Inter Library Loans allow your users to request material not held directly by their library by borrowing physical or digital copies from other collections in the UK and abroad. Our CONARLs rate enables you to reduce the cost of this to £6.00 if both the lending and receiving libraries are members. CONARLs is free to join and open to all libraries in the UK.

The steps:

  1. Determine which library/libraries hold copies of the item 
  2. Check whether the holding library is a CONARLs member
  3. Note on your request that you are requesting the £6.00 rate

Please note that sets of musical scores are not usually included in the CONARLs rate; please check specifically with your holding library. We cannot enforce the application of the CONARLs rate to musical scores.

1. Determine which library/libraries hold copies of the item 

There is no single resource which collates all library holdings in the UK but some options include:

  • Worldcat – Uses database uploads by worldshare subscribers. It is essential to also click through the suggested library catalogue and double-check availability as some holdings are not fully up to date.
  • JISC Library Hub Discover – searches mainly academic and special collections catalogues across the UK. 
  • librarybooks.uk uses live data from public library catalogues, searches by ISBN.
  • ILL jiscmail – You can email out the name and any details of the item you are looking for to this list of libraries which lend ILL. It is a fairly busy and efficient listserver so you may wish to register for receiving as a digest or similar.
2. Check whether the holding library is a CONARLs member

Search for the holding library on our IRU Participants list.

If not, you could ask if they would consider joining CONARLs – it is free and open to everyone!  We can usually process a new library joining within a couple of days or less if you make us aware it is time critical.  To join simply email the NAG Office with your BL Library Code.

3. Note on your request that you are requesting the £6.00 rate

When libraries who participate in CONARLs receive an ILL request, they are not obliged to check the IRU list to see if you’re also a CONARLs member – you need to make this clear on your request in whatever format your library/system uses or you will be charged the standard British Library rate (around £18.00).

For libraries with low ILL numbers, you can simply email the holding library’s stock/ILL team.  Email addresses are available via the Forum for InterLending.

When the library supplying the loan sends in their claim spreadsheet to the British Library, they will need to note the £6.00 CONARLs charge here.

Alternative systems:

There are some alternative systems for ILL via subscription models:

  • Worldshare OCLC system – this is a subscription service from OCLC where member library authorities can lend to each other and receive payment through the platform against subscription fees.
  • WHELF+ offers free reciprocal loans to members using ALMA library management system functionality.
  • RapidILL is a commercial solution from ExLibris used by many academic libraries.
  • Article Galaxy Scholar is a commercial solution for supplying journal articles.
History of CONARLs

The CONARLs Working Group was formed on 1st April 2009 as part of the amalgamation of The Combined Regions with CONARLs, a co-operative of national and regional library organisations. The Working Group continued the work of CONARLs, in particular:

The CONARLs Working Group worked with organisations outside The Combined Regions to ensure representation is as wide as possible, and to facilitate co-operative working including The Forum for Interlending and Information Delivery (FIL) and The International Association of Music Libraries, Archives and Documentation Centres, UK and Ireland Branch (IAML [UK & Irl]).

NAG took over the hosting of the CONARLs information and maintenance of the list of participants in September 2019.  The CONARLs database of non-English language fiction collections was not transferred as it was decided that the base data was too out of date to be useful.