Starting October 7, 2011, Library and Archives Canada (LAC) will begin a systems upgrade on its server that will ultimately enable clients to use the Government of Canada's "Receiver General Buy Button" (RGBB) when making purchases using LAC's online forms.Comment: This move is another case of LAC bringing its operations in line with general Government of Canada practice. In the long term it should provide a standard and more convenient user experience for LAC clients. Transition frustrations can be anticipated.
The RGBB is a common service used by federal departments and agencies for the electronic acceptance of payments and secure storage of related payment information. This function also provides convenient, reliable and secure payment services to clients and businesses during their online dealings with the federal government.
The transition to RGBB will help align LAC's business processes with those of other federal departments and agencies.
During the transition, clients will have the option of either being invoiced for copies or leaving their coordinates on the order form provided online. Clients who opt to leave their coordinates will be contacted at a later date to process their credit card purchase.
10 October 2011
Buying from LAC?
The following is an announcement from Library and Archives Canada
I don't think my last attempt to post a comment worked ... so here I go again.
ReplyDeletePerhaps the development of an on-line secure purchasing ability could serve the LAC in a profit making way.
I have often though with dismay that it is a pity the LAC has no "shop," as do most UK archives and museums. I remember my delight in discovering in the shop at TNA in Kew that the Booth London Poverty Maps could be purchased, as well as a very good selction of historical maps and books. Such books did not seem to be carried by ordinary bookstores, such as Waterstones. Some of these books have helped me enormously in my own research. I also took great pleasure, while researching his family for a chum, of purchasing on-line a lovely fine china cup commemorating the HMS Victory, having proved that his ancestor was a member of its crew as it was being used as a floating store in Portsmouth Harbour in the mid eighteen hundreds.
Even the National Gallery here in Ottawa has a lovely shop, which I visit in anticipation of Christmas every year, for silk scarves and such things for gifts.
Surely the LAC knows which are its most popular items, through the frequency of requests for them. Wouldn't it be wondeful to be able to on-line purchase a re-print of a historical map of Toronto, or of Vancouver, if you lived in those towns, were interested in their history, but were not likely ever to be able to visit the LAC itself?
The LAC could do a good business even in souvenir items such as mugs and cotton bookbags, pre-printed with historical figures, maps, and books about Canadian history. Stocks could be pre-planned with new exhibitions being mounted ..... It could even operate by agreement with the OSG HQ and BIFHSGO as an outlet of their publications. Well, it's just my thought ... Cheers.
Brenda Turner