Question

How does adding an item level description affect the requesting process?

Answer

If a title has at least one item that contains a description, the request will be on item level and not on title level.

This is valid for requests in the discovery system (e.g. Primo) as well as for requests in Alma.

In Alma, the description dropdown in the request form becomes a mandatory field when requesting from an all titles search. 

Note that when requesting from an all titles search, the request is always on the title level.

If a title has multiple items but not all have a description ALL must be selected since the field cannot remain blank.  In this case a note can be added to clarify what is needed.

Otherwise, the request must be initiated on the item level.  This means completing a physical items repository search, finding the exact item needed and then performing a request.

See that the item level request (request from the items search) does not have description as a mandatory field.

• Article last edited: 28-Oct-2025