ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries 624 / C&RL News D o c u m e n t d e liv e r y , co st c o n ta in m e n t a n d se r ia l o w n ersh ip By Susan B. Ardis Head, McKinney Engineering Library University o f Texas at Austin a n d K aren S. Croneis Head, Physics Math Astronomy Library University of Texas at Austin Price versus pride of ownership. B u d g e t a r y constraints and uncertain budget alio- cations are forcing libraries to re-examine strate­ gies for providing patrons w ith access to serial in­ formation. Historically, the most common method or strategy used to provide access in college and re­ search libraries has been to m aintain a large serials collection. As a result, at research libraries, serials make up a substantial percentage of the materials budget. UT Austin General Libraries is no excep­ tion; scientific and technological serials alone rep­ resent 45 % of the total serial budget. Because of in­ flation, currency fluctuations and price increases, this portion of the budget continues to increase at rates beyond the control of libraries. Ownership of serial titles involves more than simply paying an annual subscription price. Addi­ tional costs associated w ith binding, circulation, record-keeping and housing are often overlooked when determining total expenditures for serials. The desire to add new titles, while rarely over­ looked, also has an impact because the budget must also increase to accommodate these new titles. Over the last year the General Libraries have had to reduce serial expenditures by 10%. These recent serial cancellations prom pted critical evalu­ ations of the collections in terms of use, price and immediate access. The first to be canceled were du­ plicated or marginal titles. Unfortunately, in order to meet the cancellation quotas, the library also had to cancel some in-scope but infrequently used materials. For the purposes of this project, a title was considered to be “infrequently used” if it had circulated an average of less than once per year. Like other academic libraries, the strategy of the General Libraries was to own as many titles as pos­ sible and to rely on interlibrary loan (ILL) for out- of-scope m aterials. Since im m ediate access for these out-of-scope items was not a high priority, in­ terlibrary loan was a viable option. However, as in-scope materials were canceled, access became m ore im p o rtan t. Because of slow tu rn -a ro u n d times, ILL was not considered to be an acceptable option for these canceled in-scope titles. An option which has been available but not widely considered in academic libraries is the p u r­ chase of copies of journal articles from commercial document delivery services rather than subscribing to the journal itself. This alternative had never been investigated at UT for several reasons, includ­ ing pride of ownership, a centralized interlibrary loan service, and deposit account requirements. Today’s near-crisis situation in journal prices, added to the ever growing pressure of space con­ straints and budget uncertainties, suggested a new look at this option. The science librarians at UT hy­ pothesized th at purchasing articles from commer­ cial document delivery services m ight be more cost effective than ownership of infrequently used ti­ tles. In order to test this hypothesis, a pilot study of selected com m ercial docum ent delivery systems was conducted from February 2 through April 30, 1987. 626 / C&R L News TABLE I Results by Library: All Vendors Documents Documents Not Total Library Ordered Received Available Cost Chemistry 51 42 9 $575.25 Engineering 100 100 0 $1,036.70 Geology 1 1 0 $14.00 Life Science 52 48 3 $675.25 Physics-Math 8 5 3 $56.00 TOTAL 212 196* 15 $2,357.20 *The first vendor contacted supplied 188 of these documents; the other 8 were supplied by the second vendor. The following guidelines were established for the test. 1) Requests had to be submitted at one of the five science libraries (Chemistry, Engineering, Geol­ ogy, Life Sciences, Physics-Math). 2) Materials had to be scientific or technical in nature. (Funding came from additional cancel­ lations of scientific titles above and beyond the m andated cancellation target of 10% .) 3) Requests had to be for materials that the li­ braries did not own. (Because it was im portant that this be a test of document delivery as an alternative to ownership, we did not accept requests for m ate­ rials which were lost, in circulation or at the bind­ ery.) 4) During the test phase documents had to be available from CTIC, Chemical Abstracts (CA), NTIS, or GLOBAL. (These vendors were chosen because of their heavy emphasis on science and technology.) 5) Document receipt, ordering, record-keeping and accounting were centralized. Information was collected on turn-around time, staffing require­ ments, vendor performance and accuracy, docu­ ment availability, billing procedures, cost per arti­ cle and user acceptance of the service. 6) Access to this pilot service was available to all UT students, staff and faculty. 7) Publicity was by referral only due to limited funds and unknown demand. 