Interlend: The Conference

Well,it may only be Spring, but my mind is already focussing on the summer, and Interlend 2014 in Bonnie Scotland!

The conference looks like being a cracker, with something for everyone.  Most excitingly of all, we have none other than Antony Brewerton of Warwick University as Keynote.  He will be addressing the subject of Branding your Library, which I’m sure will encompass some ideas on how to market individual services. Besides being a Chartered librarian, Antony is also a qualified marketer and member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing.

With the title, Northern Exposure: Marketing & Bench Marking for the Future, we are naturally following the Marketing theme, with additional contributions from Kay Grieves (she of the 7 step marketing toolkit), and Alice Moore, Performance and Business analyst at the British Library.

Other aspects of the great world of Interlending haven’t been neglected; we have sessions on Open Access, copyright and service reviews, plus the latest from the British Library, OCLC and SUNCAT. And don’t forget the all important FIL AGM at which you get a chance to air your views and stand for election to the committee.

The Early Bird rate closes on April 17^th, so book your place today!

Jings, Crivens and Help ma Boab - Interlend 2014 is fast approaching!

Well we are at that time of the year again, the Daffodils are in bloom, there will soon be a few extra hours of daylight to enjoy and booking for the only annual conference dedicated to inter-library loan and document delivery is open!


Spring is springing, and so are the FIL committee!


As part of my role on the FIL committee, I am once again taking the bookings for Interlend, to be held this year at the Carlton Hotel in Edinburgh. This mainly involves setting up the Google form, monitoring new bookings as they arrive, and answering questions from all you lovely interlenders who are planning on attending.

Lots of hard work has already gone into planning the 2014 conference and the FIL committee are hoping for a very useful and enjoyable couple of days for all our attendees. I've blogged previously about FIL events and the great things you can learn by chatting to your interlending colleagues over a cuppa but I have to say, for me, the value of this is closely followed by the value of being a member of the FIL committee. Helping to plan FIL events is rewarding, but also is a great opportunity to learn new stuff, make new contacts and flex those project managing muscles.

If you think you've got some good ideas for future events, want to get experience in planning events or just want an opportunity to help the magic of FIL happen, Interlend 14 is a great time to get involved as this is the time we hold our AGM and elect new members to the committee. If you're interested, check out our website or contact one of us

For now, I'm going back to my bookings. Ahh the joys of Spring (and spreadsheets...)

Natalie Guest
FIL membership secretary

The Value of IFLA Vouchers

Although I imagine many UK interlenders are aware of IFLA vouchers and how they are used I would boldly suggest that there are just as many who are not. Having attended a number of FIL Conferences in the last few years I have met many people new to the world of Interending.  Those in the UK know that most requests can be fulfilled by the British Library and by other libraries generously supplying this material to us.  There is however the (usually single digit) percentage of requests that need additional steps in order to be fulfilled.  Of course some use the British Library to find it for them.  Since I have not used the British Library’s ‘Get It For Me’ service I can’t comment on its effectiveness in fulfilling requests that can’t be fulfilled by a UK supplier.   

King’s College London uses OCLC WorldShare ILL to fulfill a decent number of those requests that can’t be located in the UK.  OCLC ‘s stronghold is still North America. Although increasingly users worldwide are subscribing to WorldShare ILL (and supplying through it) what do you do for the large number of libraries worldwide that don’t use OCLC?  In my experience you can still use IFLA vouchers.  The IFLA voucher system has been around since the mid 90s and was the idea of Graham Cornish, then the UAP (Universal Availability of Publications) Programme Officer.  Graham mentioned in his keynote presentation at the 2013 Interlend Conference that initially the idea of a voucher system was met with considerable skepticism.  The system was trialled and over time it became incredibly successful.  It’s successful to a point where it really is one of the most globally recognised ways to share library resources.  I think the beauty of vouchers is found in their simplicity.  IFLA vouchers have the same value worldwide.  They can be purchased from IFLA HQ and they can be ‘sold back’ to IFLA also.  There’s no real reason to do this though unless you find yourself with a considerable excess of the vouchers.

Further information on how they work and how to obtain them can be found here:

http://www.ifla.org/voucher-scheme/general-info

There’s a great article from 1995 written by Sara Gould called “A voucher scheme to simplify payment for international interlibrary transactions” in the Interlending & Document Supply journal (DOI - 10.1108/02641619510154933).  This is accessible only to those people or institutions that subscribe to the journal.  It talks about the scheme as it was emerging and explains the rationale behind it.  Of course you could try and make an IFLA request for it if you don’t subscribe.

The current value of IFLA vouchers is EUR 8 for a full voucher (which are green) and EUR 4 for half a voucher (which are red).  In a sense though the true value of an IFLA voucher is the pioneering spirit they represent.  They ask the library professional to traverse the globe in search of hard to find resources and to work collaboratively with other library professionals in order to share resources worldwide.

Mark Kluzek