New OCLC ILL Full Text Option delivers

Easy, safe, fast and inexpensive. Those were the responses Collette Mak, OCLC consulting product support specialist, received when she asked ILL users what they wanted from an electronic document delivery service through interlibrary loan. And, based on response to its recent release, the new OCLC ILL Full Text Option delivers exactly what users requested.

In her survey, Ms. Mak asked about the benefits and the perceived barriers to the use of full text for ILL.

"Users’ concerns centered around disrupting the production-oriented ILL workflow," said Ms. Mak. "Anything that goes outside of that normal workflow can really upset the process, and a full text option slows things down. Users didn’t see it as worth the effort."

Additional questions were raised about the coverage a full text option could offer. Which titles would be covered? When does coverage begin? And, what were the charges associated with such a service?

"All valid concerns," says Ms. Mak. "These were exactly the things we needed to know. The responses to our survey truly helped us shape a product that would address users’ concerns. And the fact that the overwhelming majority of respondents indicated they would use a full-text option if it was available was the impetus for the project."

Here’s how Ms. Mak said her team addressed users’ four major requirements--making the system easy, safe, fast and inexpensive:

• Easy--The OCLC ILL Full Text Option requires absolutely no change in ILL staff workflows.

• Safe--Use of full text suppliers in lender strings is completely optional. The system verifies the library’s :MAXCOST: before it processes the request, so there are no additional charges and no surprise bills.

• Fast--Articles are e-mailed immediately to the address in the :E-MAIL: field. What used to take 10–11 days, now, in most cases, takes less than 30 seconds.

• Inexpensive--Users continue to pay normal charges for searching, displaying holdings, creating requests and use of the OCLC ILL Fee Management service. There is also an article and royalty fee for the materials ordered (currently under $4 U.S. per article). There are no additional charges.

The OCLC ILL Full Text Option was implemented in its current form on January 17. The service’s most consistent users have been the University of Minnesota and the University of Michigan.

"Our present functionality is outstanding," said Ms. Mak. "And we are in negotiations with suppliers to beef up the content we will be able to provide."

Additional functionality is in the works. There are plans to move quickly beyond ASCII into other products such as images, URLs, etc. "And of course," said Ms. Mak, "we would eventually like to deliver directly to the end user. That is always part of our mission--enabling libraries to deliver more to their users, faster and cheaper."--Jeff Ivany is contributing writer.