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I don't know about any pitfalls of sending faxes for patrons, but there is a pitfall in receiving them. In a previous job, we offered fax services at $1/page--the going rate at other businesses in town that offered fax services. People were warned that we did not offer immediate sending because there could be other people in front of them or the reference staff could be busy helping patrons. Generally, we could get a fax out within 15 minutes of it being brought in and paid for (never send unless you accept payment first). All of that generally went very smoothly. Our problem was in receiving faxes for patrons. Sometimes people would refuse to pay because they expected a 1 or 2 page fax and instead got more pages than expected. Other times they refused to pay because they felt the $1/page fee was too high; it didn't matter to them that they were told the fee when they asked about having a document faxed to the library. If I remember correctly, we ended up allowing people to send faxes but not to receive them. As for the $1/page fee, it really wasn't as high as it sounds. Most faxes required a long distance call and took about 3-4 minutes. By the time you add in staff time to do the faxing, the fee probably covered the cost of the call and the cost of the staff time. If there was a profit, it was minimal. By the way, it was $2/page to send overseas, which never happened there as far as I know. We don't offer fax service at Killeen. But there is a copy and fax service across the street from the library, so we don't really need to offer it. Deanna Frazee Director of Library Services 205 E. Church Ave. Killeen, TX 76541 (254) 501-8995 [EMAIL PROTECTED] -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Tuesday, June 04, 2002 9:52 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Fees for faxes This is a message from CTLS-L. Selecting "Reply" will send a message to the entire list. --------------------------------------------------------- This subject may have been addressed in the past, but since we didn't have a fax machine till now, I probably didn't pay attention. What do libraries charge for sending a fax for a patron? When you're itty-bitty like Mt. Calm, you get lots of folks wandering in wanting faxes sent - and I don't believe I want to do this for free. Maybe the first question actually should have been: do libraries send faxes for patrons? And, are there any pitfalls in doing so that we should be on the lookout fot? Thanks! Nancy F --------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, send to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Include in body: unsubscribe ctls-l For information on CTLS-L please visit: http://www.ctls.net/document/ctls-l.htm --------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, send to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Include in body: unsubscribe ctls-l For information on CTLS-L please visit: http://www.ctls.net/document/ctls-l.htm
