Net Lender Program:

SEMLS Net Lender Form

SEMLS has instituted a net lender program to facilitate resource sharing among SEMLS members. A member library is eligible for the Net Lender Program if if provides a greater number of materials on interlibrary loan to SEMLS members than it borrows from SEMLS members. The SEMLS Executive Board at its August 2005 meeting re-approved the following Guidelines for the Net Lender Program:

Definition of Interlibrary Loan (ILL): Ill is the short term borrowing of a specific item from one library by another library on behalf of its clientele. ILL includes Specific author/title request for print and non print resources; as well as photocopy requests for specific journal and reference materials.

ILL includes intra-network loans (network transfers), virtual catalog loans, point to point loans, MassCat loans, OCLC requests and requests from other ILL subsystems. ILL does not include deposit collections or other materials that are loaned for an extended period of time.

Who is Eligible for Net Lender?

SEMLS members who agree to provide interlibrary loan of materials and/pr photocopies of print items at no charge to other SEMLS members and who have not received a budget for materials through the regional ILL program.

What type of Loans are eligible?

Loans of all types of materials, including but not limited to: monographs, serials, technical reports, government documents, non-print materials, software, photocopies that are provided to other SEMLS members in response to a specific author/title or photocopy request.

Loans that are made between SEMLS members.

Loans that are not compensated in any other way.

What type of loans are not eligible?

Subject requests, bulk loans, extended loans, deposit collections and other supplementary collections loans are not eligible under this program.

Loans to libraries that are not SEMLS members even though they might be located in the SEMLS geographic area. For a complete list of SEMLS members click here.

Loans to libraries that are not SEMLS members.

Loans that are compensated in any other way. If you received any regional funding for lending materials to libraries in the region you are not eligible to compensation under this program. If you charge for ILL requests, including photocopies, you are not eligible for the program.

Loans, which are compensated through user charges or fees (except when such charges are for extraordinary services, such as overnight delivery.) If a library must pay a fee to use your collection you may not count any of these loans.

Loans made between libraries that are funded by the same source including:

What other requirements are there for this program?

Complete the SEMLS Net Lender Form.

A Library must have requests ready for shipment within two working days of notifying the requesting library of their willingness to lend.

A library must retain a record of the transaction. Transaction records could include system generated statistics, email forms, ALA forms. The record should include the borrowing and lending library names, form of transmittal, number of items loaned and borrowed. For auditing purposes, SEMLS requires that these records be submitted prior to providing compensation.

How is Compensation determined?

Compensation is provided on a net-plus basis, i.e. libraries will be reimbursed for loans in excess of items borrowed.

Compensation rate per net-plus transaction will be determined annually.

If financially possible, reimbursements will occur annually.

Are there any requirements for the use of Net Lender Funds?

The SEMLS Net Lender Program is intended to defray the costs of maintaining collections and processing ILL requests at loaning libraries. SEMLS Compensation funds may be expended by the lending library for any associated costs. These funds may not be expended for other than library purposes.