In our library books from other branches in the county go to a special shelf with your name on them. You check them out normally, with the system making sure you’re the person requesting it. My wife does it all the time. Books from out of the system go behind the desk, and you are warned that if you lose it you pay with a pound of flesh. 
No problem in either case.
Points finger Ah ha! So you’re the one responsible for making me feel like I’m working at a Netflix for Books. 
(I keed! I keed!)
Actually, dalej42, we encourage people to use the holds system (what we call it here) as much as possible. Some reasons:
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As mentioned above, it boosts our circulation numbers. The more books people check out from the library, the more useful we become to the community, which makes it easier for libraries to retain their budgets, staff, and services.
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More than 90% of the time, it’s faster and easier for us to get a book than to have you (or any other regular public patron) do it. (Some people are simply bewildered by the Dewey Decimal system.) To confirm what was previously mentioned, we send all the books we pull into a public area right by the entrance so people can get their own books.
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The purpose of our library–and any other library for that matter–is to remove the barriers stopping people from reading books. If using a technological solution such as an online reservation/holds system makes it easier for people to get their books, then it’s our responsibility to promote it. (For the record, both public and staff support the holds system at my library system.) We even have a service where we have converted a small bus into a wheelchair-accessible portable library to drive to various neighborhood to serve the elderly.
In a nutshell, we are happy to get books into your hands as quickly as possible. In fact, our library joined the Link+ (Link Plus) system so people can get books held from any of the 40+ participating libraries delivered to their local branch. So please, go ahead and continue to use the holds system.
I love the idea of being able to find the books I need online. It always strikes up an interesting conversation when I have a stack of books from various libraries. I really don’t mind going through all the books myself, but if I can see that a book is not available before I get there I can save myself a trip.
It’s really helpful for the cases where our daughter is absolutely in love with some of the kids books and if our local library doesn’t have it I can search it out elsewhere. It’s also quicker than walking around the library for now trying to find something with a lil one in tow, she just loves all the books too much!
Of course, the library has made a fair share of money from me in some overdue books lately! So thank you!
I asked at the dinner table last night. Both my kids agreed that doing the pull list is just one aspect of their jobs, and FAR preferable to a stint in kids’ picture books! 
Is it because kid’s picture books don’t have any standard sizes or shapes? I was complaining about that the other day while cleaning up my son’s room. I hate trying to fit all those funky individuals on the bookshelf.
Heck no. Not rude at all… And I say this because half of my job is taking care of these requests!
Of course, I work in a medical library, not a public library, so a good chunk of our work is receiving requests from busy doctors, gathering the titles or articles they need, and either holding them or sending them the info via the hospital’s mail system…
Yeah, to some extent. And the books are much thinner, so there are many more books per foot of shelf space, and there is far less room on the spine for the number. Add to that that the shelves get mixed up much more quickly than the other areas, as young kids pull books off the shelves and replace them at random. Also, the shelves are all low, so all of the shelving tasks require bending over.
But most of all, their complaints are due to the fact that the kids’ section is full of - well - kids! It is hysterical hearing my kids come home regularly bitching about how poorly behaved the kids are in the library, and inveighing against the parents who fail to control/discipline/instruct them. Far less frequently they will comment on the unusual circumstance, when a kid was well-behaved, and the parent seemed aware of and interested in how the kid behaved, as well as interested in teaching some proper behavior. The library compounds this to some extent by having puzzles, a train set, and other toys out for the kids to use, which tends to contribute to an atmosphere more akin to a playground than a library.
I’ve often thought how fun it would be to be a children’s librarian…except for all those damn kids.
Fun Fact:
Many, many children’s librarians hate kids and only do it because that’s the only open librarian position in their area. This is because all of the previous children’s librarians jump at the first chance to leave the position because they hate kids as well.
I dunno, I’d rather work in the children’s room and so would a lot of librarians I know. I’ve done both children’s and reference, and I like both, but if I was going to do one full-time I’d pick children’s. Yeah, you have to deal with badly-behaved kids, but at the ref desk you have to deal with badly-behaved adults and the somewhat nutty folks. After politely listening to a regular patron who’s schizophrenic tell me about how the Mafia’s after her–she hasn’t been taking her meds–and stopping her from starting a fistfight with the odd guy next to her on the computer, I’d much rather deal with a rude 10-yo. Then there’s the folks who yell at you when you tell them to get off the Internet because they’ve gone over their time, the people who try to cheat you out of the paltry sum you’re charging for printouts, all that fun stuff.
At the children’s desk, you get fun new books, you get to recommend your favorite authors to kids who are still discovering the joy of reading, you get to do storytime and decorate the place. The badly-behaved kids aren’t fun, but I much prefer them.
In my K-8 school we had a looooooooot of class delegates. There was the Sports Delegates (one male, one female), whose job apparently was to be our ombudskids to the PE teachers; there were the two Class Delegates who went to PTA meetings; there were the Food Delegates (only in class groups where one or more kids ate lunch at the school); there was a Library Delegate who was responsible for collecting the book requests from every student in the class, picking them from the library, returning them and badgering people who were overdue. There was no such thing as “running for office,” if you were in the class you were eligible (except for the Food and Sports restrictions).
In 8th Grade, I got chosen 39:1 as Class Delegate and informed our Class Mentor that this was not acceptable, as I was already a Delegate and you couldn’t be Delegate for two things. “But you aren’t, this is the first election.” “Well, Mother Garcia at the library said that if anybody other than me gets chosen Library Delegate she’ll turn you into meatballs, so if you want to go speak with her?”
The usual borrowing limit was 2 books per week. I borrowed 2 every day and 5 on weekends. And I’ve never heard a librarian complain about a returning customer for returning - I’ve heard them complain about people who don’t know the alphabet, or about people who go there asking for “that book in the newspaper last week” - but never about “oh my gawd, there’s this guy who comes here twice a week, borrows three books every time and always returns them the next time he comes! Horrible, let me tell you!”