SWIFT-Prospector Lending in AspenCat/Koha

Pull, Confirm, and Transfer Requests

Within Koha, Prospector requests will display in your Holds queue, with “Prospector” appearing in the Notes column. Use the information from the holds queue to pull the items from your shelves. 

Note: If you own multiple copies of the requested title, be sure to pull the item with the barcode noted in the Barcode column. If the item with the barcode is not available, or you cannot fill the request for any reason, see the Cancel ILL Requests section of this document.

From the Koha homepage, go to Circulation → Holds queue, and pull up your library’s holds.

Once you have pulled the item, scan the item barcode through the Check in function. Within the Hold found dialog, click Print slip, transfer, and confirm (P). 

The paging slip includes both a courier slip and a paging slip (item and request information that is used by the receiving library to process the requests). In most cases the courier slip will be automatically populated with the borrowing library’s courier code. In some cases the system cannot determine the borrowing library’s courier code and will populate the courier slip with C000. If you see C000 appear on the courier slip, you will need to hand-write a courier slip with the borrowing library’s actual courier code. Instructions to determine the correct courier code are outlined in the Look up Courier Code section beginning on the next page. The bottom portion of the paging slip needs to be tucked face-up in the front cover of the item.

Once Prospector requests have been pulled, and the transfer confirmed, the item will be checked out to a remote patron (CLiC Library (C000)) and the status of the request will automatically update to “Item shipped to borrowing library” in the ILL Requests module. You do not need to update the request in the ILL Request module. 

Look up Courier Code

Additional information about the request is available in the ILL Requests module including the PickupLocation, which you can use to determine the courier code for the borrowing library in the event that the courier code did not get correctly populated on the automatically generated Courier/Paging slip. 

Go to Home → ILL Requests. This queue will load all Prospector requests that are active for any AspenCat library. To find the request you want to cancel, you will most likely want to search by Keyword, using the filter options on the left. When you have located the request, click the Manage request button to view more information about the request, including PickupLocation.

Once you have determined the borrowing library’s courier code, fill out a courier slip for the item. 

Cancel ILL Requests

If you receive a request for an item that is unavailable or you are not able to fulfill, you can cancel the request. This requires that you cancel the request from the Manage ILL request page in the ILL Requests module. Canceling the request in the ILL Requests module will also cancel the Hold on the item. 

Go to Home → ILL Requests. This will load all Prospector requests that are active for any AspenCat library. To find the request you want to cancel use the Keyword search and/or other  filter options on the left.

When the item is found, click Manage request, and then click Cancel request from the Manage ILL request page. 

The request status will be updated to “Item request cancelled.” Click Mark as complete to complete the request and clear it from the ILL Requests queue.

Check In Requests

When items you lent through Prospector come back to your library, you will need to check in the item. Scan the item barcode through the Check in function.  This will automatically update the item status to Available, and the request status to “Item checked-in at owning library.” 

Complete Request

At this point, you can navigate to the Manage ILL request page in the ILL Requests module to complete the request. This step is not required, but it is recommended to keep the ILL Requests queue uncluttered.

To access the Manage ILL request page from the requested title record, click on the hyperlinked title from the grid on the Check in screen after you have scanned the barcode.

Once in the title record, click the hyperlinked Request # that appears below the bibliographic information. 

The request status will be “Item checked-in at owning library.” Click Mark completed.

The request will be updated to status “Completed” and the request will be cleared from the ILL Requests queue.