Hi Kathy, It's great to hear your enhancement plan. I love your proposal.
I have some concern of BILL-04, bullet 1. I think the hidden message here is that the items are *not* lost when Lost, Long Overdue and Claims Returned Items are renewed. If the library settings on voiding lost charges are observed, for some libraries, the lost charges will be kept (for false lost). I would think the lost charges may be voided or controlled by a separate set of library settings. I think libraries may have different preference for such "false" lost.
The above applies to bullet 3, too. (Right now at Sitka we don't use long overdue.)
Negative bills are our most reported issue. We found more often than not the issue was actually caused by staff accidentally voiding partially paid bills. The Void All function is the 'culprit'. Now we tell our libraries not to use this function, instead, to use the Void Billings function.
Tina Sitka Quoting Kathy Lussier <[email protected]>:
Sorry all! I forgot to send the link to our full requirements. Here it is! http://masslnc.cwmars.org/node/2762 Kathy Kathy Lussier Project Coordinator Massachusetts Library Network Cooperative (508) 343-0128 [email protected] Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/kmlussier -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Enhancements to billing and handling of lost, long overdue and claims returned items Date: Tue, 26 Mar 2013 16:40:54 -0400 From: Kathy Lussier <[email protected]> To: Evergreen General Discussion List <[email protected]> Hi all, MassLNC has been working on development requirements for enhancements to Evergreen billing and handling of lost, long overdue, and claims returned items. We are almost at the point where we are ready to seek quotes for the project, but I first wanted to share details on what we are proposing so that we can get feedback from the larger community. I also would like to hear if these projects overlap with other existing development projects. We were happy to hear that PINES has contracted with ESI to support a long overdue process and scratched that item off our list. We are also aware of existing code that has been posted to Launchpad to help deal with some of the negative balances issues identified in our requirements. I'm hoping any development done for MassLNC can supplement and make use of the work that's already been done. In general, we are looking at the following enhancements: * Support for no negative balances or conditional negative balances (i.e. a refund is only applied if a lost book is returned within x number of months that it was paid.) * Support for a "Lost and Paid" status that the system automatically applies once the patron has paid for the lost or long overdue item. * A permission that will allow renewals on lost, long overdue, and claims returned items. * A new penalty for exceeding a count of long overdue items (similar to the penalty for lost items that was recently submitted for https://bugs.launchpad.net/evergreen/+bug/1154258). * Enhancements to the cash reports that distinguishes among payments made for overdue fines, lost/long overdue items, and grocery bills. * Enhancements to the billing interface. Feel free to send along any comments you have on the proposed work. Kathy -- Kathy Lussier Project Coordinator Massachusetts Library Network Cooperative (508) 343-0128 [email protected] Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/kmlussier
Tina Ji 1-888-848-9250 Trainer/Help Desk Specialist BC Libraries Cooperative/Sitka
