[OPLINLIST] Thank-You Magazine Subscriptions

[Amy Garrett]

Hi All,
Thank-you for responding to my question about Cox Subscription Services. A
couple of you asked me to post the results. I tried to go from most
positive for Cox on down. I hope this helps. We have not yet decided what
we are going to do. Right now, we use EBSCO.
Thanks again!
Amy

Athens County has used Popular Subscription Services (PSS)for the past
couple of years and has been happy with it.

Centreville Library and Rocky River Public Library just switched to Cox.

Wayne County Public Library uses them.

Wright Memorial has used Cox for the last 3 years and really likes them.
No problems.

Briggs-Lawrence Co. Public Library has been using Cox for years. They
really like the company. You can see clearly how much you have ordered.
You can have the magazines sent to multiple branches or a single location.
The only problem we have had is with some issues not arriving. Usually
only a few issues. They have been very helpful in refunding the money for
those lost issues.

Andover Public Library switched to Cox and the service so far is great.
They have saved over $300 with Cox vs. EBSCO.

Jackson City Library just started with Cox. They have had the usual double
(sometime triple) issues with some of their subscriptions but that seems
to be working itself out. Director, Laura Thorne said that they were
interested because they seem to have good customer service, and respond to
issues quickly.

>From Marysville Public Library: "We use Cox and are happy enough with
them. Our customer service rep doesn't seem to ever answer her phone but
she does reply via email and is helpful when needed. Their new website is
much easier to use then the old one ..."

Ridgemont Public Library (Mt. Victory, OH) -- We have used Cox for several
years and not had any problems. The pros to using their service is that
you get all your subscriptions on one bill making it easier for the clerk
when it comes time to write checks, plus you don't have to keep track of
renewal times. The cons are that some of the magazine subscriptions are
more expensive than if you simply order them from amazon.com. I have
dropped down on the number we order from Cox and order 2 year
subscriptions from amazon on some. We are a very small library so this
works for us.

Community Library, Sunbury, OH -- We've used them for several years. They
have had some issues, in terms of too much work spread over too few people
(oh, and there was the server crash they had what, five years ago?
Mid-year renewals got lost in that, but they worked hard to get caught
up), but the direct rep assigned to us has *always* been quick to reply to
any emails. She is also helpful in forwarding any requests (for renewal
lists, etc.) to the appropriate staff person. Originally them offered an
8% discount, but when e got preferential pricing of 16% discount through
our local consortium (to go through EBSCO), Cox matched it. Recently, Cox
has switched from submitting renewals 3 months in advance to 2 months to
cut down on the number of overlaps, so now we are seeing renewals begin
with a gap from the old subscription. We don't keep magazines for longer
than a year, this is not so much of an issue for us. The new interactive
website is good for looking, but does not seem to work in terms of making
claims, at least for our account. All in all, I like working with them.
They've been good to us, and any problems have been sorted out.

Minerva PL -- They have used Cox for several years, but do not plan to
renew their subscriptions with them again. During the last year's renewal
cycle, a large number of our subscriptions were not renewed by Cox. We
discovered the problem as new issues stopped arriving. We reported the
problem to our sales rep and were told, after awhile, that the problem was
a new employee at Cox who did no do data entry for many of renewals. As a
consequence, many of the renewals took months longer to process, leaving
us without new issues. There is still a handful of magazines, almost a
year later, that have not renewed although we were billed by Cox for the
subscriptions and paid for them. I did renew subscriptions for this year
with Cox, and paid in January, even though we are still trying to resolve
these problems. Cox offered us no compensation, e.g. an additional
discount or refund, and, as I said, we still have unresolved problems with
subscriptions dating back a year now. We subscribe only to popular
interest titles, which is what Cox specializes in, not scholarly or
professional magazines, and have fewer than 200 subscriptions. I've talked
to the EBSCO rep and will get a quote from them this fall on renewing.
However, we are seriously considering managing our own renewals
individually. Prior to this past year, we had no unusual problems with
Cox, but I am very disappointed with the customer service by Cox to a
problem that was entirely of their own making.

Avon Lake -- Cox keeps calling but we are sticking with EBSCO because tis
not worth the money we save to switch, not to mention tying up loose ends
like multi-year subscriptions.

Twingsburg is sticking with EBSCO for now.

Brown Memorial Library -- I used Cox for the past 2 years; for 2011 I'm
returning to EBSCO. I am just a small PL with less than 20 periodical
subs. Overall, I like EBSCO better. Cox's customer service is iffy;
perhaps it's just my rep. I've had trouble getting email responses /
answers in a timely manner. They do just an 'OK' job. I was getting a 10%
discount; however, EBSCO upped that to 12% for 2011 renewals.

Coshocton Public Library -- Over time, they will raise your costs
dramatically. But then again, so will EBSCO and any other vendor you use.
We handle all of our subscriptions in-house now. It's a pain at the start,
but once you've started, you save a lot of money. It's probably not for
everyone, but I got sick of paying inflated vendor costs.






Amy Garrett
Head of Reference
Stow-Munroe Falls Public Library
3512 Darrow Rd.
Stow, OH 44224
(330) 688-3295

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