[LIBRARYDIR] forgiving old fines/fees

[Nina Pitts]

Because quite a few of our students do return to campus after lengthy absences, we don't automatically forgive fines and fees, but we're thinking ahead to migration, too. There's definitely a point of diminishing returns over time. When we moved to Voyager, we laboriously hand-entered all the fines and fees that didn't transfer over from Inlex (in 1998), and I still run across those occasionally. We'll be forgiving and purging the Inlex fines this time around.

We also plan to forgive fines and fees attached to periodical titles that we've subsequently deleted from the collection, either during our regular maintenance cycle or because we've chosen to discontinue the entire title. That way, since there will be no patron records associated with them, we won't need to migrate MARC records for titles we no longer have in the collection.

We haven't kept statistics on what percentage of our "lost" items are actually paid for over time, but it's my sense that there are only two or three cases a year that are settled after a period of about 5 years back. Rather than have fines be a burden to someone who is embarking on a new career or finally finishing a former course of study, we often choose to forgive the few people who approach us face to face about an old fine. Especially if they are contrite. :)

Nina

Nina Pitts
Library Supervisor
Peninsula College Library/Media Center
1502 E. Lauridsen Blvd.
Port Angeles, WA 98362
(360) 417-6274
npitts at pencol.edu

From: LIBRARYDIR [mailto:librarydir-bounces at lists.ctc.edu] On Behalf Of Sue Kennedy
Sent: Tuesday, August 11, 2015 10:36 AM
To: librarydir at lists.ctc.edu
Subject: [LIBRARYDIR] forgiving old fines/fees

Hi all!

Do you forgive really old fines/fees?  And if so, how old do they have to be?

Shellie just helped us with a patron purge, and we still have loads of records.  Thinking ahead to migration.

Thanks!

Sue
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