Hi Gerry,
We have had a campus card type system for some years now Students can load their ID cards with cash or credit card payments online for fines, printing and photocopying. We don't deal directly with debit or credit cards. I must say that this works well and we have had no complaints except when top-up machines have been out of order. The students like the fact that they need only carry the one card - college ID/library card/payment. We were very lucky in that a member of library staff moved into the IT team implementing this, so there was good awareness of library/student needs when creating the system. The changeover happened at the same time as a major self-service implementation, so we marketed it as one of the self-service benefits and as a time saver.
We also have a policy at our Main library of not 'selling' anything, so we don't sell stationery, binding items, bags or any such. These are available nearby in the SU or our reprographics dept. We are also trying to phase out 'selling' at our smaller sites but this is more problematic as there are no alternatives nearby. There is still demand for such items, and it would be nice to generate a bit of income, so we have also been investigating the use of a stationery vending machine and hope to implement this at some time in the future.
The only problem we have had with being 'cashless' is lost book replacements. There is demand for this, particularly at the end of the year when students may be leaving and want to make a payment in a hurry, or get a friend to do so We only accept cash or cheque during the hours when we can pass this directly to our business support team - we don't have a till or cashbox. These costs could go on the library system as a fine or charge, but there is no self-service option to choose what gets paid, so if a student has a number of these, or also has fines, the information on screen can quickly become confusing if they don't pay everything at once. There is also a college e-pay option, but this goes through college finance, and it is again hard to join things up following a payment.
Hope this helps.
Sue Grant
Team Leader, Public Services
Mile End Library
Queen Mary, University of London
-----Original Message-----
From: A general library and information science list for news and discussion. [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Gerry Coyle
Sent: 29 August 2014 11:28
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Cashless payments
Dear Colleagues,
If any libraries have moved to a cashless payments system (i.e. debit/credit cards only), I would be very grateful to hear of your experiences, particularly in relation to how users reacted to the change.
Thanks and best wishes
Gerry
Gerry Coyle
Information Services Manager
Senate House Library
University of London
Senate House | Malet Street | London WC1E 7HU | UK
Tel: +44 (0)20 7862 8441 Web: www.senatehouselibrary.ac.uk<http://www.senatehouselibrary.ac.uk>
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