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Lesley Zavediuk: (10/19/2016 13:00) Good Afternoon Everyone and Welcome to SHARE Chat! I'm holding down the fort today as Sue is at the ILA conference, but I'll do my best to answer any circ questions and we can always turn to the collective if necessary. :)
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:00) So, what would you all like to discuss?
Andy Rowe: (13:02) Is there some place that tells what each patron code is & what limits or advantages they have?
Yvonne Williams West Sangamon Public Library: (13:03) Is there still a discussion ongoing regarding more uniform checkout due dates?
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:03) Hi Andy! I believe it depends on what limits your library has chosen for each patron codes and what patron codes you wanted included in your set up. Traci Edwards would be the person to call/email to check on that information or if you want to change anything with patron codes.
Mary @ Hayner: (13:03) Do any of you limit the number of DVDs your patrons may check out at one time?
Andy Rowe: (13:03) Thank you! I will check with her.
Andy Rowe: (13:04) We limit 5 Dvds on an account at a time. Otherwise they will wipe out our collection
Yvonne Williams West Sangamon Public Library: (13:04) We limit to 10 DVDs per patron and we have just reduced our loan period from 2 weeks to 1 week.
Brenda Gilpatrick Red Bud Public: (13:04) We limit to two 2, and they are due in 7 days.
Noel @ Maryville Library: (13:04) Maryville Patrons can get 6 dvds at a time.
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:05) Hi Yvonne. I think the consensus has been that checkout periods will always be a local library decision - so it's doubtful that all of our fabulous SHARE libraries could have uniform loan periods. But smaller groups seem to discuss now and then how they might get closer to each other.
Laura: (13:05) Fairview has 10 dvd limit
Laura: (13:05) I have a question about epay. A patron oof ours paid for a lost book that belongs to another library thru epay. Do we have to turn around and pay that library with a check?
Julia Ellis, Six Mile RLD: (13:06) There is a report--under Tools-- Patron code loan periods and fines.
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:08) Laura, my inclination would be that the answer to that question is yes. I think if your library uses ePay, then the payment would have gone into an account for your library. Chris Dawdy would be the one to ask that question to - she is also at the ILA Conference this week, but if you shoot her an email she'll get you a more definitive answer.
Yvonne Williams West Sangamon Public Library: (13:08) Thanks Lesley. It is so hard when some loan periods are as little as 3 days and others are 4 weeks. We have really had to train our patrons to pay attention to due dates because it is no longer, "everything is due in 2 weeks".
Laura: (13:09) Thanks Lesley I'll do that!
Andy Rowe: (13:09) Thank you Julia!
Noel @ Maryville Library: (13:09) I agree wit Yvonne. I understand that we can all make our own rules, but it would be nice if movie and music items were at least a week at a time, and books at least two weeks. I can't tell you how many times patrons order in items that are 300-500 pages long and only have a week to read it.
Noel @ Maryville Library: (13:10) *with not wit
Laura: (13:13) I have another question. Our Leap has not worked since the last Polaris upgrade. I heard that the sign in is different. Do we need to reload it or just sign in differently /
April Jensen Lincoln Public Library: (13:13) has anyone had to replace their epson tv88 receipt printers? ours is printing lighter and lighter
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:15) YOur sign in for LEAP will be the same as your Polaris log in after the upgrade. I think the trick is that you need to add in the domain name. So I think you need to use your username @share.ihls.lcl and then use the same password you use to log into Polaris.
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:16) When I log into leap I use lzavediuk@share.ihls.lcl for my user name
Laura: (13:17) So we should use @share.ihls.lcl or our own library?
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:18) April, I feel like this has come up before and replacing the print head is something that can help. However, I can't remember how much replacing a print head for one of those costs - it may be close to replacing the whole receipt printer... Anybody else have an idea?
Esther Curry--C.E. Brehm Memorial PLD: (13:18) April--is your receipt printer a thermal or the older style? I think there was a discussion on this during one of the IT chats.
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:19) I'm asking Brandon now - he remembers that all he found is that faint printing probably indicates that the printer head needs to be replaced. He found info at these links: one, two
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:21) He also said that there might be a switch at the bottom of your printer that you can turn on to make it darker. So you might take a look there.
April Jensen Lincoln Public Library: (13:21) its a thermal pritner.
April Jensen Lincoln Public Library: (13:22) i was wondering if its a brandon question.
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:24) AH and those are actually supposed to be two separate links. Here is one.
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:24) And here is the other.
April Jensen Lincoln Public Library: (13:24) thanks.
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:30) Sorry, Laura - just saw your last question. You should use whatever normally auto-fills in for you when you sign into Polaris. So when you sign into Polaris you type in your user name and then hit the tab key (the field then fills in the domain name for you).
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:30) I've just sent a chat to Traci to see if she can confirm that for me or shed some light on the subject.
Laura: (13:31) Ok thanks!
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:32) ah! Traci says that only WE have to do that. You should be able to enter in your user name (no domain needed) and password. The same thing you use with Polaris. I would submit a help desk ticket if that isn't working for you and we can check your permissions and settings to make sure something isn't strange!
Laura: (13:34) Ok got it!
Julie Jarman Staunton PL: (13:35) Hi everyone, we really have trouble with the three day rental on DVDS. If it is a series, many times the patron will just hand it back over because they know there is no way they can finish it in time. No renewals makes it very difficult. Is there any way some libraries would consider changing the three day rental? just a thought, no offense to anyone who is curretnly using this practice.
Laura: (13:38) We have the same thing happen here. When we check it out and tell them the date they tell us to just keep it.
Mary @ Hayner: (13:39) Same here, Julie. We have some patrons that specifically request that we not order items from certain libraries with 3 day rental times because they know they won't have time to watch it.
