Inter-library loans

[fivemack]

An ILL through Cambridge library used to cost three pounds, and this was a magical level: instead of paying £2.76 to Amazon for a book from a 1p-seller who charged the standard postage, I could pay £3 and the library would take the book away afterwards.

I suppose that this should have struck me as strange, since an ILL implies moving the book from one library to another and back and second-class postage for a book is £2.36 each way; but maybe you could cut a factor two off that by posting books in batches, it doesn't matter to me if an ILL takes two weeks.

I went in to collect an ILL today and was told that the fee had gone up to five pounds. I pointed out that this stopped them being competitive with Amazon, and the librarian said 'but it costs us thirteen pounds to process an ILL'. Librarian salaries are about £20k per year, so with overheads this is saying that it takes most of an hour of librarian time plus postage for a second-class small packet to do a single ILL.

This isn't a problem for me; I can switch to buying the books from Amazon, and I can donate them to the library afterwards if I want the library to take them away. But I'd have used the service less if I'd known it was so expensive to provide.

Comments

[pjc50.livejournal.com]

How much does it cost the library to accept the donation? ;)

It's been a long time since I went to a library. They were a tremendous resource as a kid, but the internet has cast a long strange shadow over them.

[fivemack.livejournal.com]

I started using Cambridge library quite enthusiastically after it reopened in September 2009, because it was clearly superior to the Internet in a couple of ways. Basically, buying books on-line had given me a to-read bookcase full of things which were between uninspiring and mediocre, and it was starting to oppress me.

With the library, I could borrow books which seemed intriguing without having to spend money or worry about storing them, and I wasn't going to make my huge to-read pile any worse because the books had to go back after three weeks (or three months if I took full advantage of renewal). I could read new silly thrillers without feeling guilty that they were a costly indulgence.

It about halved my expenditure on books while increasing the number I read: 1 October 2008 to 30 September 2009 I spent 362 pounds on books and read 61; 1 October 2009 to 30 September 2010 I spent 182 and read 103.

[simont]

I've just this month got around to signing up for a new-Cambridge-library card, and I expect to feel much the same way about it as this. One of the first lot of books I borrowed at random turned out to be an obvious mistake (volume 2 of a series I hadn't read volume 1 of – I looked at the spine and the back cover, but that wasn't obvious from either and was only mentioned on the front cover), so I immediately got some value out of not having spent money to make that error :-)

But the obvious utility of a library for me is that you can grab random stuff off its shelves that you didn't already specifically know you wanted. I'm not sure I'd order things on purpose with as much abandon as that.

[rmc28]

I was up until 1am this morning reading a library book that I picked up on a whim "because it looks pretty" and I thought I'd read something else by the author that was bearable. I'd never have bought it (especially in my new Must Reduce To-Read Pile mode), which would have meant I missed out on a great few hours reading.

[fivemack.livejournal.com]

I have no evidence that the library accepts donations: they take books away, but I haven't seen them appear on their shelves or their catalogue afterwards.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

Well if they sell them for a pound in a booksale, that's the same as if you gave them a pound.

[the-magician.livejournal.com]

Indeed, I used to buy lots of books from my local (to work) library's "for sale" shelves, which were a combination of donations and "remove from collection" stuff (older travel books, good food guide 2001, trashy paperbacks etc.) ... I once went in and there were half a dozen brand new star trek paperbacks at 35p each, so I thought "well, why not?" and when I got to the pay desk they asked if I wanted any more ... they'd had a bulk donation and I ended up with 54 books at 18p each :-) ... of course I've never read them .. (doh!)

But I've also got some wonderful books that I'm very happy to have that way as well.

[jvvw.livejournal.com]

The library at the university where I work accepts donations in theory, but I'm still waiting for them to decide if they want the post-grad level maths books from the list that I gave them a month of two later.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

Until Z was born, my wills always left all I died possessed to the library, and they remain my default beneficiary if my specific named beneficiaries predecease me. There's a reason for this, and my immense use of ILL is part of that reason.

If I were rich I would endow libraries.

[carbonel]

None of the libraries in the U.S. that I've used for ILL ever charged for the service, so it came as a nasty shock to discover how much it costs the library. (Don't remember the amount, but it was enough to be startling.)

I've only used ILL for books that were comprehensively out of print and that I couldn't get used for an affordable price, so I don't feel guilty about it, but it did make me think twice about future use.

[uitlander]

Hmm. In all the Universities I have worked before it has been made pretty clear to us the International Library Loans were a subsidised privilege to be used for academic purposes only. In Oxford and Newcastle they were rationed, and I was not able to make more that 5 ILL requests per term (this was very annoying as much of the material required for my D.Phil. research was only available in Belgium).

I have to admit to being shocked to learn you've been using it in this way, although I accept that the UL do not make this at all clear in it's documentation on the subject.

[mobbsy.livejournal.com]

fivemack said "Inter-library loans", not "International Library Loans".

[fivemack.livejournal.com]

This is Cambridge City Library not the University Library - I'm an Oxford MA which doesn't give me any rights at the UL - and Inter-Library Loan rather than an international one - the book I've just picked up via ILL is from the geography library of the University of Leeds.

I've used it four times this year, which I don't think counts as improper profligacy; the fact that it's there to be used was somehow more comforting than its use. I've summoned books from the depths of the Cambridge City Library collection significantly more often than that - I don't think more than half the books I've borrowed this year are ones I've picked up off the open shelves of the Grand Arcade building, I'd be entirely happy with a library without open shelves, where you fill in a webform and come in each Saturday to collect a parcel of books.

[uitlander]

I appear to have firmly grasped the wrong end of this stick. I didn't realise the City Library offered an ILL facility, so had assumed you must be using the UL. I stand corrected. My apologies.

[meirion.livejournal.com]

I suspect it's probably cheaper to process an ILL than to fetch a book out of storage! I'll find out what happens to books donated to the library and report back.

[monkeyhands.livejournal.com]

I'd never heard of inter-library loans before. Thanks for this post.

[jvvw.livejournal.com]

I think all the universities where I have worked haven't charged you personally for ILLs but instead cap the number that you can make each year. I know some of them have made it clear they cost over £10 each to discourage people from using them too casually. I wonder if ILLs of journal papers are more or less expensive than books? Getting somebody to photocopy the paper may be more expensive than the postage.

[downybearded1.livejournal.com]

I thought library books travelled via van, not parcel?

Still, it is interesting comparing this with Amazon.

[fivemack.livejournal.com]

I imagine there's a van that drives round all the Cambridgeshire libraries about daily moving books that have been summoned from within the system to their borrowers' libraries and back to their libraries of origin, but I'd be very surprised if enough books came from Leeds University geography department to Cambridge City library to justify a van.

There clearly aren't that many ILLs going on in the Cambridge system: they have a serial number associated with them, and two requests that I made a week apart had serial numbers differing by only about 20.

[sphyg.livejournal.com]

Hrm, that's interesting. I've been using the library book request quite a lot lately as it's cheaper/greener than buying (e.g. for book club). Am I right in thinking they've only started charging for books imported from outside the county.

[fivemack.livejournal.com]

Yes; it's requests submitted by the 'not in our stock' link at the top of the Web page that are charged for explicitly. They've always been charged for, it's just that the charge has now gone up.

[doseybat.livejournal.com]

From my library employment experience I would say the greatest ILL cost is staff time with all the paper shifting/emailing/invoicing, so £13 does not sound surprising.