Alma Fulfillment Units- Using "Process Type" as Input Parameter in Request Rules affecting Local/Home Users

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Friday, October 15, 2021 - 2:00pm to 3:00pm

To register: Select the Register tab at the top of this page.
Connection information will be sent to registrants the day before.

This webinar will be recorded and posted to the CARLI website.

Who should attend/watch the recording?

  • If your institution does NOT allow local requesting (aka, does not allow your patrons to request your library’s materials), you do NOT need to attend this webinar.
  • If your institution does allow local requesting, those who are interested in knowing more about configuration settings in Alma that affect the ability of your patrons to request your library's materials may wish to attend the webinar/review the recording.
  • If your institution does allow local requesting, those at your institution who are responsible for Alma Fulfillment configuration will want to attend the webinar/review the recording.

Background:
When Alma is determining whether to send a request to an institution listed in the ROTA, Alma does two checks: a) the item is in an available status and that b) the item’s associated TOU permits requesting.
Unfortunately, Alma does those two checks separately: first a check for available, then a check for requestable. So, when an institution has multiple copies of a title, Alma does NOT make sure the SAME item is both requestable AND available.

  • For example, if a library has a physical copy of a title sitting on the shelf in Special Collections (available, but not requestable) and a circulating copy in Main Stacks that is currently not on shelf because it is missing/lost/charged (requestable, but not available), Alma will still send the request to this institution, and will “queue” the request to the requestable but not available copy (Main Stacks copy), even though other copies of the title are currently available in I-Share.

During the week of August 30, 2021, CARLI Office Staff reviewed the "Requestable for I-Share" Request rules in each institution’s fulfillment units, and will add an additional input parameter to prevent I-Share requests from queueing on non-available items.
At that time, we made no changes will be made to Request rules for local patrons, and no changes to Request rules that prevent I-Share patrons from placing requests.

  • When announcing the change, CARLI Staff also announced that we would hold a webinar in September to discuss how to make similar settings updates for local patrons; to have a little more time to prepare, the date was postponed to October.
    • This webinar is that webinar.
    • Why a webinar? The decisions that institutions would need to make for local patrons are more nuanced than the consortial settings for I-Share patrons.