[UXPROD-2634] Option to retain item's last borrower even after anonymization Created: 26/Aug/20  Updated: 10/Dec/21

Status: Open
Project: UX Product
Components: None
Affects versions: None
Fix versions: None

Type: New Feature Priority: TBD
Reporter: Ian Walls Assignee: Unassigned
Resolution: Unresolved Votes: 0
Labels: None
Remaining Estimate: Not Specified
Time Spent: Not Specified
Original estimate: Not Specified

Development Team: None
Rank: Chalmers (Impl Aut 2019): R5
Rank: Chicago (MVP Sum 2020): R4
Rank: Cornell (Full Sum 2021): R3
Rank: Duke (Full Sum 2021): R2
Rank: 5Colleges (Full Jul 2021): R5
Rank: FLO (MVP Sum 2020): R2
Rank: GBV (MVP Sum 2020): R4
Rank: Lehigh (MVP Summer 2020): R5
Rank: MO State (MVP June 2020): R1
Rank: U of AL (MVP Oct 2020): R5
Rank: Warner (MVP Jul 2020): R2

 Description   

Purpose:

User story statement(s):

As a librarian,
I want to know who the last borrower of a material was, even after years have passed since the loan occurred and it has been anonymized
so that I have traceability for undiscovered damage

Scenarios:

A user returns a material to the book drop with multiple interior pages torn out, blacked out by a Sharpie or stuck together by spilled coffee. This damage is not noticed by the staff doing the reshelving, and sits in the stacks for 6 months before it is checked out again, when the damage is then noticed by the patron and checkout staff. The library would like to bill the previous user for replacement costs, while still generally maintaining anonymization for returned materials.



 Comments   
Comment by Erin Nettifee [ 24/Sep/20 ]

I'm not sure the example here is a good one, since I think many libraries wouldn't charge in that case because the item had been out in the stacks and thus you really can't prove that the last borrower is the one who damaged it.

A better example might be equipment or materials that are kept in a staff-only area. Say you keep your DVD collection behind the desk, a patron borrows Game of Thrones Season 1, it gets returned and checked in, but the staffer who checks in misses that one of the discs is still missing. So then when someone else wants to borrow it a few weeks later, and you open it up and see there's a missing disc, if the loan has already been closed and scrubbed, you don't have any meaningful way to try to get the disc back. But even in that case, we wouldn't want to charge the person a late fee - we just want the disc back.

And our special collections people - for whom this is a theft-prevention measure - they just never scrub their loans, and people accessing their materials have to sign a waiver understanding that their info would be stored as part of using it.

I would be really uncomfortable with this feature if it was only an all or nothing thing - at Duke we likely wouldn't use it. If there was some ability to control it based on material type or location, I could see some value there. But not enough to rank it above other features that are much more crucial.

Comment by Joanne Leary [ 28/Sep/20 ]

I mostly agree with Erin - if damage were discovered after the fact, even if we knew the most recent borrower, we would not likely charge the patron because of lack of proof, or for other reasons. More commonly, we do have cases of discovering there are missing pieces of a returned item (such as parts of musical scores, maps in pockets, etc.). In those cases, it's extremely useful to know the prior borrower so we could contact them to ask about the missing pieces. Bottom line, yes, it's useful to know the most recent borrower, but mostly for getting back the missing pieces rather than billing.

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