Customer Services Update

Closure of the Integrated Catalogue (January 2012)

British Library ARTEmail Format (January 2012)

Default Copyright fees (January 2012)

Withdrawal of Overseas Library Privilege Service (January 2012)

Acquisition Cuts (January 2012)

Chinese and Oriental Serial Titles (January 2012)

Payment of your Account – Remittance Advice (January 2012)

Revised Terms & Conditions for Document Supply (December 2011)

Extended Search Service (November 2011)

VAT Change (October 2011)

Delays to Document Supply services – Update (October 2011)

EThOS Update (October 2011)

International Non-Commercial Document Supply (Sept 2011)

Catalogue Records Enhanced (June 2011)

2011/12 Prices (June 2011)

Code of Service (May 2011)

Copyright Fee Paid Service (April 2011)

LONDON Reply Code

Closure of the Integrated Catalogue (January 2012)

The Library's Integrated Catalogue has now been replaced by Explore the British Library. The new search facility gives improved access to around 57 million records for items held in the Library.

Explore the British Library allows users to search both the British Library’s website and a large amount of the items available to customers from the collections including books, journal titles and articles, maps, sound recordings, research databases, archived websites, newspaper titles, trade journals and images.

If you have bookmarked http://catalogue.bl.uk you may wish to amend it to http://explore.bl.uk.

British Library ARTEmail Format (January 2012)

As we begin to deploy the new Brtitish Library Document Supply Service (BLDSS) we have become aware that the format of many of our customers ARTemail requests do not conform to current  guidelines.  In order for you to benefit from the enhancements which will be delivered by the new service, and to reduce the risk of failures, we would like to remind customers of our published ARTEmail standard, and the need to conform fully to these standards.

Please compare your current ARTEmail format to the standard, and if your current format strays from the standard, it’s imperative you change the format of your ARTEmail request files  to match the standard. Formatting errors in future  may result in rejected orders.

We have noted these issues that will cause requests to be rejected or incorrectly processed by BLDSS:

• Customer Code and ART password quoted in the incorrect order; The first line of the ART file should always be the Customer Code number and the second line the ART password:

• Incorrect ADD Address format; A file received with a line of text between the ADD Address command line and the delivery email address will not be able to be delivered:

* (without the blank lines seen)

• Conflicting Message Keyword Codes; One delivery method or search level per request should be quoted. ART requests containing both PHOTO and SED99, or S and SL should not be sent:

• Request number formats; Customer reference numbers should contain no spaces as it can cause the characters after the space to be lost from the customer reference:

 * (without the blank lines seen)

• Redundant and inaccurate Message Keyword Codes (MKC) on TX line; Our Handbook and Guide to ARTEmail contain lists of all current valid codes. Inaccurately quoted or redundant codes may cause the request to be rejected. Inaccurate and redundant codes include:

• Extreme deviations from our published Preferred Order of Bibliographic Detail; All new requests are matched against stock holdings. The better a request meets our preferred order (in full in the Guide to ARTEmail), the more chance we have of matching it accurately against the correct shelfmark:

* (without the blank lines seen)

Submission of requests in the standard format will enable us to provide you with a better, quicker and more accurate service from us – but more importantly, fewer failures on some of your requests which we could have fulfilled.

If you require further information on this issue, please contact Customer Services.

Default Copyright fees (January 2012)

The Copyright Licensing Agency, CLA, default copyright fee for books and other non-serial material increased from £10.50 to £12.00 on 1 January 2012.  The new charges will apply to copyright fee paid copies supplied from this date.

Withdrawal of Overseas Library Privilege Service (January 2012)

We would like to remind our overseas non commercial customers that the Overseas Library Privilege service was withdrawn on the 31st December 2011 and that all article requests supplied on existing accounts will now incur copyright charges at the full commercial rate. You can search for copyright fees via Explore the British Library at http://explore.bl.uk.  The copyright fee will be displayed as ‘Rights’ in the ‘Details’ section of the item you search. Where CLAX (copyright licensing agency excluded) or ‘British Library Not Licensed to Copy’ appears, our licence does not permit us to supply a copyright fee paid copy. However, CLAX items are available via our loan service.

Academic and Government non-commercial organisations may wish to take advantage of our new International Non-Commercial Document Supply (INCD) service which offers overseas non-commercial users the ability to access articles for private study or non-commercial research purposes at a reduced royalty fee. Registration for the service is optional and terms and conditions apply. Please visit our website for more information or contact the British Library Customer Services.

