Longtime readers are aware that we here at TAA love the Abingdon library. It's got everything. In fact, just last week we were checking out books when a man from Bel Air chatted us up and said, "you know, I've lived across (MD.) 24 for four years and I never realized this was over here. It's great!"
But lately we've had some library trouble, and this has happened to us enough times that we thought it was worth mentioning.
On more than one occasion we've returned books that don't show up -- movies, too -- which can be a very expensive proposition.
The first time it happened was right after the long July 4th weekend. The librarians told me they had put things in a special bin and nothing was going to be marked overdue from that bin even though it was going to take awhile to get to it. We were concerned because we'd checked out four movies. A few days later, they still hadn't showed up as returned. Then three were, but one wasn't. We had to go to the library and they marked it as "claimed to be returned" and really made us feel like we were lying about it, to be honest.
In August, we returned a book, which wasn't overdue, but it still showed up as checked out. We went to the library, got it off the shelf, and said, "this is still showing up on the card, but it's here." He assured us that when someone checked it out, it would have cleared on the card, but it was a very obscure book that no one ever may have checked out, or not checked out for a long time. And then we would have racked up fines.
This has happened a few more times since then. We are now religiously checking our account online to make sure everything clears when we take it in. But really, it makes us nervous. We don't mind giving donations to the library that we love, we just can't bear the shame of fines or having to "claim" we returned something. (We did. Honest!)
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4 comments:
This has also happened to us many times, but also at the other branches in the county. I actually had to pay for a book I know I returned. I am hesitant to even check out movies anymore because I don't want to be responsible for the charges.
-AroundHarfordCounty
I've noticed that the Bel Air branch checks returned materials that I leave at the desk just inside the front door very quickly. If I've forgotten to return a part of something -- like a movie case without its disk -- I find there is a message on my machine by the time I get back home. However, at the Abingdon library, I noticed returned materials pile up on the front desk and are still there when I leave the library. Once, they called to tell me I'd forgotten to return something, when I knew I hadn't. I didn't have to pay a fine. They gave me the benefit of the doubt. But the Bel Air return operation seems sharper.
I won't return books/movies at the window anymore for this exact reason. I've had 2 books "not returned" according to them, when infact I return them earlier then need be!!!
When I return movies to the Abingdon branch, I take them to the checkout desk and ask that they be checked in. I once commented to a youngish fella working there that they seem to be short-handed because it takes so long for returns to clear. He acted very insulted but I find it insulting to have "claims returned" on my account when I know I returned an item. Other than this problem, I can't praise the Abingdon branch enough!
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