Income Generation and Pricing in Libraries

Abstract

Reports on a survey of charging policies and practices in London‐based public, academic and special libraries and information services with the object of establishing which pricing mechanisms are in operation and which services are being provided at a fee. The pricing mechanism cited by most respondents was “what the market will bear” rather than a direct adherence to cost‐based prices. The majority of libraries of all types have formalized some sort of differential pricing scheme in relation to user type and type of usage. There is a high commitment in academic and public libraries to a basic free level of service. Regulatory charges are largely the domain of public and academic libraries. Services acting as candidates for the generation of income differ between library types, but are mostly concerned with products rather than ideas/advice. “Value‐added” work is largely conducted by special and academic libraries.