Acquisition Cuts (January 2012)

As budgetary restrictions begin to impact on our monograph acquisition budget customers may begin to see an increasing number of NPUR (we do not have this item and have decided not to buy it) responses to failed requests.

A redefinition of acquisition guidelines to reduce expenditure unfortunately means we will no longer be able to routinely consider failed requests for purchase.  We will however continue to purchase high demand items and continue to add on order information to our catalogue and maintain waiting lists for on order items.

If you receive an NPUR response, and are unable to source the item elsewhere, it is worthwhile to keep checking our catalogue for availability.

Chinese and Oriental Serial Titles (January 2012)

Historically we have been unable to supply copyright fee paid copies of titles published in China as they are excluded from our CLA Licence and our catalogue records show them as CLAX (copyright licensing agency excluded).  

The CLAX status for Chinese titles can be ignored as we now have a separate licence agreement with CAOD (Chinese and Oriental Database) that allows us to supply scan on demand article copies from all Chinese serials. The copyright fee for all titles is £9.00.  The database also gives us access to Chinese publications not listed on our catalogue, so we would encourage speculative requests for this type of material.

We hope to be able to update our catalogue records to reflect title availability in due course.

Payment of your Account – Remittance Advice (January 2012)

To help us quickly and accurately process payments against your account and ensure continuity of service, please return your remittance advice direct to finance-receipts@bl.uk, or by mail to:

The British Library
Finance Receipts
Boston Spa
Wetherby
LS23 7BQ
United Kingdom

Revised Terms & Conditions for Document Supply (December 2011) 

Due to changes in the legal framework through which the British Library Document Supply Service is provided, our Terms and Conditions for Document Supply (“Terms”) will be changing with effect from 1 January 2012. These new Terms will apply to any documents we supply to you from that date and if you do not wish to abide by our new Terms, you should not use The British Library Document Supply Service after 31 December 2011.

You can view the complete Terms here, but a brief summary of the changes are listed below:

• New wording to cover the re-sale or re-supply of documents to third parties
• New sections to cover confidentiality and our obligations under the Freedom Of Information Act
• Wording to explain payment terms and our rights where these are not met
• Addition of standard legal provisions e.g. liability and exclusions

If your organisation has signed a separate agreement with us for the supply of documents, its terms and conditions will continue to apply to any documents you request under such agreement.

If you need any further information on this letter, or wish to discuss the changes to the Terms, please contact the British Library Customer Services.

Extended Search Service (November 2011)

From 1^st December 2011 we will be making some small changes to our existing Extended Search Service in readiness for deployment of the new British Library Document Supply Service (BLDSS).

International Customers:

Extended search requests for loan items not held in our collection will be returned to you quoting details of libraries in the UK that may hold the item and be willing to lend it to you.  We will no longer forward your requests to UK libraries on your behalf.

Alternative supplier details will be given as a Library Code. The Directory of Library Codes enables British Library customers to convert these codes into full library contact details. Using this information you may then approach the holding library directly. Please ensure that you find out and agree to the supplying library’s charges before placing a firm order.

When confirming your order with the supplying library you will need to send them details of your British Library code and a unique reference number. The supplying library will claim the agreed charges for supplying the item to you by submitting a claim to the British Library. We will charge the agreed amount to your account and reimburse the supplying library.

UK 3^rd Party ILL Suppliers:

From 1^st December 2011 you may claim the agreed amount for supplying loans to British Library Document Supply Service overseas account holders.  You will need to agree charges with them in advance of supply and obtain details of their British Library customer code and a unique reference number.

Claims for items supplied to international customers may be included as part of your routine ILL Claim. Please use our online claim form to submit your claim.

VAT Change (October 2011)

With effect from 1 October 2011, following advice received, the sale of photocopied printed matter (excluding abstracts) by the British Library’s Document Supply Service will be treated as zero-rated for VAT purposes. 

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact the British Library Customer Services Department: customer-services@bl.uk +44 (0)1937 546060

Delays to Document Supply services – Update (October 2011)

Further to the update we provided in August, access to some of the collection items held at the Library’s Boston Spa site continues to be restricted following the discovery of small traces of asbestos in some areas.

All air sampling tests have found there to be no health risk – however, the Library continues to take sensible and responsible precautions to ensure the health and safety of Readers, users and staff, in full compliance with the very strict health and safety regulations applying to the management of asbestos.

Although some areas of the Boston Spa site remain closed, leading to unavailability of items, a major programme of asbestos removal and management has been ongoing since February. Our priority has been to get the higher use collection items back in service as quickly as possible.

