Bookstore e-mail to ease frustrations
New computer shopping frees students from long line hassles
By Tatiana Botton
Instead of waiting in long lines and harsh weather to buy their
textbooks, students may soon be able to secure their reading
materials while sitting on their couch at home.
This option is part of a long-term Info UCLA package that the
student textbook store and the University Research Library have
been preparing for the last two and a half years.
"We have three different projects. The first one is to input all
the books on Orion and create a database. The second one is
enabling the faculty to order books via e-mail and the third one is
allowing students to make special book orders via e-mail," said
Carole Zaima, the textbook division manager.
The database of the bookstore’s inventory on Orion, UCLA’s
computer database system, has been done since October 1993.
Students are now able to check class booklists just by going to any
computer terminal on campus and using the Info UCLA command and
typing "bookstore."
"We started working two and a half years ago. The database is
updated everyday, and now it has 90,000 books," said Betsy Coles,
Info UCLA senior programmer analyst.
By using Orion, students can check if their class books are
available for sale. But many students are still unaware of this
option and continue to pile into the bookstore the first week of
each quarter, just to see if their books are on the shelves.
Although the textbook database can serve students’ needs, it was
primarily created to keep a historical record of what books had
been ordered in the past, Zaima explained.
And beginning spring quarter, Info UCLA may not only be letting
students check the availability of their books by computer, but
order them too, Zaima said.
In this new system there will be two different sections, one
concerning class textbooks and the other concerning tradebooks
located in the Bookzone bookstore on the A-level of Ackerman
Union.
"If students cannot come in, and their textbook is sold out,
they would be able to make individual special orders by computer,"
Zaima said.
In addition, students will be able to reserve books by computer
and buy Academic Publishing Service books over the phone. And when
students use the new system, lines to the bookstore should be
reduced to a more manageable level.
During the first two or three weeks of each quarter, hundreds of
students walk through the textbook store, said Maureen O’Shea,
undeclared first-year student and customer service representative
at the Plaza Bookstore.
But unfortunately, students won’t be able to reserve their books
during the first two rush weeks of each quarter.
"We want to give priority to the students that come to the
campus to buy the books. If we let all the students put a hold on
the books, all the books will be on hold and no student (in the
bookstore) will be able to buy them," Coles said.
During those two weeks, book buying will remain on a first come,
first serve basis, Zaima explained. However, Academic Publishing
Service books can still be ordered over the phone, she added.
Although UCLA students might want to order books and pay for
them via e-mail, UCLA’s computer terminals don’t have the high
security measures to allow credit card transactions with
privacy.
"The UCLA network is not a secure network. We cannot do money
transaction in this network, because the credit card numbers could
be stolen. So the money transaction will be made by phone," Coles
said.
Once a student has made an order via e-mail, the bookstore will
contact the student and make the credit card transaction in a
secure environment over the phone, Coles added.
But even though students may be able to shop for books via
e-mail by spring quarter, faculty members will still need to order
their class books by mail.
However, a new system from Info UCLA will soon allow professors
to quickly order their books on a computer database that can
process orders immediately and with total accuracy, Zaima said.
In the meantime, UCLA’s faculty still need to fill out a
textbook order form and send it by mail or fax. This begins a two-
to three-day ordering process that is still hindered by order form
errors.
Once the student book ordering system is ready, the system will
run a trial test period and technicians from the UCLA Library and
Information Systems will implement the necessary modifications to
make the program run more smoothly.
"We have done some steady work. But each step along the way has
taken us longer than we thought," said Terry Ryan, assistant
university librarian for UCLA’s Library Information System.
The bookstore manager and the computer technicians from the
University Research Library will meet at the end of March to test
the student book ordering program and see the results of their long
work.
"It’s a wonderful idea, but we want to make sure it works before
implementing it," Zaima said.