Directory of Interlibrary Loan Policies & Photocopying Services in Canadian Libraries

Virginia Gillham is Associate Librarian in the Public Service Library at
the University of Guelph.

Organized alphabetically according to the National Library’s location symbols, this directory offers interlibrary loan information about more than 350 Canadian libraries. Library symbol, name and mailing address, telephone number, telex/TWX, and Envoy 100 access codes are listed. In addition, loan availability and loan length for various formats of information (monographs, microforms, serials, theses) are detailed, as are loan and photocopy charges and methods of billing and payment.

This second edition of the Directory updates and augments its predecessor with information current through December 1983. As is pointed out in the introduction, this kind of information is constantly changing, rendering such a tool outdated, at least in part, as soon as it is published. As the library world grows closer to handling the “paper” work for all such inter-institutional transactions online, the obvious ultimate solution will be for all libraries to mount their guidelines online where they can be updated instantly whenever necessary.

In the meantime, this directory is an admirable substitute. If new editions are forthcoming frequently, it will be the best possible alternative to online utopia.