8) Articles became the property of the requester. Results Results of the study are summarized in Tables 1-3. Low usage by PM A and Geology was expected and is related to the vendors selected. The proposed addition of other vendors such as UMI, Petroleum Abstracts and AIAA is expected to affect usage dis­ tribution. However, it should be noted th at some of the collections are stronger than others. The Geol­ ogy collection, for example, is very strong while the Life Science collection is at a disadvantage because the medical school and its collection are located 75 miles away. Results for Engineering are also some­ w h a t skew ed by th e a d d itio n of NTIS and GLOBAL as vendors because all of these requests originated at the Engineering Library. Conclusions As anticipated, the study confirmed the hypoth­ esis that commercial document delivery of infre­ quently used materials is a cost-effective alterna­ tive to ownership. If only 20 infrequently used journals with an average subscription price of $200 per year were cancelled, the resulting savings could be used to purchase 415 articles. Commercial doc­ ument delivery would provide a method of cost TABLE II Results by Library: Vendors CA, CTIC Documents Documents Not Total Library Ordered Received Available Cost Chemistry 51 42 9 $575.25 Engineering 30 30 — $349.00 Geology 1 1 — $14.00 Life Science 52 48 3 $675.25 Physics–Math 8 5 3 $56.00 TOTAL 142 126 15 $1,669.50 November 1987 / 627 TABLE III Results by Vendor Documents Average Total Average Vendor Ordered Cost Cost Time** CA 69 $ 9.62 $ 664.00 7.3 CTIC 68 $ 9.04 $ 615.00 8.4 GLOBAL 4 $32.50 130.00 10.2 NTIS 66 $ 8.45 557.70 14.4 TOTAL 207 nm* $1,966.60 10.1 *not meaningful * * average turn-around time in calendar days $$ containment and information on collection devel­ opment. In addition, as a long-term strategy, it would offer greater flexibility in space and facilities management. Increased accountability and improved public relations were two unanticipated results. The deci­ sion to decentralize this service rather than enlarge the traditional interlibrary loan function was for­ tuitous. Users knew where to follow up on their re­ quests, a fact that increased accountability for in­ dividual library units. Patron awareness of this service increased dramatically in a short time w ith­ out any formal publicity. Over half of them ex­ pressed the hope that this would become a perma­ nent service. Another unexpected result occurred because each request was forwarded by reference librari­ ans. In the past, UT staff sent users to a centralized interlibrary loan office and as a result staff had no further contact with the patron. Both users and ref­ erence staff came to view document delivery as an extension of the reference process. Although pa­ trons usually make this connection in special li­ braries it is rarely made in academic libraries. Another benefit of the study involved staff and user morale. The addition of document delivery service gave the staff something positive to offer pa­ trons during the cancellation project. In turn, users did not feel obligated to campaign for retention of specific low-use titles slated for cancellation. The science librarians have now suggested to the library administration that this service be contin­ ued and expanded. One proposal is the establish­ ment of ongoing document delivery funds for each unit. These would be created by the cancellation of additional lesser-used titles. An important compo­ nent of this proposal is that each library would de­ termine the size of the fund, monitor the fund bal­ ance and be responsible for a u th o riz in g expenditures. This test successfully demonstrates that docu­ ment delivery is cost effective. It can control costs, provide timely access, and give the library some­ thing positive to offer during difficult times. Docu­ ment delivery is an attractive alternative to owner­ ship. ■ ■ RBMS Preconference in New Orleans ACRL’s 29th Rare Books and Manuscripts Preconference in New Orleans, July 5-8, 1988, will focus on the relationship between special collections libraries and the museum world and what they can learn from each other. Topics to be examined will include public programs, fundraising, access and cataloging, collection development and reference services in a mu­ seum library, the scholar’s perspective, and in­ stitutional perspectives of archives, libraries, and historical societies. The speakers will include: William Cagle, director of the Lilly Library, University of Indi­ ana; Werner Gundersheimer, director of the Folger Shakespeare Library; Nancy Gwinn, as­ sistant director for collections management, Smithsonian Institution Libraries; Anthony P. Harvey, coordinator of planning and develop­ ment at the British Museum (Natural History); and Deirdre Stam, School of Information Stud­ ies, Syracuse University. To com plem ent the plenary sessions, the RBMS Continuing Education Committee is planning a variety of seminars on topics related to the theme of the preconference. There will also be visits to Tulane University and to Louisi­ ana State University in Baton Rouge. Further information on the seminars and program will be provided in the registration brochure, which will be available in March. The brochure will also include a full schedule of events that will run until 3:30 p.m. on Friday, July 8. The preconference hotel will be the Royal Orleans in the French Quarter. Rates will be $65 for single, double, or twin; $20 additional for a third person. These rates will be honored throughout ALA Annual Conference. The Program Com m ittee consists of Ann Gwyn (chair), Robert Martin (local arrange­ ments), John Y. Cole, Ellen D unlap, Joan F rie d m a n , B a rb a ra Paulson, and Alice Schreyer.