hauser acq

2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST

Chris HauserWeber State University, Stewart

Library

ACQ through CAT: OMG you’ve got to be kidding me


The Environmental Factors

• The Department• The Staff• The Management


Analysis Approach

• Recognize the purpose of the analysis• Recognize the potential of the existing

resources• Understand the current workflow


PROCESS: ASSUMED• Harvest Purchase Requests• Search vendors for products• Order titles• Build PO/PO lines• Receive titles• Invoice/Statement• Pay vendor• Catalog titles• Preservation/brand/secure• Check-in/Circulate


PROCESS: OBSERVEDHarvest Purchase Requests

– Received hardcopy requests from faculty– Requests stored in physical pile until “ordering week”– Sort and process pile in order of personal preference – Rarely checked local holdings prior to procurement

Resulting Recommendation• Develop standardized method for submitting purchase requests• Develop standardized set of required fields for purchase requests• Develop first in/first out & priority rush policies for order processing• Standardize/automate local holdings check


PROCESS: OBSERVEDSearch vendors for products

– Search individual online book vendors seeking best price– Had over 300 vendor records in ILS database– Based purchase decision only on retail cost – Often used private sellers via Amazon market place

Resulting Recommendations• Select a primary monograph vendor• Develop policy for selecting secondary or private vendors• Notify requesting faculty when title ordered (Jim Taylor)


PROCESS: OBSERVEDOrder Titles

– Favored FAX ordering, ordering from catalogs– Avoided premier academic book vendors/aggregator – Log all order details in paper ledger

Resulting Recommendation• Establish EDI ordering profiles with primary monograph vendor(s)


PROCESS: OBSERVED• Build PO/PO lines

– Created new PO and PO lines manually– Only monographs were entered into the ILS accounting system– Brief bib and item records deleted when titles-in-hand were fully

cataloged by Cataloging.

Resulting Recommendation• Establish PO import procedure• Record all purchases made by acquisitions in the ILS• Build bib/items from brief PO import (vendor supplied)• Establish overlay points for bib and item at acquisitions level


PROCESS: OBSERVED• Receive titles

– Title searched, PO line found, PO line printed, and placed in title-in-hand.

– Inconsistently ‘received’ in ILS – Titles-in-hand sent to physical processing

Resulting Recommendation• Receive and Invoice on order titles in single procedure• Assign and affix title barcode at receiving (For item overlay point)• Auto print workslips at receiving• Send titles to CATALOGING rather than physical processing. (Physical Process Last)• Receive, statement, and invoice subscription and serial purchases at time of PO

line creation


PROCESS: OBSERVED• Invoice / Statement

– Feature of ILS wasn’t consistently used– Budgets never accurate– Any statistical gathering useless

Resulting Recommendation• Development payment accounting policies that require an ILS generated

PO/Statement before payment can be authorized. (primary vendors)


PROCESS: OBSERVED• Vendor Payment

– Used departmental credit card for nearly all payments – Had established many dozens of private/personal accounts with

vendors– Most payments made in advance of receiving titles– Used a private PayPal account to make some payments– No oversight on payment authorizations– Most time spend meeting the reconciliation requirements associated

with the university credit cardResulting Recommendation• Only use credit card for secondary/private vendor purchases• Eliminate all private/personal accounts• Use university purchasing department to pay vendors


PROCESS: OBSERVED• Catalog titles

– Deleted originating acquisitions bib/item– Manual copy catalog record searching (OCLC)– Import OCLC selected/harvested records W/949 item creation– Manual item record editing post bib import– Manual ‘clean-up’ of bib record tags– Generated spine label, performed all physical processing

Resulting Recommendation• Overlay brief acquisitions originated records/items with full records• Integrate WCP with title vendor (Receive/import full MARC record with titles)• Automated OCLC holdings update• Reassigned physical processing to part time classified


PROCESS: OBSERVED• Processing

– Performed preservation on new titles – Prepared materials for bindery

Resulting Recommendation• Perform spine label processing • Perform branding, security, and circulation prep. • Prepare and deliver shelf-ready titles to circulation• Notify requesting faculty titles are available for circulation


THE DEPARTMENT TODAY• 4 full time staff

– Cataloging Manager – Acquisitions Manager– Acquisitions Assistant– Cataloger (copy)

• 2 part time staff– Processor – Original Cataloger

Most of the improvements we had hoped to make have been applied

Not all of the paths we took led to the correct solution but they have all led to discovery of new ideas

There is always room for improvement

There is much more that needs to be done


THANK YOU

Chris [email protected]

https://public.me.com/chauser123 for Full Workflow (PDF)

hauser acq

Documents

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