Interlibrary Loan and Document Delivery

Scans of material from the Burns Law Library collection

• Submit a request to receive a scan via the interlibrary loan system.  
• Students: No copies will be made from material that is on course reserve, reserve, or study aids.
• Students: Limited to 20 images per day.
• Faculty can choose to send an email to docservices@law.gwu.edu instead of using the ILL system.  
  •  Using the ILL system is preferred.  If a request cannot be fulfilled from the Burns collection, library staff will initiate an ILL transaction to borrow the item from another library. 
  • When sending an email, be sure to provide full bibliographic details:  book title and author, chapter information, publication year, and the first and last page numbers.
• Copyright policy and restrictions apply to all requests. 
• Scans will be emailed to your @law.gwu.edu address.
• Generally, scans will be provided within 24 hours of receipt of a request; scans may take longer based on staffing, busy periods and closures. The office is not open weekends or holidays.  

Loans for Burns Law Library items

• Most circulating items are available to be checked out.
• Course Reserve, Reserve and other non-circulating items are not available.
• Faculty can choose to send an email to docservices@law.gwu.edu instead of using the ILL system.  
  •  Using the ILL system is preferred.  If a request cannot be fulfilled from the Burns collection, library staff will initiate an ILL transaction to borrow the item from another library. 
  • When sending an email, be sure to provide full bibliographic details:  book title and author, chapter information, publication year, and the first and last page numbers.
• Students: Items are held for 5 days. 
• Distance Students: You may request items be shipped to you.  

Returning books to the library

• Return books to the circulation desk or the book drop located in the lobby at 716 20th Street, NW, in front of the library doors. 
• If you are a distance education student who has borrowed books, ship them to the library via a carrier that offers tracking services (UPS, FedEx, etc.) at your expense. 

Interlibrary loan is available to faculty, students and staff of the law school.  The service obtains material for you from institutions all over the world, if the material is not available at the Jacob Burns Law Library, Gelman Library or Himmelfarb Medical Library.  Lending of material by other institutions is a courtesy.  Therefore, returning the items on time is important.  Late fees are assessed for books returned after the due date.   

Contacts:

• ill@law.gwu.edu (best method)
• 202.994.4156

Current law students, faculty and staff automatically have an account in the interlibrary loan system.  

• Access your ILL account by inputting your law school email userid and password in JACOB.
  • Click on the ILL button on the top menu of the JACOB catalog page. 
• Request ILL material by using the GW Law Library WorldCat Discovery catalog, locate the material and click on "request the item." 
  • Use the signin button (top right) to access your ILL account.  

• The staff makes every effort to get the material as quickly as possible.  However, we are dependent upon a lending library.  It make take up to 3 weeks for a lender to either fulfill or deny the request.
• Copyright fees are the responsibility of the patron.  The Interlibrary Loan staff will alert you, via email, if a request requires payment of copyright.  
• Overdue fees are assessed at $3.00 per day.  They will not be waived.  In addition to fees, excessive overdues can result in loss of ILL privileges, loss of library circulation privileges and/or a hold on your law school account.  Please work with us and return items on time.  

Borrowing items from other libraries is a privilege.  Therefore, if items are lost and/or damaged fines and fees will be incurred.

• An item is declared lost if overdue 3 weeks, or sooner if it is the end of the semester.
• An invoice will be sent to you for the replacement cost (plus processing fees) and overdue fees. 
• If you find the book prior to payment of the invoice, please return it asap.  All fees except overdue fees will be waived.
• If you find the book after the invoice has been paid, there will be no refund. You can add the book to your collection. 
• Unpaid invoices will result in blocks placed on your library accounts.  And, if necessary, a hold will be placed on your University account.
• Fees for damaged books will be determined by the lending library.  You may be responsible for replacement of the book.