The library is an arena of possibility, opening both a window into the soul and a door onto the world.
Rita Dove
Objectives:* Define the concept of resource sharing
* Verify, locate and process interlibrary loan/document delivery requests using online sources
* Select appropriate delivery options for ILL/document delivery requests
Required reading
Lunau, Carol d. “Canadian Resource Sharing at the Close of the 20th Century.” National Library News Nov. 1999. 26 Mar. 2001. http://epe.lac-bac.gc.ca/100/202/301/nlnews/nlnews-h/1999/nov99e/3111-18e.htm
National Library of Canada. “Interlibrary Loan Policy.” http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/6/16/s16-204-e.html
Introduction
In the first act of Hamlet, Polonius gives the following advice to his son Laertes: “Neither a borrower nor a lender be.” Fortunately libraries do not practice this maxim, but rather engage in the task of opening the world to their users. From the smallest public library in rural Manitoba to the largest academic library and all those in between, no matter their type or size, there is an obligation to fulfill the information needs of users. Just because a library does not own a particular item is no reason to shrug our shoulders and say: “Sorry.” Libraries are in the business of bringing users and items together. For this reason, resource sharing activities including interlibrary loan/document delivery exists.
Resource sharing
In 1994 “A Canadian Information Resource Sharing Strategy” was published. This discussion stated: The goal of resource sharing is to ensure that Canadian library patrons have rapid, convenient access at reasonable cost to information required for research, business or leisure purposes…” In 1999 the National Library reported:
Interlibrary loan continues to be the mainstay of resource sharing. However, union catalogue development, cooperative cataloguing, cooperative reference, cooperative collection development and joint storage of material are all components of A National Information Resource Sharing Strategy. (Resource Sharing)Carole Launau’s article “Canadian Resource Sharing at the Close of the 20th Century” pinpoints the growth of library consortia as the first general characteristic of the present library environment. The pervasiveness of change and the impact of technology, primarily the Internet and the World Wide Web, are listed as the other two. Libraries are feeling the impact of technology “by an increase in workload, an increase in requests from other countries or regions, greater accessibility to resources for a library’s patrons, and more knowledgeable patrons”. Most libraries report increases in interlibrary loan activity, with 42.8% automating their ILL functions. Of the respondents, 68.8% had reciprocal borrowing agreements, but only 12.7% (mostly academic libraries) offered patron-initiated ILL.
Interlibrary loan
Interlibrary loan (ILL) is the process by which a library requests material from, or, supplies materials to, another library…
(CLA/ASTED InterLibrary Loan Code, 1996, 4)
The provision of published or unpublished documents in hardcopy, microform, or digitized format, usually for a fixed fee upon request. In most libraries, document delivery service is provided by the interlibrary loan office and patrons must pickup the material at the library. Also refers to the physical or electronic delivery of documents from a library collection to the residence or place of business of a library user, upon request. (Reitz)New electronic technologies have brought ILL into the forefront of library operations. It is impossible for any one library to contain all the items, whether books, periodicals, audiovisual materials, etc. ever produced. At some point in time you will be asked for something which is not in your collection. This is when an interlibrary loan may be appropriate.
Interlibrary loan is provided through the co-operative efforts of libraries from around the globe, and is governed by local, national and international codes. The basic document governing ILL practice in Canada is the CLA/ASTED Interlibrary Loan Code revised in 1995. Examples of provincial ILL codes are Saskatchewan Resource Sharing (http://www.lib.sk.ca/staff/ill/resshareill.html) and Interlibrary Loan Code for British Columbia Public Libraries (http://www.bcpl.gov.bc.ca/qc/showstatic.php?page=staticpages/systech/illcode/index.txt) The National Library of Canada acts as a backup to local efforts.
