[Publib] Cost per Reference Transaction

[Corner, Dean]

I think that all direct costs (salaries, benefits, and reference books,
serials, databases, microforms, supplies, telephones, and computer
costs) for each year should be added and the total divided by the number
of questions received to arrive at the cost per question.
 
There are too many indirect cost variables (use of the circulating
collection to answer questions, newspapers & magazines, utilities,
technical and support services, etc.) that are either impossible to
calculate or not meaningful for calculations.  There are probably some
other direct-to-reference costs that I have not included that could be
added to the list in the first paragraph.
 
This cost has been studied in academic libraries much more than in
public libraries.  Glen Holt has been looking at the cost of reference
and cost/benefit studies for quite a while.  He is the co-author of a
recent ALA book that could be helpful:
 
 Measuring Your Library's Value: How to Do a Cost-Benefit Analysis for
Your Public Library
<http://www.amazon.com/Measuring-Your-Librarys-Value-Cost-Benefit/dp/083
890923X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1230912481&sr=1-1>  by Donald S.
Elliott, Glen E. Holt, Sterling W. Hayden, and Leslie Edmonds Holt
(Perfect Paperback - Feb 28, 2007)
 
Dean
 
 
Dean Corner
 
Director of Reader and Information Services
Maine State Library
64 State House Station
Augusta, ME 04333-0064
207-287-5604
207-287-5615 fax
 

________________________________

From: publib-bounces at webjunction.org
[mailto:publib-bounces at webjunction.org] On Behalf Of George Bergstrom
Sent: Wednesday, December 31, 2008 12:22 PM
To: Lockhart, William S.
Cc: LIBREF-L at listserv.kent.edu; publib at webjunction.org
Subject: Re: [Publib] Cost per Reference Transaction


Bill,

     What a fascinating question.  Lets take a look at it, not knowing
the particulars of your library, who is asking the question or what they
may want to know/how it will be used...  you will get very different
numbers depending on what you use.

If you use salary:

Say the total salary of the department is $600,000 (not counting
benefits) and the total transactions is 200,000/yr then you get $3 per
transaction

Say the total materials budget is only $400,000 then you get $2 per
transaction

But the transaction is never completed by just the new books from 2008
(or for that mater the entire yearly materials budget...)  so my initial
gut would be something like using the value of the entire reference
collection, the value of the salaries of the entire reference staff, and
possibly adding some value for the internet and infrastructure...

So if salary is $600,000 and new materials is $400,000 and the rest of
the collection is $1,000,000 (depreciation) then you have $10 per
transaction.  Now if you then added in the value of the staff benefits,
and the other infrastructure I could see this easily doubling to $20 or
more per transaction.

Now we come to the who wants the numbers and for what purpose.  If admin
wants the numbers for budgeting purposes, then maybe the smaller numbers
are better (look we can answer each question for $1 each!)  but if they
are trying to find a number for promotion of the service/possible bond
measures then the bigger numbers seem to look better (look if we charged
for our service per transaction it would be $20 each, but you get it for
the bargain price of  $x per $1000 of property value...)

Thinking about it in these terms should help you identify what
components to use in your equation, and hopefully help justify your
choices.

-George


On Wed, Dec 31, 2008 at 11:28 AM, Lockhart, William S.
<lockhartws at elpasotexas.gov> wrote:


	Hi,

	Please excuse the cross posting.  I have been asked to find a
formula for the average cost of a reference transaction for our system.
We are establishing a series of benchmarks to represent patron use and
cost of our system.  Has any public library used this statistic for this
purpose and if so what variables did you use to accurately depict the
cost of the transaction?  We have a count of all of our reference
transactions but I do not know what monetary values to use; staff
salary, reference materials budget, total budget etc.  I have been
researching this for awhile now and have not had much luck.  Any help
you can provide me would be appreciated. Thank You,

	Bill Lockhart

	 

	Bill Lockhart

	Head of Reference

	El Paso Public Library

	(915)543-5451

	lockhartws at elpasotexas.gov

-- 
George C. A. Bergstrom
Business Reference Librarian
Management & Economics Library
Purdue University
Lafayette, IN 47907

(765) 494 - 2918

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