We’re pleased to announce the cleaning of the most heavily used current serials and monographs stock (1985-present) is now complete, and that overall fulfilment has gone up from 65% to 71%.

Following discussions with DCMS, funding for the bulk of the programme has now been confirmed. Work to clear other areas is being done in sections, so more of the remaining affected material will become available as this work proceeds - however, some low use items will continue to be unavailable into next year.

Interim measures to complete customer orders from alternative sources remain in place – in particular fulfilling requests from e-journal resources where licences for document supply are held, and making greater use of duplicates in our London stock.  

We wish to thank customers for their continuing patience while we deal with this substantial challenge – please be assured that we are making every effort to make stock from the affected areas available again as soon as possible.

Please cascade this information to colleagues as appropriate. Please also continue placing orders as usual, and you will be informed if you need to reapply for your requested item at a later date.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact the British Library Customer Services Department: customer-services@bl.uk +44 (0)1937 546060

EThOS Update (October 2011)

At the start of 2011 EThOS, the UK E-Theses Online Service, moved to become a shared service delivered by the British Library on behalf of Higher Education. A new Governing Board was set up, and a new business model developed to bring improvements and enhancements to the current service.

The new membership business model is now being rolled out, and all participating institutions should recently have received detailed information and a revised Member Agreement.

In the meantime, EThOS continues to deliver great results: over 52,000 full-text theses are now available for immediate free download, and 300,000 records of UK doctoral theses available for searching. Links can also take the user direct to an open access copy held at the institution’s own repository, and an ordering system in many cases allows the user to request a digital copy of an older, paper thesis. Over 350,000 copies have been downloaded since the launch of EThOS: in September alone theses were downloaded by users in 190 countries.

Catalogue Records Enhanced (June 2011)

In readiness for the launch of our new British Library Document Supply Service the British Library Catalogue is being enhanced. This data will enable improved matching of requests, in addition to faster and more accurate responses to orders. It also distinguishes between reference and document supply collections, providing customers with more accurate information regarding the availability of items for document supply.

Customers may start to notice the following additional information on catalogue records:

Available for Reading Rooms Only   
Available for Remote Supply    
Remote Supply - Home Loan Ban    
Remote Supply - Surrogate only
DSC Temporary Loan Ban  
          
N.B. Please note, in light of the recent changes to our Copyright Fee Paid Service, to enable customers to maximise the use of our Loan service the 6 month loan ban on all publications is currently suspended.

2011/12 Document Supply Prices (June 2011)

2011/12 Document Supply Prices are now available. Click here for further details.

Code of Service

The Library's Code of Service sets out our service commitments to customers including our targets for email responses.

We aim to respond to all written general enquiries within 10 days of receipt and give priority to Document Supply order queries, where our target is to respond within 24 hours. To help us ensure order queries are responded to within this timescale please quote your request number in the subject line of the email.

If you have not had a reply to a standard service request after one week, you may ask us for a progress report by resubmitting your original request using the Message Keyword Code CHASER after the original request number, or selecting ‘Chaser’ from the options on the ARTWeb order form.  

Copyright Fee Paid Service (April 2011)

From 1 April 2011, where we don’t have a direct licence with a publisher, our Licence covering the provision of copyright fee paid copies from print items has changed. This change restricts the provision of copyright fee paid copies from items according to country of publication.  Regrettably this will reduce the amount of material that can be copied for commercial document supply customers, or be supplied in response to copyright fee paid requests from our non commercial customers.

Where applicable, if we are unable to supply a copyright fee paid copy we will offer you the alternative of reapplying for a loan copy.  In these instances you will be given the Reply Code RCOP – LOAN?  To enable customers to maximise the use of our Loan service we will be suspending the 6 month loan ban on all publications.

Our Licence also restricts the supply of items published in France by electronic document delivery methods.  Requests for electronic delivery will be returned to you inviting you to reapply for a mail, fax or loan copy. The Reply Code we will send you is RCOP – MAIL/FAX/LOAN?

The supply of copyright fee paid copies from publications where we have a direct licence with the publisher and copies supplied via our library privilege service remain unaffected.  We continue to work with Publishers and other Reproduction Rights Organisations to increase direct licensing agreements and minimise the impact of these changes to our customers.   

LONDON Reply Code

Due to the temporary closure of some areas of the Boston Spa site we are making extended use of our London collections to fulfil your requests. The increased numbers of document supply requests we are now routing to London is inevitably impacting on our speed of service.

To ensure you are kept informed of the progress of your requests we will use the interim reply code LONDON if we feel that there may be a delay in our response times.

Click here for a summary of previous Customer Service updates.

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