According to the CLA/ASTED InterLibrary Loan Code, the purpose of ILL “is to obtain, upon the request of a library user, materials not available in the user’s local library.” (4). Any type of materials can be requested, not just books and periodical articles. It is the choices of the potential lending library, however, to determine whether or not it will lend certain formats. Many libraries, for example, will not lend:
- reference materials
- entire issues of journals
- rare and or fragile items
- items in high demand, e.g. bestsellers, new books
- items which are difficult or expensive to ship, e.g. oversize materials
- audiovisual items
- textbooks
In the past, interlibrary loan was oftentimes a slow somewhat cumbersome ser vice relying almost exclusively on the public mail system for the sending of requests and receipt of materials. Much “detective” work could be involved in trying to determine who had the items you were seeking to borrow. In today’s world, however, we have electronic access to a myriad of resources such as OPACs and electronic union databases to assist in finding locations. We also have a variety of alternatives to traditional mail services, ranging from couriers to fax to electronic document transmission systems.
Many libraries now use the term “document delivery” or “document delivery and interlibrary loan” instead of “interlibrary loan”. By doing so they reflect the change in the practice that has occurred. There are now a variety of sources from which to obtain items not physically held in a library. As the definition of document delivery previously given indicates, actual loaning of items from one library to another is just one of many ways to obtain requested materials.
In traditional interlibrary loan, a library borrows items from other libraries on behalf of users. Alternatively, a library might buy items from a document supplier such as CIST I (http://cisti-icist.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/eng/services/cisti/document-delivery.html) or Ingenta (http://www.ingenta.com/) on behalf of its users. In either case, the library acts as an intermediary between the user and the item requested. The item is received by the library which then informs the user who must then pick it up.
In situations where reciprocal borrowing arrangements have been set up, rather than having an item sent directly to a user’s “home” library, it may be preferable to send the user directly to the participating library which has the item. The user can then borrow it directly. Red River College, the University of Manitoba and the University of Winnipeg, for example, have an agreement that allows students, faculty and staff from any of the three institutions to borrow materials on-site and in person from any of the three participating libraries.
When users download or print off a full text article from a database service made available through their library, such as EBSCOhost, they are in effect participating in a document delivery transaction. Similarly, if a library allows users to place their own orders from a document delivery source, document delivery occurs.
What are the steps involved in an interlibrary loan?
Receive request
An interlibrary loan starts with a request from a patron for an item he or she cannot find in the library’s collection. The request can be received in a variety of ways. Sometimes patrons are in the library and approach the library staff with a citation to an item they have been unable to find. Alternatively, more and more libraries allow patrons to request items not in the local collection through forms mounted on their website. See for example, the Red River College Library’s “Book Request Form” and “Article Request Form” accessible from http://library.rrc.ca/Services/Inter-Library-Loan.aspx
Once you determine that the user is eligible to receive ILL service, staff next check to ensure bibliographic facts about the item are correct. This process is known as “bibliographic verification”. Verification consist s of checking in authoritative sources, the details of an item that allow it to be identified completely and unambiguously. For a book, it would be such information as its author, title, year of publication, publisher and place of publication; for a magazine or journal, its author, article title, title of the magazine or journal, year, volume and page number(s). Authoritative sources include such tools as union catalogues, e.g. MAPLIN and AMICUS; print and electronic indexing databases, e.g. CBCA, EBSCOhost, and Reader’s Guide; and bibliographies, e.g. Bibliography of the Prairie Provinces. For in print items, consider using the web sites from commercial book stores such as Chapters Indigo http://www.chapters.indigo.ca/, McNally Robinson http://www.mcnallyrobinson.com/home, Amazon http://www.amazon.ca/ etc.
When verifying journal articles, you may find that the indexing source does not spell out in full the name of the journal in which an article appears. It may be necessary to consult an abbreviations list to determine the full journal title. Many such lists are available over the Web. Try the phrase “journal abbreviations” in a search engine to retrieve some. A gateway that provides access to journal abbreviations in many different subject areas is All That JAS: Journal Abbreviation Sources available at http://www.abbreviations.com/. The D.W. Craik Engineering Library at the University of Manitoba also maintains a “Journal Abbreviations” page which provides links to other journal abbreviations sites at http://www.umanitoba.ca/libraries/units/engineering/abbrev.shtml
Bopp and Smith provide several reasons why citations may not be correct.
- Newspapers, magazines, scholarly books and articles may not provide enough bibliographic details for an item to be found.
- Students may not have written down complete or accurate information about an item their instructor wants them to read.
