick slip to identify what is needed. This would be a good time to use Conditional and ask for more specific information. As important as it is to use Conditional to ask for more information, it is equally important to respond in a timely manner to Conditional questions as a Borrower. For more information about using Conditional check out my June 20, 2006 posting. http://blogs.minitex.umn.edu/mnlink/conditional_requests/

Posted by Nick at 1:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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).

Posted by Nick at 10:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Luckily it doesn't happen very often, but when it does what a pain it is to deal with. You know what i mean, the user who accidentally chose the wrong Pickup Location. There is no easy way to deal with this one because even though you can change information in the request with the action Local Change Request Details the information on the Lender's Pick Slip does not change. When the material arrives the only way to know the changed Pickup Location is to select Details and look under the Borrower tab. Who wants to do that on every request? So what is the best way to handle these changes?

With the introduction of the Cancel button on ZPortal we can always tell our users to Cancel a request that has the wrong Pickup Location and place another request. This option works best if the request is not Shipped. Once the item is already Shipped by the Lender and another request is created that copy is unavailable to fill the new request.

Another option is to wait for the request to arrive and the patron is notified that their request is available. You can have your patron contact their library and have them ship it to another location for pick-up.

Of course you can always use my old tried and true method of sticking Post-it note reminders around the edge of your computer monitor to remind you of the many important changes that need to be made and things that need to be done.

The reason I bring this issue up is I am asked this question occasionally by our users and I don't have a real good answer for this one. I refer these questions back to your library and you're the people who need to know what to do with the information. If someone has a good way to handle this type of problem let us all know. Somebody out there must certainly have a better suggestions than mine.

Posted by Nick at 3:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It is very important to keep the requests moving through your Lender In Process file. You may need to check the file on a regular basis to make sure that requests don’t end up sitting there. Set a timeframe that is reasonable for your location and if your institution hasn’t filled the request, just mark it Not Supplied and give someone else a chance. You can easily sort the requests to present the oldest requests first.

First choose the Requests option to bring up the Advanced Search screen. Scroll down in the Status box and choose In Process. The Status box is directly below the Reset Form button at the top of the screen. Then at the bottom of the screen in the Sort by options select the radio button for ascending. Then select Submit. This will bring up the oldest Lending In Process request first.

If you have any comments, questions or ideas that I should write about please let me know.

Posted by Nick at 9:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)