Australia: City of Sydney Scraps Library Fines After Trial Shows Reminders Work Better
From The Guardian:
The City of Sydney council has abolished all library fines after an eight-month trial revealed they do not work as an incentive for people to return books.
Three times as many overdue items were returned to the council’s libraries during the no-fine trial period, compared with the 12 months before the trial.
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More than 60,000 items were returned between July last year and February, some of them decades old.
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Under the new scheme, those with an overdue book will have their membership suspended and will be barred from borrowing until the item is returned.
Read the Complete Article
Additional Coverage: City of Sydney Library gives fines the flick prompting flood of overdue returns (via ABC)
See Also: Nashville Public Library Eliminated All Overdue Fines as of July 5th
Filed under: Libraries, News, Public Libraries
About Gary Price
Gary Price (gprice@gmail.com) is a librarian, writer, consultant, and frequent conference speaker based in the Washington D.C. metro area. He earned his MLIS degree from Wayne State University in Detroit. Price has won several awards including the SLA Innovations in Technology Award and Alumnus of the Year from the Wayne St. University Library and Information Science Program. From 2006-2009 he was Director of Online Information Services at Ask.com. Gary is also the co-founder of infoDJ an innovation research consultancy supporting corporate product and business model teams with just-in-time fact and insight finding.
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