- Instructors may have provided incomplete or inaccurate references to their students.
- Many citations come from non standard sources which may not provide complete information e.g. the Internet, or from colleagues.
Find locations
Once it is determined that the requested item is not available either physically or electronically at the local library, the next step is to find out where the item is located. Sometimes both the bibliographic verification and location steps can be done at the same time. For example, if either MAPLIN or AMICUS is used to check the citation for a book or other item, it tells you which library or libraries reported having a copy. Finding locations for requested items is much easier now. Web mounted catalogues, for even the smallest libraries, are not uncommon today.
Prepare and transmit request
By far the preferred method of transmitting interlibrary loan requests nowadays is electronic. If using an ILL module which is part of a bibliographic utility, such as A-G Canada, AMICUS or OCLC, it is important to follow the protocols laid down by the system. Where e-mail is unavailable, fax, telephone, and regular mail are options.
Receive and prepare materials for users
For items which need to be returned such as books, be sure to retain any special packaging so it can be used when returning the item. The basic rule for returns is to send the item back using the same method it was sent to you. If the item was sent by courier, for example, you would return it by courier. If it was insured, you have an obligation to return it insured. Note any restrictions such as “no photocopying,” or “in library use only”, and notify the patron the item has arrived. Be sure you make the patron aware of the due date for return to your library. Photocopies are normally kept by the patron.
Return borrowed items
The lending library sets the borrowing period and it is your responsibility as the borrowing library to adjust the time allotted for the patron to have the item to ensure it reaches the originating library on time. Sometimes it is possible to extend loan periods but such requests should be made well before the initial loan period is over. As mentioned earlier, items should be returned the same way they were sent, unless instructed to do otherwise.
Compile statistics
Statistical records of interlibrary loans need to be kept. Statistics are useful in assessing your collection’s strengths and weaknesses. Such statistics are commonly kept in electronic format, either using an in-house system or a commercial package.
Snags
Naturally not all attempts to borrow material will go smoothly. There will be times when you will not be able to verify an item. When this occurs it should be noted if you are passing it on to another source for fulfillment. Patrons will lose items, return them in damaged condition, or not return them on time. Your library should have policies to cover these and other snags in the system.
Cost
Interlibrary loan predates photocopier technology and thus the name derives from the fact that originally libraries lent actual books. This meant that copyright was not an issue as the original item was not copied, but rather lent and then returned. Although never free to operate, costs were minimal and volume low. Oftentimes ILL was only available at academic libraries and then only to academic staff and not to students. Using the mails and printed library catalogues, it might take weeks or months for a request to be located and received.
Nowadays, the interlibrary loan/document delivery section may be the most technologically advanced library department. Time is of the essence and demand is high. With end-user searching of databases and an extension of service to all client groups requests for interlibrary loans have swelled. The majority of items now asked for are journal articles, not books. This is occurring at a time when many libraries have cut their serials titles because of rising costs.
Costs are incurred in ILL in staff time, photocopying, postage, courier charges, telecommunication charges, fees charged by lending libraries, etc. Mary Jackson as part of the ILL/DD Performance Measures Study concluded that in research libraries “the average cost for a completed ILL transaction in 1996 was $27.83.” Many libraries choose to pass some of these costs on to their patrons. Others absorb the costs.
To recoup some of the costs of providing ILL/DD services, a number of libraries have imposed significant fees on interlibrary loan requests. The University of British Columbia, for example, charges community/alumni cardholders a minimum of $30.00 per request. Fees charged by Canadian libraries can be found in the National Library of Canada’s ILL Directory on the Web. A library’s Web site may also have information about any ILL/document delivery fees it charges. See for example, the Health Sciences Libraries page at the University of Manitoba Libraries at http://www.umanitoba.ca/libraries/units/health/docdel/lending.html
CopyrightAs more and more libraries are requesting articles through ILL/DD the issue of copyright has gained in importance. Normally libraries do not lend entire issues of periodicals. Instead a photocopy of the requested article is made and sent to the “borrowing” library. In the vast majority of cases the copy of the article is “given” to the patron to keep, either free of charge, or for a fee as stated in the library’s ILL policy. The amount and use of photocopied material may be governed by copyright legislation. Remember that copyright varies from country to country. What is permissible under Canadian copyright legislation may not be permissible in the United States and vice versa.
