How quickly will items be delivered?
It is difficult to estimate how quickly ILL materials will be delivered, because each ILL request is sent to a string of up to five lending institutions. Each institution has four business days (weekends and holidays excluded) in which to respond to the request. As a result, we dont know in advance which institution will be filling the request, which makes it hard to predict how long it will take. In theory, a request could take up to 31 calendar days to move through the entire string. That being said, ILL books usually take about one week to arrive; materials sent from within Massachusetts are delivered via a courier, which reduces turnaround time. Article requests take 3-4 days on average, and some are received within 24 hours. To make the best use of the interlibrary loan service, plan ahead!
