The Acquisitions Department of the University Library is responsible for the acquisition of library materials from all regions of the world, except the former Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, China, Taiwan, Japan, and Korea. The department purchases materials in many formats ranging from print materials to manuscripts to microforms to electronic products. The department acquires these materials through a variety of methods including purchase, lease (for electronic products), gifts from donors and institutions, or exchange with other institutional partners.

The Department's annual purchases range from 8.0-8.5 million dollars each year. This money is used to support our ongoing commitments, such as subscriptions to serial publications, as well as one-time purchases of books. The Department has an annual expenditure deadline for the use of funds provided by the State of North Carolina and other sources.

The Department is organized into four sections and one unit. The Searching and Order Management Section is responsible for two major acquisition methods. This section searches the firm order requests from bibliographers, selectors, and faculty to ensure that the title is not already held and to provide ordering and cataloging information. This section also handles our two major approval plans: the University Press Approval Plan (UPAP) and the Library Expedited Approval Plan (LEAP). These plans are arrangements with vendors whereby the Library provides instructions regarding titles to send automatically based upon a profile. This profile includes parameters such as the publishers to include, the subject areas, and other non-subject parameters like the nature or level of the material.

The Receipts and Invoice Management Section places the firm orders with various vendors, performs the necessary follow-up of the firm orders (including claiming of outstanding overdue orders), and receives the material upon its arrival, verifies the invoices for payment, and routes the material to the appropriate Cataloging Section. This section also handles materials received on blanket order, a process similiar to approval plans but without the right to return.

The Gifts Unit handles gifts-in-kind from donors. As part of this service, the Gifts-in-Kind Specialist acknowledges donors, arranges for review of the material by the appropriate selectors, and adds the materials donated into the collection or sends them to the Friends of the Library Book Sale if not needed.

The Print Serials Section places new subscriptions for print materials with vendors and receives and checks in the serials supplied. This Section also acquires serial material in three ways other than paid subscriptions. Some titles are acquired through standing orders with vendors. The vendor, based upon the Library's instructions, ships these titles, such as monographic series and annual publications, automatically. The other two methods used are gifts from other institutions or exchanges with other institutions whereby the University Library sends certain material to the other institution and receives material in return.

The Electronic Resources Section is responsible for the acquisition of electronic materials which includes the license negotiations, the placement of orders, and the monitoring of access to these resources.

The Acquisitions Department is an administrative service operation, supporting the primary mission of the Library through the acquisition of resources needed for our collections. We encourage patrons and staff to contact us regarding any issues related to the procurement of library materials.