We're just about to embark on a fairly radical shake-up of overdue
charges and reminders in Plymouth. We don't yet have the facility to
send reminders in advance of items being due, but have been offering
Library Elf to customers for the past four or five years.
We're planning to move, like Manchester, to the first reminder going out
at one day overdue by email, but with postal reminders still at two
weeks. This is partly a logistical issue, and partly to encourage
customers to opt for paperless notification. (Customers who don't have
their own email addresses can opt to have the reminder going to their
local library who will phone them in the evening, and can renew the
items at that point to stop charges increasing.)
Second reminders will be almost exclusively by phone from the local
library. We've trialled this for three months, with another three month
control by post, and the results were most encouraging. Customers
responded very positively to a call from a real person using the right
sort of approach. (I'm aware that automated systems exist, but the costs
don't stack up for an authority of Plymouth's size.)
I know it's self-evident, but I think that we sometimes forget that
stock kept overdue is often never returned, resulting in loss of stock,
income from overdue charges - and customers.
Chris
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Chris Goddard
Plymouth, U.K.
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