Lost and Paid CSU+ Items

QUICK GUIDE

Borrower

1. Collect payment (or replacement copy if applicable) from the patron
2. Delete loan from patron’s circulation record (Delete, not Return)
3. Update Resource Sharing record to “Report Lost Item to Partner”
4. Send General Message to Lender indicating the item is lost & paid or a replacement copy was received.
5. Remove the temporary item record from your catalog
6. Forward replacement copy to lending library if applicable.

Lender

1. Update Resource Sharing record to “Lost”
2. If $90 was paid, inform your tech services department of the lost item and follow local procedures to consider re-purchasing the item.  If replacement copy was submitted, follow local procedures dealing with replacement copies.

STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE

Borrower

1. Collect payment per you campus’ policies/procedures.  Payment may include a replacement copy if lender accepts them:  Replacement Copy Policies

2. Delete Loan from Patron’s Circulation Record

Fulfillment > Manage Patron Services > Look up Patron’s record

Find the needed loan under the “Loans” tab (make sure the display is for “all loans”)

Click on the ellipses (•••) next to the appropriate loan. Select “Delete Loan”

***DO NOT RETURN the item or complete the resource sharing request.***  Returning the item will clear the resource sharing request.  You want the resource sharing record to remain (for now).

3. Update Resource Sharing record to “Report Lost Item to Partner”

Locate the appropriate record in your borrowing requests. Click on the “Edit” button

Scroll down to the “Request Status” field. Select “Report Lost Item to Partner” and then Save.

4. Send a general message to the lending indicating the item is lost and the patron has paid the replacement fee or submitted a replacement copy.

Locate the appropriate record in your borrowing requests. Click on the ellipses (•••) and pick “General Message”. Type your message in the field (something like the following will do: "Book reported lost by patron. Replacement fee paid mm/dd/yy"). Click “Send”.

To find lost and paid items: 

Alma does not automatically connect the Resource Sharing request to the loan on the patron account so the Resource Sharing department needs to locate these lost and paid loans using analytics and then update the corresponding Resource Sharing requests.

Open analytics from your institution's Alma. Navigate to the folder below or do a search for the following report: "Lost and Paid CSU+ loans".

File path: Shared Folders > Community > Reports > Institutions > CalState > Resource Sharing > click on "edit" under the Lost and Paid CSU+ loans report

Once you find the report and open the Results tab you will see a list of all the CSU+ loans that have been marked lost and paid. This report provides the title of the item and primary identifier of the patron. Use this information to find corresponding Borrowing requests using steps 1-4 above.

You can run this report automatically and have the results emailed to yourself on a regular basis. See Ex Libris' doc titled How to schedule an Alma Analytics report to be sent by email nightly for instructions and modify to fit your needs.

Lender

1. Update the resource sharing lending record to “Lost”

Locate the appropriate record in your lending requests. Click on the “Edit” button.

Scroll down to the “Request Status” field. Select “Lost” and then Save.

2. If $90 was paid, inform your tech services department of the lost item and follow local procedures to consider re-purchasing the item.  If a replacement copy was submitted, follow local procedures for dealing with replacement copies.

Long overdue CSU+ items

Borrowing Library

QUICK GUIDE

1. Loan is marked as lost (done automatically)
2. Identify long overdue items

3. Check shelves

4. Check the patron account to ensure the loan is marked lost, item charged and letters sent to patron

5. Mark borrowing request lost and communicate loss to lending library

STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE

1. Loan is marked as lost – this is done automatically at 14 days overdue by the overdue/lost loan profile.

Patron receives a notice that the item is marked lost

Patron is billed for replacement charges (usually a $90 fee)

• This fee may be transferred to the campus bursar’s office. Policies on the time frame for this transfer and actions based on incurring this fee (blocking class registration, library privileges, etc.) vary by campus.
• The fee is removed when the item is returned. Policies outlining the time frame of the return also varies by campus.

If the replacement fee is paid the loan is removed from the patron account. See Step 2 of the Borrower Guide above for Lost and Paid CSU+ items.

• The replacement fee can be refunded upon return of the item up to a certain date (refund window determined locally) or if the patron supplies a replacement copy approved by the lending institution.

2. Identify long overdue items

You can go about this two ways:

• Using analytics

Open the analytics report "CSU+ borrowed items due back 90 days ago". Either search for the title or navigate to Shared Folders/Community/Reports/Institutions/CalState/Resource Sharing.

This report shows active CSU+ loans with a loan due date of 90 days ago or more. If opened from your own institution’s Alma instance it will include patron information and title of the item so you can follow up appropriately as outlined below. If opened from the NZ the columns with patron information will be blank or contain  “-1”.

Schedule this report on a regular interval and it can be emailed to you or whoever handles following up on these items. More information on scheduling analytics reports can be found in the Alma Online Help.

