Hi Sarah,
Having seen the details of your experience it does seem that since ASM made
the mistake (i.e. provided the quote to the agent and then rejected the
payment from Swets even though it was correct) then it should take some
responsibility for the two months lack of access you've suffered whilst this
all gets sorted out as well as the time both you and your agent have spent
trying to get this all sorted.
If was the ASM then I would have made sure your access was activated in a
timely manner whilst the problems were rectified. That way the end users
wouldn't suffer and it would give some time to resolve the situation.
However, in my experience ASM is not known for its customer service, when we
did have problems in the past it was like hitting your head against a brick
wall and we had to be prepared to be tenacious and not give up.
The last thing a publisher should ever do is cut off access or not allow
activation of access for a customer. Most society publishers are pretty good
in such circumstances and will do almost anything to avoid loss of access.
Let's hope the ASM are taking note of all our comments and make the utmost
effort to improve their customer services and relationships with both agents
and customers.
Cheers
Lesley
-----Original Message-----
From: An informal open list set up by the UK Serials Group
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Sarah Pearson
Sent: 21 April 2008 08:41
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Reponse from ASM to recent postings
Hello Lesley,
Thanks for your email. It is interesting to note the issues leading to a
change in customer number. Others have mentioned this factor on and off list
to me. Our timeline for the 2007 access problems is as follows:
2007
- Quote received from ASM via Swets for ASM package
- We placed an order for ASM package and Swets raised a cheque on 10th Nov
2006. They also sent details of our IP range / contact etc
- ASM cashed cheque on 8th Dec 2006
- Early Jan 2007 no access. Swets contacted ASM who advised that payment had
been returned to Swets as incorrect amount had been paid.
- Swets queried this as it was based on a quote that ASM sent. AS< then
acknowledged that it was correct and that payment shouldn't have been
returned.
- New payment then raised by Swets on 1st Feb 2007
- This was processed on 28th Feb 2007
So this resulted in 2 months without access and we were advised by ASM that
they would not provide compensation for this loss of access.
So far we have not been able to find out the cause of the 2008 loss of
access as we have not had any communication from ASM about why access was
not enabled.
Best Wishes
Sarah
Sarah Pearson
E-Resources & Serials Coordinator
Library Services
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
Tel: 0121 414 5825
Email: [log in to unmask]
-----Original Message-----
From: An informal open list set up by the UK Serials Group
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Lesley Crawshaw
Sent: 18 April 2008 10:53
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Reponse from ASM to recent postings
Hi Sarah,
I would also like to understand how these problems arise in the 1st place as
I know that there have been some other widespread problems this year which
haven't surfaced on this list.
Luckily we don't seem to have problems with our ASM renewals this year
although that hasn't always been the case, but then we've had the all 11
journals online only package since 2002. We did suffer access problems in
2003 (the dreaded Divine situation), 2004 and 2005, but since then things
have been fine.
However, I think it's important that the source of the problem and its
solution be resolved so that this doesn't happen again. As you say it's
rather strange that ASM was unaware of the problems until your email and
others hit this list. I would have thought that it would be carefully
monitoring the renewal of subscriptions in order to avoid the problems that
many have been facing.
The ASM has made a number of changes to its subscription
options/banding/systems in the last few years and it's always been my
experience that any changes have the ability to disrupt the renewal process
and lead to these sorts of problems.
e.g. In 2006 ASM changed its banding structure which affected the band we
were in and because this information wasn't available on the ASM site at the
time we did our renewal instructions for 2006 we gave our agent, Ebsco, the
wrong renewal instructions. However we didn't lose any access because ASM
were overpaid! If the situation had been the other way around we might not
have been so lucky.
e.g. In 2008 ASM introduced several new online bundle packages which we were
informed about in September 2007 and changed our customer number due to
system upgrades which we were informed about in February 2008.
The posting by Barbara Goldman is a very positive first step towards
improvements in our varying experience with ASM over many years.
Cheers
Lesley
-----Original Message-----
From: An informal open list set up by the UK Serials Group
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Sandra Morris [ssm]
Sent: 18 April 2008 09:00
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Reponse from ASM to recent postings
Dear Barbara
Thank you for responding to the list and it is very welcome news that the
problems will be addressed.
Perhaps you could also help us on a couple of points, and indicate how we
can best stop these kinds of problems occurring or escalating.
First, it seems unfortunate that, as you state, that your organisation was
unaware of the problems until these many emails of the past couple of days.
If we have problems in the future, who should we contact to help solve them
as there seems to be some breakdown in communication somewhere.
You appear to be saying that the problems are caused by our subscription
agents not providing the correct information. Can you tell us what this
information is that you specifically need, so that we can make a point next
year of reminding our agents (and some people have said they had problems
even ordering directly) that they need to give this information when
ordering/renewing? It must be some information that is not normally required
by publishers, as we have not heard of similar widespread problems with any
other publisher.
Thanks very much.
Sandra
Sandra Morris
Electronic Information Development Officer
Subject Support & E-Library Team,
Information Services,
Hugh Owen Library,
Aberystywth University,
Aberystwyth,
Ceredigion, SY23 3DZ
====================================
Email: [log in to unmask]
Phone: 01970 621892
FAX: (01970) 622404
Tîm Cynorthwywyr Pwnc ac E-Lyfrgell,
Gwasanaethau Gwybodaeth,
Llyfrgell Hugh Owen,
Prifysgol Aberystwyth,
Ceredigion, SY23 3DZ
====================================
Ffon: 01970 621892
====================================
-----Original Message-----
From: An informal open list set up by the UK Serials Group
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Goldman, Barbara
Sent: 17 April 2008 21:46
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Reponse from ASM to recent postings
As the new director of the ASM journals program, I would like to let members
of the UK Serials Group listserve know that we've read your recent postings
and now are aware of the high degree of frustration you've been
experiencing. Since the first post to this listserve a couple of days ago,
we have been investigating the source of the problems and working to resolve
them.
ASM has begun to restore service to customers who have notified us of access
problems--either directly or via postings to this listserve--while we work
with subscription agents to get the information and payments that still have
not been received. .
The problems you've described usually stem from orders submitted by your
subscription agents that are missing full payment and/or enduser information
required to activate the subscriptions. Our policy until now has been to
grace customers through March 15 while we work with agents to obtain
complete order details and full payment. If the agents do not respond by
mid-March, access has been cut off.
We are working to immediately reinstate access to affected customers and
will contact them to resolve payment before the new grace period expires on
May 19th. .If you are experiencing access problems, I'd encourage you to
contact your subscriptions agents to let them know full payment is past due.
Please also feel free to cc: me, so that I may alert our subscriptions
fulfillment staff. Alternatively, you may contact customer service
directly, as follows;
Email: [log in to unmask]
Phone: 205-995-1567
Fax: 205-995-1588
My goal as I get up to speed in my new position is to bring ASM policies
more in line with other publishers' best practices, so that we provide a
quality of customer service that is commensurate with the quality of ASM's
journals. We are modifying our policies so that customers don't lose access
to our valuable journals when it's clear that their intent always was to
order appropriately. In the future, we'll also be sure to give librarians
advance notice before terminating access because correct payment has not
been received, so that you can follow up with your agents directly.
I'd like to thank you in advance both for your feedback and your patience as
we work toward better serving our customers.
Barbara Goldman
Director, Journals, ASM
[log in to unmask]
*******************************
Barbara M. Goldman, Ph.D.
Director, Journals
American Society for Microbiology
1752 N St. NW
Washington, DC 20036-2904
202-942-9239
[log in to unmask]
*******************************
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