Laura - Chatham: (13:40) @Laura I know at one point the url changed for Leap. Try typing this into your address bar and see if your username and password work for it. I knew this threw us for a loop when it changed. :) Leap login
Laura: (13:41) Thanks I'll give it a try!
Esther Curry--C.E. Brehm Memorial PLD: (13:41) The Circ committee has had this discussion on many, many occassions. It is a huge frustration, but these libraries don't want to change--which is their right. That was why the committee with the option of fines following the patron rather than the library. These 3 loans are often the ones that charge $1/day
Mary @ Hayner: (13:41) Esther is right. It's been very frustrating.
Laura: (13:42) Wow...
Andy Rowe: (13:43) Does anyone do Homebound checkouts? Do you let them get items from different libraires with different loan dates? How do you handle that, besides waiving any overdue fines?
Esther Curry--C.E. Brehm Memorial PLD: (13:43) I think that there could be some movement to "universal" loan periods for books/print materials. But we always hit the wall when we started discussing DVDs
Esther Curry--C.E. Brehm Memorial PLD: (13:44) Andy--we use a Senior patron class which is set to not charge fines.
Mary @ Hayner: (13:44) DVDs seem to be the biggest sticking point. And there are valid concerns. Especially when talking about the difference between a single disc DVD and a TV series that has potentially 7 or 8 discs.
Linda Richter: (13:46) We only checkout our materials to homebound. Waive fees also
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:46) While we're here - I might as well pick your brains. We'll be conducting the SHARE Circulation Forum via Zoom next week and we're working on the agenda. Any topics you would really like us to discuss?
April Jensen Lincoln Public Library: (13:48) other libraries that do not follow any rules (constant resetting the due date, overriding holds etc) and how to deal with them.
April Jensen Lincoln Public Library: (13:49) or just overriding holds
Esther Curry--C.E. Brehm Memorial PLD: (13:49) Reminder to run some of the very helpful Circ reports--items that are wandering around in-transit or got checked in at the wrong place, etc.
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:50) Great ideas Esther and April. Keep em coming!
Laura: (13:50) Have we ever discussed making circulation training videos? It's hard to get new employees into a class and we could use the videos as a training tool at our staff meetings.
Julie Jarman Staunton PL: (13:50) Thanks at least for the discussion on three day loaning periods. I know no one wants to be told what to do by another library or a library system. It was a good discussion at any rate.
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:50) There are quite a few circulation videos on the SHARE website here.
Candace Hancock - FREP: (13:51) Lesley, for the Circ. Forum, please make sure everyone knows how and does overdue notices:)
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:51) I think Sue made enough to pretty much cover what she covers in a Basic Circ Class. You can find them by scrolling down to Circulation > Videos
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:52) We're still working on making this page prettier and we've been discussing what other types of training videos we can get up there - so more will definitely be coming in the new year!
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:52) Thanks Candace!
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:53) We've got about 9 minutes left - any other burning questions for today? Are any of you chatting from ILA?
April Jensen Lincoln Public Library: (13:54) best way to do inventory with Polaris
Esther Curry--C.E. Brehm Memorial PLD: (13:55) I agree with April! We use the inventory tool, but we muddle through it. I know that there is more that we can do with it, but I'm not sure how and I really don't have the time to "play" with it.
Lesley Zavediuk: (13:56) Great idea. Inventory might not make it onto next week's agenda - but I'll make sure we get it on a future circulation forum agenda. Maybe we can have a special guest come and talk about it!
Yvonne Williams West Sangamon Public Library: (13:56) Thanks for the suggestion to avoid libraries with 3 day loan periods on DVDs. This will help our patrons.
Virginia GECS: (13:56) Use Polaris Inventory Manager. We found it to be easy to use.
Yvonne Williams West Sangamon Public Library: (13:57) Inventory Manager is great, we just don't have the time or staff to stay on top of it. We're lucky to do it once a year.
Virginia GECS: (13:58) We discovered that we were not shelving some of out formats in the order that our call numbers in Polaris was organizing them. This has let to a huge project to rearrange information in the call number fields so that inventory will work next time.
April Jensen Lincoln Public Library: (13:58) is that under utilities
Esther Curry--C.E. Brehm Memorial PLD: (14:00) Inventory manager is a separate software that we have installed on a Windows tablet computer. I think it's available for desktop as well. It's free, but not everyone uses it.
April Jensen Lincoln Public Library: (14:01) ok. i am insterested in that who do I contact for it? and can we use it on a laptop instead of a tablet?
Virginia GECS: (14:01) IT is a separate package, but free. I worked with Joe DeVillez at IHLS when I set up the inventory manager. THere is an instruction guide with the worftare that is fairly easy to understand.
Virginia GECS: (14:01) software
Esther Curry--C.E. Brehm Memorial PLD: (14:01) You can contact Traci Edwards
Lesley Zavediuk: (14:01) Joe had made a video about Inventory last year - so you may want to check it out for some basic starter information and we'll put our heads together and get some better information together and out to the masses. :) You can find the video on the SHARE website, under Training>Circulation>Videos>Inventory or here.
April Jensen Lincoln Public Library: (14:01) great. thank you all.
Jane: (14:02) We use Inventory Manager with laptops over our wireless network, and it works just fine.
Yvonne Williams West Sangamon Public Library: (14:02) So do we
Lesley Zavediuk: (14:02) And with that - Chat is over. Thanks for the great ideas and a great discussion! We'll see you all next time.
Yvonne Williams West Sangamon Public Library: (14:03) Thanks!
Candace Hancock - FREP: (14:03) thank you
Julie Jarman Staunton PL: (14:03) Thanks all!