[Publib] Discontinuing Fax Service

[Dusty Gres]

We offer fax service and would not discontinue it.  A lot of people use it.
There are many documents that can't be scanned but that can be faxed. We do
a lot of international faxing as we have many Hispanic, Asian and Middle
Eastern patrons. We charge less than most of the businesses around -- but
then we also charge less than the bookstore and video store ;>)
We do make a profit, certainly enough to make it worth while to continue,
and it takes about the same amount of staff time to do the faxing as it does
to explain how to use the public copier and that is supposed to be
self-explanatory....
Of course, we also use it ourselves so we would have to have one at each
location anyway.
Perhaps what needs to be considered is why it is taking so much staff time
and how much you are charging.

Dusty Gres
Director
Ohoopee Regional Library System
610 Jackson Street
Vidalia, GA 30474
http://www.ohoopeelibrary.org
"Common sense and a sense of humor are the same thing, moving at different
speeds.
A sense of humor is just common sense, dancing."
William James

- 


At 04:11 PM 9/2/2009, Michelle Mears wrote:
>Sorry to be bugging you again.  But this is a time-sensitive 
>question and I need some input before my Board meeting next week.
>
>If any libraries have discontinued your public fax service, can you 
>share the reasons why or your motivation for doing so?  I am leaning 
>very heavily towards stopping it, but I want to be sure I'm not 
>going too far out on a limb.
>
>Seems as if libraries started offering public fax service as a way 
>to justify getting and using a fax machine for their own library 
>business, particularly when so much of ILL was done over fax.  Like, 
>hey let's do this and we can recoup some of the costs while we're at 
>it (no library I know makes a profit at faxing).  But now I just see 
>it as a strain on my already overloaded staff and sort of unfair 
>competition with local businesses who charge a lot more.  And faxers 
>(like copiers) often come in just to do this one thing and are not 
>utilizing any other part of the library.
>
>Is scanning and e-mailing replacing the old-fashioned fax, or is it 
>still a necessary business machine?
>
>Michelle
>-----
>Michelle R. Mears, MSLIS, PhD
>Library Director
>Public Library of Enid & Garfield County
>120 W. Maine Ave.
>Enid, OK 73701-5606
>580.234.6313 Phone
>580.249.9280 Fax
>620.506.8576 Mobile
>http://www.enid.org/library/


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