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General Circulation Documentation: User Records

Procedures, forms and templates, circulation statistics and policies, & legacy documentation

General Information About IDs

  • The User ID is a unique number assigned at random by the Commodore Card Office or Medical Center Card Office and embedded in the magnetic stripe on the back of the card. New cards are issued by the Card Office, 184 Sarratt Student Center, 322-2273.
  • Only 1 user profile per patron. If a patron has more than one status (i.e. an alum but also a staff member), the status/profile that grants the best privilege is the one the user is given by the Commodore Card Office. If there is a mis-match between the status of the card and the status of the record, and there is a question about this, contact MAT Trotter.
  • The majority of records are created and modified by the daily Enterprise Personal Index (EPI) feed. Patrons should be encouraged to correct EPI feed errors by visiting either the Office of the University Registrar (students) or Human Resources (faculty and staff) web pages.
  • IDs are NOT TRANSFERRABLE.

Vanderbilt IDs

  • Student IDs are issued at the Commodore Card Office. Cards are re-validated each semester the student is enrolled. Records loaded July 1-September 9 expire December 31. Records loaded September 10-November 30 expire March 31. Records loaded December 1-June 30 expire October 31.
  • Post-Doctoral Scholars have records valid for the period of their appointment. For the university side only, post-doctoral scholars have an HR status of staff but their library privileges are faculty. Records are automatically received and loaded into Library Catalog and loaded with a profile of faculty. If the record is not loaded through HR, create a record according to their appointment letter.
  • Faculty IDs are valid for the period of employment with an expiration date of NEVER. Cards are issued at the Commodore Card office or the Medical Center Card office, depending on place of employment. Library Catalog records for faculty are automatically loaded into Workflows.
  • Surrogate ID. This user profile was designed to assist faculty when they want someone to check out books for them. These cards are issued at circulation desks and the professor who requests surrogate privileges must fill out a form stating they will be responsible for the material checked out on the ID. The expiration date is one year from issue with the option of yearly renewals. The surrogate USER ID is the six digit number affixed to the back of the surrogate card and the PIN is the first four digits of that number.
  • University Staff IDs are valid for the period of employment with an expiration date of NEVER and are issued at the Commodore Card Office.
  • Medical Center Staff IDs are issued by the Medical Center Card Office and records should be automatically loaded into WorkFlows. If not, they are created by the Eskind Biomedical Library.
  • Vanderbilt Temporary Services (VTS) staff have access privileges only.

Affiliate IDs

Individual libraries may grant borrowing privileges for their specific library to a variety of patron groups. See the chart for system-wide courtesy access and borrowing cards.

  • Cross-registered students receive Vanderbilt ID cards and should be included in the daily feed.
  • Alumni IDs for the University and the Medical Center are valid for the period of one year and have an expiration date of one year from issue. Starting with the class of 2010, students will keep their VUNetIDs. Before the class of 2010, alumni will be issued an ALT_ID to log in to Library Catalog. Alumni VUnetIDs and ALT_IDs grant remote login to select library databases.
  • Faculty from ARL institutions are granted courtesy borrowing. Faculty members of other research universities that are ARL (Association of Research Libraries) members should contact MAT Trotter (mat.trotter@Vanderbilt.Edu [preferred] or 615-322-6993) to apply for borrowing privileges. To borrow materials, the visiting faculty member must present the Reciprocal Faculty Borrowing Program card (obtained at their home library prior to visit). For a list of participating RLAC institutions see this list.
  • Spouse IDs and Dependent IDs are valid for the period of one year and have an expiration date of one year from issue. Cards are issued at the Vanderbilt Card Office or the Medical Center Card Office depending on place of spouse’s employment. Cards are labeled "Family". Spouses have courtesy borrowing; dependents have access only. The faculty, staff or student must accompany their family member and show ID in order to create the spouse or dependent ID card. The Card Office does not issue spouse or dependent cards for family members of retirees.
  • Visiting scholars, interns/observers, and non-OFAC/RLAC university and high school faculty may obtain borrowing privileges with the sponsorship of a VU department (visiting scholars, interns/observers) or their home university/school (non-RLAC university and high school faculty).  Visiting scholars will typically have an appointment letter which should be retained, but it is acceptable if they only have the signed form.  Non-RLAC university and high school faculty should contact MAT Trotter (mat.trotter@Vanderbilt.Edu [preferred] or 615-322-6993) to apply for borrowing privileges.
  • High school students may borrow VU library materials through a librarian at their school library, to be sent via Athena.