[Publib] automating booking of book club sets

[Nancy Jones]

Does anyone use an automated booking system for book club sets?  If so, is
it purchased software or did you invent your own solution?

We have 34 book club sets in our system.  Each set includes 10 books and
biog/discussion/background information.  We book the sets in advance (up to
a year in advance) for 6 weeks (no renewals) and they can be picked up at
any of our 17 branches.  At the moment patrons email or call us with their
requests and provide the title or titles they'd like to borrow and the dates
they want to pick the sets up.  We are using a table in Word and we note the
patron's name, branch and date for pickup.  Then I check the chart
frequently to see where bookings could fit, what's out, is it back on time,
does another set have to be sent out....  

When we started with 10 sets a year ago, the table in Word worked fine, but
as the table has grown, it's easier to make more mistakes!  I'd love to have
the system automated and on the web so that patrons could do their own
bookings and see what's available when.  

Any solutions out there?  Thanks for any suggestions.
Nancy

 
Nancy Jones
Kingston Frontenac Public Library
130 Johnson Street
Kingston ON  K7L 1X8
(613) 549-8888 ext 1410
njones at kfpl.ca