New issues surrounding copyright have arisen as more and more documents are made available through contractual agreements with electronic fulltext database providers. If a library does not have an actual paper copy of an article in its collection but rather access to an electronic version for which it has paid, does it have the right to make a copy of it for another library which does not subscribe to the service? Elsevier Science a major publisher of scientific journals has responded to the issue by developing an interlibrary loan policy for its electronic files which is accessible at http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/intro.cws_home/SD%20interlibrary%20loan
Participating library types and locations
Interlibrary loan is not exclusive to any one type of library. All libraries can participate as long as they conform to the established codes. Traditionally, however, school libraries have been much less active in requesting interlibrary loans than other types of libraries. In Manitoba, teachers can borrow directly from the Instructional Resources Unit of the Department of Education, Citizenship and Youth which eliminates the need for many interlibrary loan requests.
ILL is an international service. It is not restricted to any one country. Normally, a library will request materials from within its own country’s borders before going abroad. In Manitoba, Public Library Services provides interlibrary loan back-up to all public libraries outside of Winnipeg. If a local library cannot find an item itself, it can forward the request to PLS which will use its resources to find locations. When local and provincial resources have been exhausted requests for specific items can be forwarded to the National Library of Canada. The National Library will lend items, or provide photocopies of articles if they are in its collection. If they do not have a copy they will supply locations for those libraries that do. For more detailed information on the role of the National Library in ILL check out its ILL policy at http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/6/16/s16-204-e.html
Libraries are free to request loans from other libraries anywhere in the world as appropriate. Some libraries may not loan directly, but require you to go through a central agency. It is usually best to try and find an item locally first and then branch out further afield if it cannot be found. Borrowing from other countries may require currency conversion or the use of special coupons or vouchers to cover fees. Guidelines governing international lending can be found on the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) Web page at http://www.ifla.org/files/docdel/documents/international-lending-en.pdf
Document delivery
If instead of requesting items from another library, particularly in the case of periodical articles, a library chooses to purchase a copy from a document supplier, different procedures will be followed. Oftentimes speed is a factor in choosing a commercial document service over a library.
The Canada Institute for Scientific and Technical Information (CISTI) http://cisti-icist.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/eng/services/cisti/document-delivery/service-levels/custom-services.html provides a fee-based document delivery system for articles in science, technology and medicine. It guarantees delivery of “urgent service documents” within two hours by fax or Ariel for an additional surcharge. Cinahl, a nursing database, http://www.ebscohost.com/cinahl/ offers access to most of the items it indexes for a fee with selected files available for immediate downloading. Ingenta http://www.ingenta.com/ is a major supplier of documents in all subject fields. It has a database which can be searched for free. Articles found in the database can be ordered immediately usually at a cost of less than $25.00 U.S. Information on other document delivery services is available on the Internet Library for Librarians at http://www.itcompany.com/inforetriever/
Document delivery is most popular with special librarians which may have a relatively small staff but demanding patrons who need information quickly. Document delivery services may allow patrons to by-pass libraries entirely and order items directly from them as long as payment is guaranteed e.g. by credit card.
Interlibrary loan tools
Numerous finding aids are available to assist in both verifying and locating items. The World Wide Web in particular has been a boon to interlibrary loan. Two types of finding aides are particularly important, union catalogues and union lists.
An example of an online union list for periodicals is the Manitoba Library Association Serials List, which is accessible from http://xnet.rrc.mb.ca/library/mla/
This listing does not include titles held in the University of Manitoba. It also does not provide “holding” information. Even though many listings are badly in need of updating, it is nevertheless of invaluable assistance in identifying serial titles held in a wide variety of Manitoba libraries. The Manitoba Union List of Serials (MULS) is a project sponsored by the Manitoba Library Consortium Inc. and is available only by telnet. It does not include holdings. For further information see http://web.archive.org/web/20040105232437/http://www.umanitoba.ca/libraries/mlci/muls.html
MAPLIN http://www.gov.mb.ca/chc/pls/index.html (currently unavailable for use) is an example of a union catalogue. It was initiated by Manitoba’s Public Library Services Branch and consists of records of items held in the province’s public libraries with the exclusion of Winnipeg Public Library. The Legislative Library’s holdings are also available on the system as are those of Public Library Services itself. An extended version of MAPLIN is MAPLIN Global which allows a metacrawler like search to over 100 libraries of all types worldwide.
