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    Circ block by item status?

    • Article Type: General
    • Product: Aleph
    • Product Version: 20, 21, 22, 23

    Description:
    I know we can block circ loans by patron status and sublibrary, but can we block by item status?

    Example, if patron status 01 (undergrad student) has an item of status 05 (video/DVD loan) overdue, then block that patron from checking out any other items of status 05. How can we do that?
    Could that be an automatic block after the first overdue notice is sent?

    Resolution:
    You can specify a maximum number of loans for a particular patron status/item status combination -- in tab16, col. 12. But this does not distinguish overdue items from non-overdue items.  

    You can use the xxx50 tab_block_circ to block a patron from checking out items for a particular sublibrary if the number of overdue items -- or the cash balance -- for this sublibrary exceeds the value in tab_block_circ, column 4. But this is at the sublibrary level, not at the item_status level.

    (And, if you don't charge fines, you can -- as described in the article " Overdue item returns: patron is not suspended " -- block a patron from borrowing any more items for x days after an overdue item is returned.)    

    Thus, there is no way to block a patron based on the number of overdue items for a particular item status.    

    But it would seem that this might be done via SQL. Each day, after overdue notices have been printed, you could read the z36 table looking for cases where the z36_item_status = nn and the z36_letter_number is greater than 0. In these cases you would update the z305_delinq_xx fields of the z305 record(s) pointed to by z36_id. Then you would make sure that there's a "LOAN check_circ_1_b" line in tab_check_circ for this ADM library (to make the program check delinquencies).


    • Article last edited: 10/8/2013