• Filtering your Borrowing Requests queue

Use the facets to filter the queue down to  items with

• Due date = “older”
• Status =  Loaned item to patron OR Overdue request

Manually select the requests with due dates of 90 days ago. Although the due date in the borrowing request is different than the loan due date issued to the patron, since either date has long passed at the point you’re doing the search we can use either one.

3. Do a search/shelf check for the items identified

4. Check that the patron actually has the item checked out, it's marked lost and that Alma sent notices to the patron

Look at the loans for the user who requested the item – is the item currently checked out? Is it marked lost and replacement fee charged? If the answer to either of these questions is "no" put the item aside for follow up.

• If the item is not checked out search your shelves and contact the lending institution to check their shelves too. If not found look through the request audit history and item history to see if you can track down the last place the item was scanned. Update the resource sharing request accordingly.
• If the item is not marked lost talk to someone at your institution who does Fulfillment configuration to ensure the overdue/lost loan profile and TOUs are functioning correctly.

Open the user account and look at the Attachments tab to ensure a letter notifying the patron that the item is marked lost was generated.

Attachments are usually sorted by date so find the date the item was marked lost and scan through the attachment list to find the appropriate one. If no attachment is there, it is likely the user has not been contacted about the lost item. Work with a local fulfillment or systems person to identify why a letter was not sent and follow up with the patron.

If you encountered anything unusual during these checks send a general message to the lending institution, inform them of the situation and how the issue is being handled.

5. Mark the borrowing request lost

Marking requests lost is done manually. This indicates that the item has been billed and whatever measures the library takes to get items back from a patron have been taken (library blocks, registration holds, etc.) and the item has not been returned.

Click on Edit and change the Request Status to “Report Lost Item to Partner”. You can also use the check boxes in the queue and use the “Change Status” function. For screenshots showing how to do this refer to Step 3 of the Lost and Paid CSU+ Items above.

Send a General Message to the lending institution indicating that the item has been marked lost and a search/shelf check came back empty.

Lending Library

QUICK GUIDE

1. Identify long overdue items
2. Check shelves
3. Mark lending request lost and communicate status update to borrowing library
4. Proceed with local procedures to consider repurchase or item withdrawal

STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE

1. To find items that you have lent out that are long overdue

Similar to identifying overdue borrowing requests, you can go about this two ways:

• Using analytics

Open the analytics report "Lending Requests with due date more than 90 days ago". Either search for the title or navigate to Shared Folders/Community/Reports/Institutions/CalState/Resource Sharing.

This report shows lending requests filled by your library that have passed their due dates by at least 90 days and have not yet been marked lost.

Schedule this report on a regular interval and it can be emailed to you or whoever handles following up on these items. More information on scheduling analytics reports can be found in the Alma Online Help.

• Filtering your Lending Requests queue

Use the facets to filter the queue down to  items with:

• Due date = “Older”
• Status = “Overdue request” (though if you want to look at other statuses with an older due date that’s good too)

Manually select the requests with due dates of 90+ days ago. Although the due date in the lending request is different than the loan due date issued to the patron, since either date has long passed at the point you’re doing the search you can use either one.

2. Do a search/shelf check for the item.

Search your own shelves and check-in/shipping area. Request a shelf check from the borrowing library also. If both shelf checks come back empty move on to step 3.

3. Mark the lending request lost

Marking requests lost is done manually. Click Edit and update the Request Status to “Lost”. You can also use the check boxes in the queue and use the “Change Status” function. For Screenshots of this see step 1 of the Lending process for Lost and Paid CSU+ items above.

Send a General Message to the borrowing institution indicating that the item has been marked lost.

4. Proceed with local procedures to consider repurchase or item withdrawal

Each institution should adhere to their own local replacement processes for lost CSU+ items.

Once the library wants to do anything with the item (withdraw, delete, etc.) the item has to be scanned in to remove it from the Resource Sharing Request process type and put back “in place”. Alma won’t allow any level of cataloger to do anything with an item that it believes has been shipped off to fill a request. Once the item is scanned in the Lending Request will be marked complete and no longer be marked lost.

The impact of this limitation is somewhat minimal. The lost status of the borrowing request and the loan at the partner institution will be retained. However if you are looking for a gross measure of lost lending requests this will have to be done by using an NZ report measuring lost borrowing requests, limiting the report to your institution as Lender.

There is currently no workaround for this as of August 2018. However the Alma roadmap indicates that at some point in 2019 workflows related to lost/missing resource sharing requests will be improved so hopefully this will remedy the issue.

Contacting the borrowing institution:

If you would like to follow up with the borrowing institution about the status of the item or to request a shelf check at any point in the lending process feel free to do so. General messages (created in Alma, attached to the borrowing/lending request) are recommended as an initial course of action. If you do not receive a response to the GM contact the individual on the CSU+ Contact Sheet found on the RSFC wiki. Please be respectful and recognize that each library has determined the most effective method of getting items back from their users and they may not match the methods used at your institution.