Interlibrary loan (ILL) is a service for borrowing and lending library materials between libraries. The objective of Meredith's ILL service is to support the educational and research needs of Meredith faculty, staff, and students by obtaining needed materials that are unavailable in the Meredith library's physical and online resources. The ILL service also supplies materials from the Meredith library's collections to patrons at other libraries. All ILL borrowing and lending is managed through OCLC's WorldShare Interlibrary Loan service.
ILL Borrowing Policies
Current students, faculty, and staff of the Meredith College community are eligible to request items through ILL. Faculty emeriti are also eligible to use ILL.
The Meredith library staff reserves the right to suspend the ILL borrowing privileges of any community member who owes substantial library fines or who has abused their ILL borrowing privileges in the past. Such abuse may include consistently returning items late or damaged, or routinely not picking up items that they ordered via ILL.
Most books, articles, and other library materials may be requested through ILL. If a requested item is available through the Meredith library's physical or online collections, the ILL staff will alert the patron of its availability and cancel the ILL request. If a requested book is available through Meredith only in e-book format, ILL staff will contact the patron about whether they will be satisfied with the e-book, and if not, will proceed to request a print version through the ILL service. If Meredith's copy of a requested item is checked out or missing, the ILL staff will request it through the ILL service.
The following types of materials can NOT be requested via ILL:
Before submitting a request, the patron is strongly encouraged to use OneSearch, Books and More, or the Journals tab to determine if the needed item is available in the library's physical and online resources. If the item is not available, the patron may submit an ILL request.
There are three ways to submit a request:
There are no charges for requesting items via ILL. There are also no limits on the number of items that a patron can request, but ILL staff reserves the right to cut off a patron if they submit an excessive number of requests.
New borrowing requests are ordinarily processed within 2 business days of receipt. Processing time may be longer during college holidays and breaks. ILL staff will send a confirmation email that the request has been received and processed.
Average turnaround times are 3 days for articles and 10 days for books. But please realize that there is wide variation in processing time, depending on how many libraries have the item and how far the item must be shipped. If you have any questions about the status of your request, please email ill @ meredith.edu.
For physical items, ILL staff will notify the patron when their requested item is available for pick-up. Items will be held at the Circulation/Reference desk. The ILL staff reserves the right to send an item back if it is nearing its due date and has not been picked up.
For electronic items such as PDFs of articles, ILL staff will either email the patron with a link for downloading the item, or email the patron the item as a file attachment.
The loan period for an item obtained through ILL is determined by the lending library, and may range from 3-12 weeks. Meredith library patrons are expected to adhere to the due date which appears on their item's book strap, and also in the notification email sent to patrons when their item is ready to pick up.
If a patron needs a particular item for longer than the given loan period, they should contact ILL staff to place a renewal request. If the request is granted, ILL staff will notify the patron of the new due date. If the request is denied, the patron must return the item as soon as possible.
Only ONE renewal is allowed per ILL item. If a patron needs a borrowed item for additional time beyond the renewal period, they should return the item before its due date and submit another ILL request for it. ILL staff will obtain the item from a different lending library.
If a Meredith patron fails to return an item within a reasonable time after its due date, the library reserves the right to suspend the patron's library privileges until the item is returned.
If an item is lost or damaged or not returned, ILL staff will contact the lending library about its preferences for replacing the item. The patron will normally be billed for the full replacement cost of the item plus a processing fee. It will be the responsibility of the patron to pay this bill in a timely manner.
ILL Lending Policies
Meredith's library will lend its materials to patrons in good standing at any library affiliated with OCLC. Requests must be submitted by an OCLC member library. The Meredith library staff reserves the right to decline requests from libraries that have a track record of not returning items in good condition and in a timely manner.
Most books, articles, and other materials at Meredith's library may be requested through ILL.
The following types of materials can NOT be requested from Meredith's library:
Meredith's library does not charge fees to eligible borrowing libraries for items borrowed via interlibrary loan. However, Meredith's ILL staff reserves the right to charge a fee in special circumstances: for example, loans to libraries outside of North America, or loans of multiple large volumes that will be expensive to ship.
All items are loaned for a period of five weeks.
Only ONE renewal is allowed per ILL item. The renewal period will be three additional weeks. The borrowing library is asked to strongly encourage their patron to return the item by the renewal due date.
In special cases (for example, fragile books or sets of microfilms), Meredith's ILL staff reserves the right to restrict the material to in-library use only, or to not allow any renewals.
If a borrowing library fails to return an item within a reasonable time after its due date, Meredith ILL staff will contact the library about making every effort to recover the item. If these efforts fail, Meredith's ILL staff will send the borrowing library an invoice for the replacement cost of the item plus a $25 processing fee.
If an item is marked in OCLC by the borrowing library as returned but does not arrive at Meredith within a reasonable amount of time, ILL staff will contact the library to see if they can locate it. If these efforts fail, Meredith's ILL staff will send the borrowing library an invoice for the replacement cost of the item plus a $25 processing fee.
If an item is returned in damaged condition, ILL staff will send the borrowing library an invoice for the replacement cost of the item plus a $25 processing fee.
Carlyle Campbell Library
Meredith College
3800 Hillsborough St.
Raleigh, NC 27607
919-760-8532
