Borrow Direct
Borrow Direct is an interlibrary borrowing service offered by all of the Ivy League Universities except for Harvard.
It allows students, faculty and staff at these institutions to request books directly from each others' collections.
Much faster than Interlibrary Loan (ILL), Borrow Direct is a great way to obtain books that are checked out, on reserve or otherwise unavailable in the Columbia University library system.
Borrow Direct books have a loan period of 4 weeks. No renewals are permitted. However, lending institutions rarely proceed to charge overdue fines for late books despite the fact that patrons are warned that such fines may be charged and strongly advised to return items promptly for the maintenance of "good relationships with our partner libraries."
If available, requested materials will be ready for pickup within four business days of the original request. In one user's totally subjective personal experience, Yale and Princeton libraries are fastest (sometimes delivering books within one day).
