[Delivery-all] some delivery clarifications

[Hutchinson, Judy]

The PALS delivery staff has been fielding a number of questions related to the new procedures that we issued last week.  A big thank you to everyone who has been working hard already to follow the new procedures - we greatly appreciate it.  I wanted to answer a few frequently-asked questions from this week because probably others have had the same questions.

1.) What if a delivery code that I need to route materials to (in my hub) isn't on any of the route lists that I received?
That could occur for three reasons.  One is that the library receives delivery from PALS via Mail/UPS.  We only issued you the physical delivery routes, not the Mail/UPS routes.  You can print off Mail/UPS routes on the PALS website at:  http://www.palsnet.info/services/delivery/appendixa.asp. Please note that you need to select the hub and the Mail or Mail/UPS route, and then select the Mail/UPS radio button.  The new PALS website will have an even nicer feature that will allow you to search by library and find out which route the library is on.  We hope to have the new website live by October 1.

Another reason you might not find a delivery code on either the printed route lists or the Mail/UPS list is because PALS only delivers to one location for most of our member libraries. The only exception to this is the very high volume public libraries where we deliver to multiple branches because their volume is so high.  So, for instance, for the typical school district, we only deliver to one location, but materials can be routed to that location for other schools within the district.  For example, we only deliver to Fulton Elementary School (FESG) but if you have something for Fulton High School (FHSG) you simply put the high school code on the label, and we will route it via the elementary school.  So, if you see a member agency on a route list, that tells you which route to sort to for that member.

A third reason is that you are routing to an academic member library that only gets ILDS delivery now.  Any PALS academic library that has a three character delivery code only gets ILDS delivery.  Their PALS code = their ILDS code and you should use an ILDS label to route to that academic library.  We are working to add an ILDS "route" to our website so that will be searchable as well.

Note:  if you are having trouble finding the route for an item, simply put it in one of the containers with materials for other libraries for your hub and we will make sure it gets there!

2) I noticed that one or more libraries on my route lists is on more than one delivery route.  How do I sort their items?
It is true that a small number of libraries are on more than one route because of the way the routes are configured.  If you can tell from your routes which is the "primary route" for that library (which route they are on most of the time), please sort that library's materials to their primary route.

Please remember that if your library typically only has one container of materials a day, it is OK to sort materials for us within that container, rather than using extra containers with very few items in them.  The most important sort for us is that you put the materials for other libraries on your route at the top of the one container.  Our primary objective is to reduce the amount of time drivers are spending sorting en route, so we want them to have easy access to the materials that can possibly be delivered the same day, and then leave the rest of the materials to be sorted back at the service center.  Please rest assured that we sort all materials every day, so accidentally picking the wrong route occasionally will only delay the material slightly as we all learn the new procedures.

Please keep asking your good questions!  This is new for all of us and we are obviously working through these changes together.  Again, we appreciate all you are doing to help us in delivery.

Thanks,

Judy


Judy Hutchinson
Administrative Services Manager
Prairie Area Library System
PO Box 125
Coal Valley, IL 61240
judyh at palsnet.info
309-799-3155, ext 3150