The University of Sheffield
The University Library

8. Lending Services


Description of Service

Provision of a lending service to manage the availability of Library material: issue, renewal, return, reservations, recalls, handling of circulation related enquiries, and administration of appropriate penalties for defaulting borrowers.

Client Groups/Eligibility for Services

All University staff and students, NHS staff and external users with external borrowing rights.

Provider Responsibility

  1. To maintain an accurate record of borrower circulation transactions and ensure that reservations are dealt with and returned books are re-shelved promptly
  2. To monitor active reservation requests and provide regular feedback to users on the progress of requests
  3. To ensure the maximum availability of materials by providing a fast turnaround of reserved items

User Responsibility

  1. To have their UCard or Library card available when they wish to borrow
  2. To renew or return books and other materials by the due date and to the site from which they were borrowed
  3. To care properly for Library materials
  4. To pay any fines which result from the late return of material
  5. To ensure that their correct address (semester and vacation) is notified to the University, or in the case of external borrowers, to the Library
  6. To ensure that any books they re-shelve are returned to the correct location
  7. To read and respond to Library emails and letters

Availability of Service

During Library opening hours until 15 minutes before closing. It is possible to renew items 24/7 via Star and the Renewals Hotline and to reserve items and check the status of reservations and document supply requests 24/7 via Star. See Service 9, Self Service Account Management for details.

Service Statistics/Outputs

A log of all transactions is maintained from which a range of reports is generated regularly, and on demand as needed for specific purposes.
Occasional analysis of loans data by site, user status, department and type of material.
A record of reservation requests from which statistics of types of request, uncollected requests, user reports, recalls and untraceable Library material are available for analysis.

Service Measures

Re-shelving
  • 90% of returned items will be re-shelved within 2 working days
Reservations
  • In semester: 60% of all requests will be available for collection within 5 working days and 90% within 10 working days of the request being placed
  • In vacation: 60% of all requests will be available for collection within 10 working days and 90% within 15 working days of the request being placed

Dependencies

The Campus Network.
Borrower records are derived from the CiCS/Student Services student database.
Where the late return of reserved Library material occurs, a delay in the circulation of heavily requested material is likely.
Re-shelving dependent on lifts being in working order.

Feedback and Monitoring

The Library's Customer Services Group Strategy Team monitors service quality and considers feedback from users via the Comments, Compliments and Complaints scheme.
Sample returns are collected from Talis twice weekly and checked for progress on a daily basis to monitor re-shelving service measures.
Statistics of Talis transactions are collected to monitor reservation service measures.
Annual Student Satisfaction Survey.
SCONUL dataset records volume of loans by loan status.

Benchmarking

SCONUL dataset records volume of loans by loan status.

Location of Service

Customer Services Group

Contact Details

Exclusions

Library staff will not normally retrieve material on behalf of users. They are expected to visit the Library in person and locate their own material in order to borrow.
The re-shelving of returned store materials is excluded from the service measure.
Some categories of material, e.g. Core Reference items, are not normally available through the reservation service.

Charges

The service is free of charge, except when material is either lost or damaged, or is not returned on time. See http://www.shef.ac.uk/library/services/fines.html for details of charges for non-return or late return of materials.

Failure Response

In the event of system failure, an automated backup system is provided. Any failure of the main system for technical reasons is investigated immediately during core hours. Outside these times, the response time is longer and depends on the availability of technical staff. Should the back-up system fail, then a manual system is available to ensure that the borrowing service remains available.
Users are invited to place a Document Supply request, free of charge, after 10 days if the Library is unable to locate a reserved item. Alternatively, in the case of multiple reservation requests for an item which cannot be located, the Library will order a replacement copy immediately.