Grumpy Lady

[KellyHabersham]

*not a customer I personally dealt with, but I was sitting next to the co-worker who unfortunately DID have to*

To give a little background info - in the library system I work in, when a customer returns a damaged item, we bill them, and hold onto that item for two months. (it goes on a "Damaged Item shelf". After two months, that item gets discarded out of the system and is thrown out.

Grumpy Lady came into the library yesterday to dispute a damaged item. This in itself isn't unusual, BUT........the book in question had been returned/billed/discarded (not sure which) back in October, and we no longer had it. (I believe her gripe was that she couldn't believe a book had such bad liquid damage that it couldn't be fixed)

So then Grumpy Lady agrees to pay for the cost of the book, but she pulls out a credit card, and my co-worker tells her that we don't have a card reader at the desk. Grumpy Lady gets all snippy with "Of course you don't!". Followed by "You know what? Forget it!" and marches angrily out of the building.

[workerbee222]

There are two things I don't understand. What is the purpose of holding damaged items two months before you throw them away? Is that in case the patron disputes the charge?

And two: What kind of liquid damage to a book CAN be fixed?

If I dumped a glass of anything on a borrowed book, I'd just assume I needed to pay for a new one.

[Slave to the Phone]

I can't answer for the OP, but have my answers from my time working at a library.

1. In case the patron turns into a CS who demands to see the damaged item.

2. None. Small amounts of liquid damage to a book doesn't really make it unreadable, but nobody will want to read it.

I was raised that if you borrowed something and damaged it, you replaced it without being asked. That was just how things were done.

I also value having a library and have never once complained about the cost of my errors. I have learned that most library's will happily accept a replacement item as long as it is in new condition. Hello Amazon!!!

[earl colby pottinger]

Uses

I assume she can not use the library until she pays.

[KellyHabersham]

I assume she can not use the library until she pays.

Kind of - she can still come in and use our public computers and access our online databases, just can't check anything out until she pays off all or some of the fine. (Our limit is $25, and the book Grumpy Lady was/is being charged for apparently cost just over that)

Anyhow, if this helps explain things a little better - when we send out a bill for a damaged item, it included wording about the item being held for two months for the customer to examine...if they wish to.

[Mongo Skruddgemire]

I also value having a library and have never once complained about the cost of my errors. I have learned that most library's will happily accept a replacement item as long as it is in new condition. Hello Amazon!!!

Most, but not all. I ruined an audiobook CD of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Went to the library and reported that I had and wanted to know what the cost was. They told me $80. Thinking “That’s a little high” I went home and looked on Amazon.

Found a new, still shrinkwrapped copy for $20 so I bought it.

Went back to the library and they refused it. I argued that it was the same version with the same case and everything. They refused and said that it was $80 plus another $20 for the administrivia to shelve the new copy that I provided.

I tossed the copy on the desk, spun on my heel and marched out of the library...never to return.

[Mental_Mouse]

When we get books in at our used-book shop, water damage is a near-automatic rejection. Especially as it's sometimes accompanied by mold.

[Slave to the Phone]

That's horrible, Mongo! I am outraged on your behalf!!!

In part, libraries get money by their circulation numbers. Most libraries LIKE people to become repeat customers because it helps their numbers. (Not to mention that most people who work at libraries are there because they love the media.) Causing someone to walk away and never come back over something so easy to solve is totally the wrong way for a library to do business.

While I have never been charged a re-catologing fee, I would have been willing to pay that along with giving them the replacement item because that is reasonable. Being told that they would rather have the money than the replacement item to have on their shelves so that other people could enjoy it would have made me crazy mad.

[Tanasi]

By now it's many years ago, I bought a hardback off of eBay. It was part of a series that I likes and when I like a series I buy hardback to shelve to kinda backup my paperbacks. Anyways the book was used and I knew that before hand what I didn't know was that it was a library book. It was from a library somewhere in WI. Thinking it was stolen I called them to report that I had it and wanted an address to send it back. The lady asked if it had a black stripe on it and it did, she said it was a book they sold so it was mine to keep.

[Argus]

The lady asked if it had a black stripe on it and it did, she said it was a book they sold so it was mine to keep.

I think I can see the reason for that. The library around here also has book sales from time to time, and any "library" indication designed to be hard for a book thief to remove is also going to be hard to remove before such a sale. I have a few books that I've bought at such sales; maybe if I look through them I'll find a local equivalent to that black stripe.

[Mental_Mouse]

Ex-library books aren't an automatic rejection for my shop, but we'll take even a Book Club edition before a ex-library book of the same title, and those are already disdained.

We do get a lot of them coming in... the thing is, they're generally beat to hell, plastic covers welded on with ugly tape, obtrusive stickers and/or card pouches, etc. That's the new way, the older ones often have the original cover replaced entirely with an anonymous carpet-pattern cover. ;-)

[CyberLurch]

I have a few records in my collection that are ex-library. I love that you can get them off eBay, Discogs, etc. for practically nothing. And most of them are actually in really good condition. But then, once upon a time, people took care of things they borrowed.
Two examples of ex-library records I got in good condition: Fleetwood Mac's JUMPING AT SHADOWS (live in Boston 1969, WOW!) and Kenny Burrell's MIDNIGHT BLUE.