The National Library of Canada is responsible for AMICUS, Canada’s national union catalogue of more than 24 million records, including serials’ titles and holdings information, from over 1,300 Canadian libraries. AMICUS may be searched for no charge and is available at http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/amicus/index-e.html
Another free service was the virtual Canadian union catalogue (vCuc), which was discontinued in 2006. vCuc was a gateway service to the catalogues of major Canadian libraries. Databases could be searched individually, as part of a group, or all at once. Libdex, formerly WebCats, http://www.libdex.com/ is a worldwide directory of Web OPACs. It extends the ability to search in individual catalogues or catalogues of library consortia throughout the world. As part of its Canadian Library Gateway service, the National Library provides a “Browse Lists of Canadian Library Web Sites and Catalogues” at http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/gateway/s22-200-e.html
A fee based bibliographic utility is A-G Canada which has a range of bibliographic and authority record databases along with holdings information contributed by their customers. Subscribing libraries can search for potential ILL locations in Canada.
OCLC is another fee-based bibliographic utility. It dominates the American library marketplace and is gaining more of a presence in Canada. OCLC facilitates interlibrary lending through its network of subscribing libraries throughout the world. WorldCat is the name of its online union catalogue. It contains records of all materials catalogued by OCLC member libraries including books, serial titles and, audiovisual materials. It is available through the FirstSearch database service.
Union lists, union catalogues, and bibliographic utilities, etc. use symbols or codes to identify which libraries have copies of items they record. The National Library of Canada is responsible for assigning symbols to Canadian libraries. The ILL Directory on the Web http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/illcandir-bin/illsear/l=0/c=1 is the master list for Canadian library symbols and ILL policies. It contains OCLC symbols and WHO [A-G Canada] codes for libraries in Canada. A-G Canada’s WHO codes are also available in PDF format at http://web.archive.org/web/20030711124450/http://www.ag-canada.com/marcit/prod/whotemp.PDF
OCLC also maintains its own list of member symbols which can be found through the “Participating Institutions Search” page at http://www.oclc.org/contacts/libraries/
Summary
Interlibrary loan
Interlibrary loan is the process by which a library requests material from, or supplies materials to, another library…interlibrary loan includes the provision of reproductions as substitutes for loans of the original materials.
Purpose
The purpose of interlibrary loan… is to obtain, upon request of a library user, materials not available in the user’s local library.
Scope
Interlibrary loan is a mutual relationship and libraries must be willing to supply materials as freely as they request materials.
Any materials, regardless of format, may be requested from another library. The supplying library determines whether the material can be provided (CLA/ASTED Interlibrary Loan Code).
Document delivery
Definition:
Supplying a copy of an item which is retained by the requester, as opposed to the supply of a loan copy. It also includes the purchase of photocopies, usually of journal articles from suppliers (Keenan).
Typical ILL steps
Borrowing library:
- patron asks for item not in library collection
- staff double check to ensure item not in collection
- staff verify bibliographic citation
- staff identify locations of libraries/commercial services which have item and select one
- request to borrow or obtain copy of item sent in approved format
- determines if item circulates and is available on shelf
- if available, original item or a copy of article or section sent to requesting library
- if available, requesting library notified
- on receipt, patron informed item available and if original sent, when it is due back
- when original item returned, sent back to lending library
- perform necessary administrative chores, e.g. maintain record of transaction, process and pay bills, collect statistics
Glossary
Ariel
A document transmission system developed by the Research Libraries Group (RLG) which provides rapid, inexpensive, high-quality document delivery over the Internet by integrating scanning, sending, receiving, and printing functions. The user can send text and gray-scale images (illustrations, photographs, etc.) in letter, legal, and other sizes to another Ariel workstation, to an e-mail account used by another Ariel machine, or to anyone who uses MIME-compliant e-mail software and a multipage TIFF viewer. The Ariel system is used in libraries to facilitate interlibrary loan and document delivery service. (Reitz)
Bibliographic utility
An organization which provides access to and support for machine-readable bibliographic databases, directly to member libraries or through a network of regional bibliographic service centers, usually via a propriety interface. The largest bibliographic utility in the United States is OCLC. (Reitz)
Holdings
The issues of a serial in the possession of a library. (ALA Glossary 112)
Interlibrary loan (ILL)
A transaction in which, upon request, one library lends an item from its collection or furnishes a copy of the item, to another library not under the same administration or on the same campus (ALA Glossary).
