I have to agree with much of what Kevin Randall said in his message.

Prior to implementing NOTIS, we had essentially a Level 3 holdings list
at each reference desk.  NOTIS offered us the opportunity to be more
explicit than v.1-  , and this concept was heartily endorsed by public
as well as technical services.  Patrons and library staff now really
do believe if it's not explicitly listed in the OPAC that we don't
own it.  And four years after implementation it's pretty much the
truth.

As to staff time, it really isn't such a big deal.  Of course, we
are dealing with currently received material, no big push to really
clean up the retrospective holdings is going on (these were all
loaded into NOTIS from the OCLC LDR so they are not in bad shape).
The same staff who check in (using Level 4 in the NOTIS O/P/R) update
the holdings and do the binding.  It's quite easy (more or less) to
do Level 4 when you have the piece(s) in front of you.

We wanted to give our users the best and most complete information
possible.  Occasionally the holdings records become pretty cumbersome,
particularly with government documents where you rarely have a
complete run that can be compressed.  But we made the commitment, it's
a priority and we have staff who are really into quality, so it works
quite well.  The hardest part was reading the standard, understanding
and applying it.  There aren't nearly enough examples, so we made some
decisions on the fly.  But we have three technical services units which
can consult each other for help in interpretation.

I would be happy to share some of our early documentation with you, Kay,
if you wish. Contact me off-list.

I might also say that we fill in the fixed fields of the MHLD (Marc Holdings
Record) for all our current titles as well, and retrospective titles as we
come upon them.

*****************************************************************************

Susan Davis                           BITNET: UNLSDB@UBVM
Head, Periodicals                   INTERNET: UNLSDB@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU
Central Technical Services             PHONE: (716) 645-2784
Lockwood Library Bldg.                   FAX: (716) 645-5955
State University of NY at Buffalo
BUFFALO, NY  14260-2200