U Of U’s Marriott Library Offers Three New Services For Patrons

The J. Willard Marriott Library at the University of Utah is now offering three new services for easy access to the three million volumes in its collections, allowing patrons to customize the way they retrieve library materials. A pull service, a document delivery service, and the automated retrieval center (ARC) are the latest offerings at the Marriott Library.

The pull service means that patrons can now request that books and other items be pulled from the stacks via the library catalog. Patrons then pick up requested volumes from the reserve desk on the first floor. There is no limit to the number of books that can be requested. With the exception of collections in reference, special collections, multimedia center and Katherine W. Dumke Fine Arts Library, all collections can be pulled.

Pull requests are processed every six hours while the library is open. Bound journals are held for patrons for 24 hours and all other items are held for up to seven days.

Ian Godfrey, facilities and access services manager at the Marriott Library, states that the pull service is popular because of its convenience, “Some patrons will request multiple items, and because there’s no limit on the number, we can provide ’one-stop shopping’ which saves patrons lots of time walking through the stacks or hunting items themselves,” he says.

Document delivery is another customer-focused option that the library has recently expanded. From the library’s inter-library loan webpage, all patrons can request a specific paper journal article be pulled and delivered to them electronically. Library staff pull the journals from the stacks, scan the articles, and send them out to the patrons as links. This process has been available for faculty in the past, but this is the first time that all library users can get journal articles delivered in this way. The request takes approximately 24 hours to process and the patrons receive the articles without leaving their home or dorm room.

The third new service option is delivery from the ARC itself. Housing roughly one million items-everything from journals to special collections materials-the ARC allows patrons to request items in a couple of mouse clicks, and in five to ten minutes the items are waiting for them at the reserve desk. Special collections materials must be requested from and used in special collections. For those who like to browse the stacks, the more commonly circulated items have been kept on the shelves for patrons to peruse at their convenience.
In early December, when all of the ARC items have been loaded, it will take roughly five minutes for ARC requests to be processed. “Patrons need only step 50 feet inside the library to gather materials that are housed in the ARC or in the stacks,” explains Godfrey. “This expedites the process for patrons and makes their trips to the library all the more efficient and user-friendly.”