Library-at-home customers

Make a customer a library-at-home participant

To identify a customer as a library-at-home participant:

Search for the customer that will receive library-at-home services.
Open the customer record.
Select the Notification preferences tab.
Click Change to edit the customer record.

Click Set next to the Library at home delivery field. The Delivery process for customers window opens.

Select BAH - Library-at-home from the Delivery code drop-down menu.
Click Continue.

Provide additional Delivery process details:

Field	Description
Delivery process	Default description of the delivery process method.
Library-at-home (BAH) branch	The branch that will deliver the materials to the customers.
Carrier	The field is not editable. Click Select delivery carrier at the bottom of the window and select a Carrier from the drop-down list. Click OK to save.
Number at home	The maximum number of materials that can be borrowed by the customer. This number cannot conflict with the maximum number of materials allowed by the library policy.
RMT Materials yes	Material preference of the customer. Specify which materials are desired in this field.
RMT Materials no	Material preference of the customer. Specify which materials are not desired in this field. If nothing is entered, all types of materials will be considered for delivery.
Note	Space for small notes regarding the customer. Example: Not home on Thursday. There is a cha
Status*	The standard library-at-home status is Active, but it can be changed to inactive. This makes it possible to provide library-at-home services to customers who are temporarily or permanently Inactive.
Examine term lending history (days)	Indicate the number of days the system must take into account for previously borrowed materials. Materials borrowed within this period of time will not be delivered to the customer again until the number of days have passed.

Click Save and select a delivery carrier. A selection window opens.
Select a delivery person from the list and click OK.
Click OK.
Click Save. The delivery process and delivery person are assigned and saved.

Library-at-home requests

Customer preferences and loan history are leveraged to provide library-at-home customers materials that fit their needs. Before a delivery person can take materials to a customer, a library-at-home report is printed with titles that align with the customer's profile. A customer defines their preferences or works with their library-at-home delivery person to set them using the following methods:

Method	Description
Holds	Customers can place holds via the web catalog or work with their delivery person to have requests made via the staff client. Customers who use the library-at-home service receive no hold request notifications, instead the hold notification is moved to the library-at-home report.
Wish list	Customers can create a wish list via the web catalog. The library-at-home function uses the titles from the customer wish list to provide title suggestions. The wish list is automatically maintained so that once an item is borrowed, it is removed from the wish list.
Library-at-home profiles	Each library-at-home customer can tell library staff which library-at-home profile they would like to use. The customer can select as many profiles as they like. The library-at-home profiles are defined at the system level and can specifically account for the desired material type. For more information, see Library-at-home profiles.
In-person readers advisory	Titles can be generated through readers advisory. In order to leverage readers advisory, there must be access to the customer's loan history. Once a customer has selected one or more library-at-home profile(s), all advisory titles are generated from it. This means that personal reading recommendations are the least recommended method of building a borrowing list because it will focus only on selected profiles.
Add items	The library-at-home delivery person can add items to the wish list on behalf of the customer.

Subscribe to library-at-home profiles

Once library-at-home profiles are created, they can be assigned to library-at-home customers.

To subscribe a library-at-home customer to a profile:

Search for the customer account to which you want to add profiles.
Select the library-at-home customer record.
Open the Profiles tab.
Click Change at the bottom of the window.
Select Library-at-home profiles from the Profile type drop-down menu. A list of available profiles appears in the table.
Click to select the profile you want to add and then right click.
Select Activate library card for this profile from the right-click menu. The Membership column displays Yes when the membership is activated.
(Optional) Activate additional profiles for the customer account.
The customer account is updated to include the library-at-home profiles.

To remove a profile, follow the same steps, but for step 7, select End membership for this profile.