Librarian Ire

Fine Issue from HELL!

At the end of Nov. We had a student return a 3 day reserve item. It was 2 1/2 months overdue. The only reason he was returning it was because of his approaching graduation and the hold placed on his account due to the replacement fees for the item he was billed. He proceeded to berate the nicest, most polite student worker I've ever come across for over 5 minutes. He then stormed out only to return within moments to yell some more.

Well, yesterday I got a call from him. He was complaining that the fine appeal form he submitted for this item was denied and he wanted to know why. [Because he was rude and he knowingly and grossly abused the system.] His defense? He can download the reserve item free on the internet why should we charge him overdue fees for any price higher than the base medium cost (in this case a CDROM). He insisted on speaking quickly and constantly not letting me get a word in to answer any of his questions. I started with the most basic of complaint questions:
Did you know the item was 3 day reserve? Was there some reason you were unable to return the item (ie hospital)? Did you phone us to let us know you were unable to return the item before its due date?

Since all I got was more yelling about the item being free I hit him with the facts. The software is not free to the library. A staff member spends time negotiating a license to duplicate and distribute the software, he then makes the copies, delivers it to another staff person, library staff then catalog and process the item. Then we have the time that the item was unavailable for anyone else and the time and expense of acquiring another copy of the item.

Logic escaped this guy, so I hit him with the question that might finally bring some resolution: If it was free on the internet, why didn't he get it from there?

Gee... I'm taking the dead silence for confirmation from him that the software was not in fact free.

What a dufus.

posted by Loki at 1:38 PM