1. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
Chris Hauser
Weber State University, Stewart
Library
ACQ through CAT: OMG you’ve got to
be kidding me

2. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
The Environmental Factors
• The Department
• The Staff
• The Management

3. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
Analysis Approach
• Recognize the purpose of the analysis
• Recognize the potential of the existing
resources
• Understand the current workflow

4. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
PROCESS: ASSUMED
• Harvest Purchase Requests
• Search vendors for products
• Order titles
• Build PO/PO lines
• Receive titles
• Invoice/Statement
• Pay vendor
• Catalog titles
• Preservation/brand/secure
• Check-in/Circulate

5. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
PROCESS: OBSERVED
Harvest Purchase Requests
– Received hardcopy requests from faculty
– Requests stored in physical pile until “ordering week”
– Sort and process pile in order of personal preference
– Rarely checked local holdings prior to procurement
Resulting Recommendation
• Develop standardized method for submitting purchase requests
• Develop standardized set of required fields for purchase requests
• Develop first in/first out & priority rush policies for order processing
• Standardize/automate local holdings check

6. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
PROCESS: OBSERVED
Search vendors for products
– Search individual online book vendors seeking best price
– Had over 300 vendor records in ILS database
– Based purchase decision only on retail cost
– Often used private sellers via Amazon market place
Resulting Recommendations
• Select a primary monograph vendor
• Develop policy for selecting secondary or private vendors
• Notify requesting faculty when title ordered (Jim Taylor)

7. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
PROCESS: OBSERVED
Order Titles
– Favored FAX ordering, ordering from catalogs
– Avoided premier academic book vendors/aggregator
– Log all order details in paper ledger
Resulting Recommendation
• Establish EDI ordering profiles with primary monograph vendor(s)

8. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
PROCESS: OBSERVED
• Build PO/PO lines
– Created new PO and PO lines manually
– Only monographs were entered into the ILS accounting system
– Brief bib and item records deleted when titles-in-hand were fully
cataloged by Cataloging.
Resulting Recommendation
• Establish PO import procedure
• Record all purchases made by acquisitions in the ILS
• Build bib/items from brief PO import (vendor supplied)
• Establish overlay points for bib and item at acquisitions level

9. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
PROCESS: OBSERVED
• Receive titles
– Title searched, PO line found, PO line printed, and placed in title-in-
hand.
– Inconsistently ‘received’ in ILS
– Titles-in-hand sent to physical processing
Resulting Recommendation
• Receive and Invoice on order titles in single procedure
• Assign and affix title barcode at receiving (For item overlay point)
• Auto print workslips at receiving
• Send titles to CATALOGING rather than physical processing. (Physical Process Last)
• Receive, statement, and invoice subscription and serial purchases at time of PO
line creation

10. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
PROCESS: OBSERVED
• Invoice / Statement
– Feature of ILS wasn’t consistently used
– Budgets never accurate
– Any statistical gathering useless
Resulting Recommendation
• Development payment accounting policies that require an ILS generated
PO/Statement before payment can be authorized. (primary vendors)

11. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
PROCESS: OBSERVED
• Vendor Payment
– Used departmental credit card for nearly all payments
– Had established many dozens of private/personal accounts with
vendors
– Most payments made in advance of receiving titles
– Used a private PayPal account to make some payments
– No oversight on payment authorizations
– Most time spend meeting the reconciliation requirements associated
with the university credit card
Resulting Recommendation
• Only use credit card for secondary/private vendor purchases
• Eliminate all private/personal accounts
• Use university purchasing department to pay vendors

12. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
PROCESS: OBSERVED
• Catalog titles
– Deleted originating acquisitions bib/item
– Manual copy catalog record searching (OCLC)
– Import OCLC selected/harvested records W/949 item creation
– Manual item record editing post bib import
– Manual ‘clean-up’ of bib record tags
– Generated spine label, performed all physical processing
Resulting Recommendation
• Overlay brief acquisitions originated records/items with full records
• Integrate WCP with title vendor (Receive/import full MARC record with titles)
• Automated OCLC holdings update
• Reassigned physical processing to part time classified

13. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
PROCESS: OBSERVED
• Processing
– Performed preservation on new titles
– Prepared materials for bindery
Resulting Recommendation
• Perform spine label processing
• Perform branding, security, and circulation prep.
• Prepare and deliver shelf-ready titles to circulation
• Notify requesting faculty titles are available for circulation

14. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
THE DEPARTMENT TODAY
• 4 full time staff
– Cataloging Manager
– Acquisitions Manager
– Acquisitions Assistant
– Cataloger (copy)
• 2 part time staff
– Processor
– Original Cataloger
Most of the improvements we had hoped to
make have been applied
Not all of the paths we took led to the correct
solution but they have all led to discovery of
new ideas
There is always room for improvement
There is much more that needs to be done

15. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST

16. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST

17. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST

18. 2010 COSA USER CONFERENCE | 26-27 OCTOBER | GOLD COAST
THANK YOU
Chris Hauser
chauser@weber.edu
https://public.me.com/chauser123
for Full Workflow (PDF)