---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Tue, 23 Nov 1993 12:44:20 -0500 (EST)
From: DNEWBILL@hq.nasa.gov
Subject: centralized vs. decentralized serials control

I am Head of Technical Services with the NASA Headquarters Library in
Washington, DC.  As Technical Services was not allocated floor space in the
library, and therefore operates from a remote site several miles away, we
do a great deal of check-in of daily publications directly at the Library.
Weeklies and less frequent titles are checked in at the Technical Services
site and couriered to NASA Headquarters.

Con's:
*  A staff member at the Library site must CONSISTENTLY take responsibility
   for check-in.  This has been a problem in the past, because the staff
   has gotten busy with other things.  We only find out about this as we
   receive claim reports from FAXON, about 2 weeks later.  Then there is
   a need for retrospective check-in.
*  There is still some confusion over who is responsible for claiming any
   missing issues.  Decide beforehand how you plan to handle this, and get
   procedures on paper for all participating staff.

Pro's:
*  Timeliness is definitely the primary reason for our decision to decentralize
   checkin!  Tech. Services retains control over weeklies and less frequent
   subscriptions where timeliness is not such a factor.  Our courier delivery
   occurs daily, at a cost of about $35.00 per round trip ($$$!!!).  Note that
   even though the delay is only one day from receipt to delivery into the
   library collection, the reference staff frequently needs specific issues
   quickly.  We are still struggling with how to best serve the patron on this
   issue.
*  I hinted at cost above.  Since there is no floor space for technical service
   staff, and reference does not have time to perform check-in for all 400
   journal titles regularly, the courier is the best option accepted by NASA.
   This enables us to do most of the job, but gives public services what they
   require to do their job as well.

Related issue:  As you plan to move to automated acquisitions/check-in, have
you considered the potential difficulties of mainframe computer databases?
Reporting, availability of reports, format of reports, information contained
in those reports, timeliness of reports...those were all reasons why NASA
opted out of Innopac or NOTIS for acquisitions functions.  We use NONESUCH
which is pc based, easy to use, and has controllable "quirks".  We dovetail
that with journal check-in on FAXON's SC-10 database, and are looking to
replace this with FAXON's Microlinx in the near future.  Microlinx is pc based
as well.  We then have serial records with date ranges on NOTIS which is our
online catalog and circulation system.

I'd be glad to discuss this with you further!   Lynn Newbill