Inter-Library Loan services at RUL

The Higher Education Quality Committee (HEQC) of South Africa recognizes that individual academic libraries in South Africa cannot afford to hold all the resources that will be needed by their institution’s researchers.  At the same time, it is the vision of all academic libraries to provide ready access to information resources for their users.  Therefore it becomes the mission of the Inter-Library Loan (ILL) service to provide ready access to the materials that the Rhodes Library does not hold for its researchers, academic staff and postgraduate students by co-operating to share library resources efficiently and effectively with other libraries.





RHODES UNIVERSITY LIBRARY






As the Library has made an enormous financial investment in both its print resources and the access that it provides to online scholarly journals and e-books, it is important that these items are not requested on ILL.  Therefore, before submitting an ILL request, users should first check

1)       the Rhodes University catalogue (OPAC)    

2)      the Cory Library

3)       A-Z e-titles via SFX (a listing of full text electronic journals available to Rhodes users) to ensure that the item is not held locally. 

Once it has been established that the item is not available at Rhodes, it can be requested on ILL by filling in the appropriate form

1)      electronically (via the ILL link on the OPAC web page)

OR

2)       manually by using the forms available at the Loans desk on Level 1.

Points to Note:

i)                    Before users can request ILL material electronically, they must first register with the library on OPAC and create a log-in pin.

ii)                   The ILL process is governed by the CHELSA (Committee for Higher Education Libraries in South Africa) agreement, an agreed set of criteria and standards to regulate inter-lending between institutions.  This being said, the lending conditions are determined by the lending library.  In the case of books, the return date of the item must be adhered to as the system depends entirely on the co-operation of others.  Renewal is possible in some cases and this should be discussed with the ILL staff member. 

iii)                 At Rhodes University Library the postage costs of ILL material are charged to the requester.  At present the cost is R 20.00 per item for loaned items (books, theses etc.) and 50c per page (with R1.00 service charge) for items that need to be printed.  PDFs of items are forwarded to the requester free of charge.

iv)                  Original periodicals are almost never available for loan.  Instead a photocopy of the article is supplied.  As mentioned earlier, with regard to locally obtained articles, requesters are expected to pay for the photocopy of the article supplied with the addition of a small service charge.  Articles which are not available in South Africa can be requested from overseas, although this is an expensive option.   Overseas requests should be discussed with the ILL staff member.

v)                  Non-South African theses which are not held in South Africa may be purchased by the requester.  The ILL staff member should be contacted for more information about how these theses may be obtained.

vi)                 It should be noted that some books are not available for loan such as reference materials or rare items. 

vii)               Provided that the requested item is on the shelf at the holding library, the average turnaround time for books and articles sent by mail is 10 – 14 days.  Articles sent by Ariel or PDF should arrive within 3 to 5 days.  The average turnaround time for overseas requests is 14 – 30 days. 

Whenever you are unable to locate an article or book at Rhodes University

– remember to try Inter-Library Loans!!