Innovative Successfully Serves Libraries with Additional Resources and Support During Global Pandemic
EMERYVILLE, Calif. July 29, 2020 – Innovative, a ProQuest company and leading global provider of library software, has successfully worked with customers around the world to help them sustain and update operations during the global pandemic. Working with individual libraries, Innovative has offered free services and discounted subscriptions when needed. Globally, Innovative has also provided a significant amount of new resources and a comprehensive approach to customer support, through actions such as:
- Responding to a 50% increase in customer support tickets during the last two weeks of March while libraries closed physical locations
- Reducing the total Customer Support ticket backlog by 29% from late March to the end of May
- Supporting 32 libraries with a custom service to help them maintain or reopen operations during the pandemic
- Hosting over 35 training webinars since March 24, with more than 10,000 registrations and more than 6,000 attendees
- Sharing new training videos
- Publishing three Supportal Guides with resources and considerations for opening physical locations
- Inviting customers to share tips for reopening
- Writing two new Sierra Scripts
Innovative continues to focus on excellent customer support and building individual relationships with all its libraries. Here are a few examples of how Innovative has helped customers recently:
In France
Innovative’s monitoring utilities alerted engineers that the Encore server for the Sorbonne Interuniversity Library in Paris had not run any backups for nine days. Innovative staff contacted the Sorbonne library and learned the library didn’t have any staff available to change the physical tapes due to stay-at-home orders. Innovative engineers immediately set up a Cloud Backup service at no cost and agreed to run the service until the library’s IT Department would be able to run back-ups beginning in mid-July.
“We are thrilled with the outstanding customer service that we received,” said Francoise Pina-Mironneau, Head of Informatics at the Sorbonne library. “During the pandemic, Innovative noticed a problem of backup, contacted us quickly, solved the problem and immediately put a cloud backup in place for the full time the library was closed for sanitary reasons and until our local team was able to regain control. It was absolutely wonderful!”
In Italy
In Milano, Italy, library staff at Università Bocconi reported to Innovative that they were also not able to change physical tapes for local backups due to stay-at-home orders. Again, Innovative immediately set up a Cloud Backup service and maintained it until the university IT staff was able to return in late June.
“I cannot thank Innovative enough for their help in this emergency period,” said Carla Martini, Systems Librarian at Università Bocconi. “We hope everyone can continue to be safe thanks to excellent customer service like this from Innovative.”
In the United States
Trinity University in Texas is planning for an unknown but most likely reduced budget for the coming year and worked with Innovative account managers and executives to update their Sierra subscriptions to better fit their expected budget.
“Similar to other vendors in the industry, we appreciate Innovative’s willingness to work with us to show support for the library community and the many challenges we’re facing,” said Christopher Nolan, University Librarian & Professor at Coates Library, Trinity University.
“Every business, library, and university is going through a difficult time and Innovative is proud to work with our customers to provide unique solutions that fit their needs, while also providing global resources to our library community,” said Yariv Kursh, Innovative General Manager.
Like many companies during this time, Innovative has also completed this work with a 100% remote workforce. Innovative continues to make adjustments month by month as the global situation evolves and remains focused on:
- The health and safety of employees and customers
- The continuity of services
- Supporting customers and their users
- Compliance with governmental regulations and public health guidance
In addition, Innovative continues to partner with customers and vendors on other topics impacting libraries. The global pandemic has caused many libraries to reconsider fines and fees. Innovative recently published a paper titled “Are Library Late Fees a Barrier to Equity?” that anyone can download from the Innovative website.
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About Innovative
Innovative, a ProQuest company, provides leading technology solutions and services that empower libraries and enrich their users worldwide. Innovative offers one of the most comprehensive portfolios of library automation products on the market today, serving academic, public, national, consortia, and corporate and special libraries. Headquartered in Emeryville, California, Innovative has a global presence—serving thousands of libraries in 66 countries and offices worldwide. For more information, visit www.iii.com.