[NHCOLL-L:5226] Re: question re: natural history loan support

[Couteaufin at aol.com]

Hi Mariko,
 
I sympathise - this is a tricky issue since as soon as you start charging  
for staff time then the customer (if they can afford it) expects 'something  
more for their money' and if a specimen gets damaged in transit then they  
sometimes expect their 'fee' to cover the cost of repair/conservation!
 
I have always found that the best approach is for the borrower to come to  
an amicable arrangement whereby a fee (just for your staff time, packaging  
&c) can be agreed in advance per loan of 10 specimens say of up to 30  Kg.  
The problem is that this can sounds like a contract and give headaches  to 
the accounting section who have to collect the fee and shipping costs.   I 
think that some museums have introduced a scale of fees per Kg/package size  
for regular borrowers.
 
The other side of the coin is that the more loans that go out this helps to 
 justify the existence of the institution in some cases!!
 
With all good  wishes, Simon

Simon Moore MIScT, FLS, ACR,
Conservator of Natural  Sciences,
20 Newbury Street,
Whitchurch RG28 7DN.
_www.natural-history-conservation.com_ 
(http://www.natural-history-conservation.com/)  
_www.pocket-fruit-knives.info_ (http://www.pocket-fruit-knives.info/)  

_http://uk.linkedin.com/in/naturalsciencespecimenconserve_ 
(http://uk.linkedin.com/in/naturalsciencespecimenconserve)   


In a message dated 31/01/2011 17:13:25 GMT Standard Time,  
aspeciosus at yahoo.com writes:

     
     
    Hello,

Please  pardon my cross-posting. 


Our university's  natural history teaching collection of vertebrates are  
often loaned out to support university biology courses  such as mammalogy 
taught at a research station off  campus. It is not uncommon over a hundred 
specimens  are requested and checked out at a time. To process  such loans, 
staff labor time and supplies needed could  be significant including cost for 
packing and boxing  all the specimens. So far we have never charged for  such 
services to support the university's  undergraduate and graduate courses 
offered off campus,  but we started wondering if there is any other  
institution in a similar scenario that charges a  nominal or modest course support 
fee for this kind of  collection service based on their policy, other than  
recouping loan shipping costs. If you do not mind  sharing your experience or 
opinion with us, we would  appreciate it.


Mariko


Mariko  Kageyama
Collections Manager, Vertebrate  Zoology
University  of Colorado Museum of Natural History
Boulder,  CO






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