Intralibrary loan
A transaction in which one library lends an item from its collection to another library within the same library system upon request (ALA Glossary).
Reciprocal borrowing
The granting of borrowing privileges to the members of each other’s user groups by cooperating libraries (ALA Glossary 186).
Union catalog
A catalog of the holdings of more than one independent library, library system, or library collection, indicating the location of each item by the names or location symbols of the libraries or collections which own at least one copy (ALA Glossary).
Union list
A complete list of the holdings for a group of libraries of materials of a specific type (e.g. periodicals or annuals), on a certain subject, or in a particular field, compiled in the interests of library cooperation. The entry for each bibliographic item includes a list of codes to indicate the libraries that own at least one copy. Union lists are usually printed but some have been converted to online databases.
WHO code
Unique symbol originally assigned by UTLAS, then ISM and most recently A-G Canada to identify libraries participating in their bibliographic database.
Works cited
Bopp, Richard E., and Linda C. Smith. Reference and Information Services: An Introduction.3rd ed. Englewood, CO: Libraries Unlimited, 2001.
Canada. National Library. A Canadian Information Resource Sharing Strategy. Prepared by the Working Group to Review and Update the Canadian Information Resource Sharing Strategy. 10 May 1994. 23 Apr. 2002. http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/8/3/r3-640-e.html
Canada. National Library. Interlibrary Loan Directory on the Web: Symbols and Interlibrary Loan Policies in Canada. 30 Apr. 1998. 23 Apr. 2002.
http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/ill/s16-202-e.html
Canada. National Library. Resource sharing. 24 Oct. 2001. 23 Apr. 2002
http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/8/3/r3-648-e.html
Canadian Library Association. CLA/ASTED Interlibrary Loan Code. Ottawa: Canadian Library Association, 1996.
Jackson, Mary E. “Measuring the Performance of Interlibrary Loan and Document Delivery Services.” ARL: Bimonthly Newsletter of Research Library Issues and Actions. Dec. 1997 23 Apr. 2002 http://web.archive.org/web/20031225084144/http://www.arl.org/newsltr/195/illdds.html
Keenan, Stella. Concise Dictionary of Library and Information Science. London: Bowker
Saur, c. 1996. Lunau, Carrol D. “Canadian Resource Sharing at the Close of the 20th Century.” National Library News Nov. 1999. 26 Mar 2001. http://epe.lac-bac.gc.ca/100/202/301/nlnews/nlnews-h/1999/nov99e/3111-18e.htm
“Interlibrary Loan Code for British Public Libraries”. The Quintessential Consultant. British Columbia Library Services Branch, Victoria. 13 Jan. 2004. http://www.bclibraries.ca/qc/showstatic.php?page=staticpages/systech/illcode/index.txt
Reitz, Joan M. ODLIS: Online Dictionary of Library and Information Science. 2000. Western Connecticut State University Libraries. 23 Apr. 2002. http://lu.com/odlis/
“Saskatchewan Resource Sharing.” PLEIS. Saskatchewan Provincial Library, Regina. 23 Apr 2002. http://www.lib.sk.ca/staff/ill/resshareill.html
ALA. Interlibrary Loan Request Form. http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/rusa/resources/guidelines/
*Scroll down the page to Interlibrary Loan and choose Interlibrary Loan Code for the United States http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/rusa/resources/guidelines/interlibrary.cfm
Choose to download the form in PDF http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/rusa/resources/guidelines/illformprint.pdf or Word format http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/rusa/resources/guidelines/illformprint.doc
