Interlibrary loan is the process of locating materials held by other libraries, and borrowing them on behalf of local library users.
Interlibrary loans are title specific transactions. As the borrowing library we have to identify a specific title, edition, etc. of a work to request.
World-wide databases of items owned by libraries (such as WorldCat) make it easier to identify items. But there are still limits — lots of things not available for loan. Some common reasons include:
- recently published — all copies in use at the libraries that own them
- specific edition or format not available — non-print formats such as DVDs or audio CDs are not loaned by many libraries
- rare & fragile materials — this is often a consideration when trying to borrow local histories or family histories for genealogy research
The process of identifying items and placing interlibrary loan requests can be time consuming. The system we use gives each library in a prospective lender string four days to respond before the request is shifted to the next library. The prospective lender string can hold up to five different libraries. That means a request could go as long as three weeks, and still have a “no” at the end.
At Kilgore Memorial Library, end users are asked to reimburse for direct costs (shipping costs one way plus any charges imposed by the lending library) related to interlibrary loan.