About reservations

OLIB works out whether there are any reservable copies as soon as the User clicks the Reserve icon to place a reservation in the OPAC. If there are reservable copies for that user, the reservation goes ahead. If not, the reservation does not go ahead and instead a message displays to the user explaining, e.g. no reservable copies at the User's location.

There are many parameters enabling system managers to control whether a User is able to place reservations and which copies can be reserved by a User. In some cases, this results in the Reserve icon not being displayed for that User, e.g. if he/she has reached the maximum number of reservations.

It is possible to define an expiry period for held reservations. The day before it is due to expire, OLIB automatically sets the reservation status to Held – Soon To Expire so that library staff can readily identify it and notify the user. Once the "expire after" date is past, OLIB automatically flags the reservation in such a way that staff can easily identify it and cancel it.

Reservations are not deleted from OLIB. They are retained in the system with a status that indicates why they are no longer active, e.g. Fulfilled or Cancelled.

A number of reservation alert emails can be configured for sending to staff / users.