In answer to Keith Stetson's question about returning funds saved
by serial cancellation to pay for new subscriptions, the University
of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has been doing this for several
years -- when possible. This has been our only money for new serials
for some time.

At first the Library Administrative Board approved an 80% rebate to
the library or academic department cancelling a title. It was later
reduced to 50%. In times of large price increases and low or non-
existent budget increases all the money must be used to cover prices
of the remaining serials.

To qualify for the rebate, the department must initiate the cancella-
tion. Titles that cease publication do not count. Also, the library
must have paid for the title in the current (or sometimes, the pre-
vious) fiscal year. In other words, you can't have 50% of money you
haven't spent.

Until this year only subscriptions have qualified for the rebates.
Now, however, certain annuals have been included. The idea is that
if we paid last year in one payment and can predict what this year
would cost if we did not cancel, the department can have the 50%.

A few years ago departments had to identify the bottom 5% of their
list of titles and the next-to-bottom 5% for possible cancellation
if conditions warranted (they did!). If they went ahead and authorized
cancellation on their own, they got the money. When the library had
to cancel all remaining titles on the lists, no rebate was forthcoming.

For a discussion of the procedure used at UNC-CH, see NEWSLETTER ON
SERIALS PRICING ISSUES, no. 2 (March 1989).

The following year we asked the departments to review their standing
orders (nonperiodical serials and sets) for cancellation, but no