Circulation Committee Meeting 01-09-2024 (Hybrid)

It’s been 4 years since we met in person!

Marking Items Claims Returned/Never Checked Out

Claims Returned: Once an item is marked Claims Returned, it stays on the patron’s record until it’s removed (ie: checked in). It’s best to use Claims Returned as little as possible. Report templates are available to get a list of items marked Claims Returned.

A better workflow: Renew the item and mark it missing. This gets it off the patron’s record. You can check it in and mark it missing to get it off their card also.

Megan Fenton says: We use Claims Returned as a last resort, but we have had a patron or two that has multiple claims returned from multiple libraries, which can be useful to know as well. Allison Pryor suggested a note be added to a patron’s record in that case.

During the Q&A Kharin Villaflor wanted to circle back to this: If a patron claims they returned a book at multiple libraries, unless its being notated each time a patron claims it, we won’t know the actual number.

When an item marked Claims Returned gets checked in, the number of Claims Returned recorded on a patron’s record goes down.

We need to find another way and use it as little as possible. Claims Never Checked Out is not a great option.

Lindsay Stratton–It depends on what your plans are…

  • Are you going to hold the patron responsible? Then you should eventually mark the item lost. Here’s a suggestion: You can renew the item, tell the patron we will look for the item over the next 6 weeks and ask them to look as well, and if not found say they are responsible.
  • If you are not holding the patron responsible for the item, clear it from their account and mark it missing.

Megan Fenton–We run biannual reports of Claims Returned and remove any that are exceptionally old (with a note on the patron’s account).

Allison Midgley  – There are two report templates to use, Claims Returned Items by Owning Library and Claims Returned Items by Checkout Library. You can also find them by searching for “Claims returned” in the search field.

Never Checked Out: Lindsay says that when you mark an item as Never Checked Out it automatically marks the item as missing.

Patron Stat Cats

Libraries use stat cats in different ways and they need clean up!

In addition to the profile that every patron has, there are also stat cats at the bottom of the edit screen. Some libraries use them to differentiate between patrons. Example: Contract patrons–adult and juvenile, Resident/non-resident (super important for annual report!)

It seems redundant to mark a patron both Contract and non-resident. Need to come up with a standard practice.

WLS out of system accounts are used for this. We need to have a discussion about how we use it, how we want to use it and what the intention is when we make those choices. AOC/JOC–adult and children out of county patrons, whereas Contract is within.

Some libraries use stat cats for nannies, teachers, etc.

Stat cats are rarely updated when a patron moves because they are buried at the bottom of the screen–makes reporting on these really hard. Is there another way to indicate they are a teacher, nanny, etc. so it’s easier to keep things up-to-date?

Examples and comments members pointed out:

  • Alix Townley–BDV has a private school in their area that they provide library cards to its students. Many students live in CT–didn’t know to mark non-resident.
  • MTP uses stat cat for funding information.
  • Kharin Villaflor–All Sleepy Hollow patrons are Acontract
  • Marianne BRO Bronxville does not use the Patron stat cats for cards that are issued to non residents. We give them a 1 year privilege on the expiration date of their card, so they have to be renewed every year.

So many different scenarios! We will discuss it at a later time.

Lindsay provided NYS annual report definition of residents/non-residents:

  • 3.2 Registered Resident Borrowers – Count the total number of individual borrowers, registered by the library as library cardholders that reside in the library’s chartered service area. Multiply by 2.77 if registration method is by household or family.
  • 3.3 Registered Non–Resident Borrowers – Report the total number of individual borrowers, registered by the library as card–holders, that do not reside in the library’s chartered service area. Include here individuals that reside in areas the library has contracted to serve.

It seems we all agree that stat cats are the absolute worst 🙂 More information to come on this topic! We will discuss again.

Patron Purge Update

Originally intended to be set up in 2021 but have not been updating since 2021 because of an error (more specifically, a typo) in the software code.

There are other issues with our purge process because of decisions we made as part of pandemic closures and libraries going fine-free:

  • A substantial number of records would be purged–largest pool would be patrons expired for 21 months and have fines under $25 and no lost items, no open transactions. It’s a large chunk of most library’s patrons’ accounts.
  • Expired but using online resources: relaxed the rules during pandemic, removed requirement that they had to be an active non-expired user. Going to reimplement that if you’re expired you have to renew your account access. Prior to doing that we are going to identify those patrons so we can get a notification out to them. We will build into the purge process as a method of activity.
  • Extended library card expiration dates as well through to 2021 during the pandemic. Some patrons should have been previously purged.
  • Libraries have been clearing old accounts of fines–they will also be in the current pool of records to be purged.

Working on getting info out to libraries to better understand the drop in records for annual reporting.

Allison will come up with a statement for annual reports (note) to explain large change in the statistic, because that’s what the state will want to see.

Will speak about this at the next technology committee meeting.

Reminders

Update your closed dates in Evergreen for 2024. Allison can send a link if you need help. If you have regular days that you are closed (ex: closed Sundays in summer) send a help desk ticket the Sunday before it begins. Send another ticket when you go back to winter hours.

Confirm circulation contact information on the shared spreadsheet. Many libraries are changing to their own email domain. Committee members are highlighted. Please also view the contacts on the Circulation page; if updates are needed, email Allison M.

Using Solar Winds for Help Desk queries: Login with the Single Sign-in button at the bottom of the screen and use your Active Directory credentials firstname.lastname@westchesterlibraries.org and your VDI/Evergreen password. If you have any issues logging in, contact the Help Desk. Help Desk is currently in the process of updating the system where if you ask a question it populates suggestions.

Discussion and Q&A

Nora from PEK – If we run a report of the most books checked out for the year, are items 6 month old available in the report? Yes.

Allison M – There are two report templates available relating to this: List Titles With High Circ by Owning Library and Date Range and List Titles With Circ by Checkout Library & Date Range. The latter shows what is checked out at your library – a better indicator of what’s popular with your patrons.

Kharin reported that she runs a stat cat report for patrons every month, and that stat cats don’t change on the report even if you change in it in Evergreen. Allison M. updated the template List Patrons by Library & Statistical Category. More changes will be ahead, depending on discussions about the future of Patron Stat Cats.

TUK is undergoing a renovation. They moved upstairs to the community center. Lindsay just reinstated them as a hold pickup location (as of last Friday 1/5/24) however it may not be updated yet in the WLS app. Collections are not yet fully holdable because only a portion of their collection was moved (we think!).

We will have hybrid meetings in 2024 but would love to have as many people in person at our May meeting (05-14-2024).

Our next meeting is on March 12th (hybrid).

Happy New Year!