Self-serve kiosk

Self-serve lets members borrow and return toys on the library's own tablet while the desk is busy — they scan the member card on their phone, scan the toys, and go. It is a mode a team member opens on the tablet, not something members can do from home. You can also let members do the same on their own phone, from a poster at the desk — see Self-serve on members' phones below.

Switch it on in Settings → Loans → Self-serve kiosk. It's off until you do.

Opening it

On the tablet, sign in, open the Loans desk, and press Open self-serve on this device in the Self-serve panel. Give the tablet a name if you have more than one ("Front iPad").

By default you are signed out of the tablet as it opens, so nobody at the kiosk can reach the staff app. The kiosk doesn't need your sign-in — it has its own key, kept on that tablet.
It stays open until the end of today's roster shift (plus the same grace period shift access gets). With no shift running or starting within the hour — or one ending in the next 15 minutes — it stays open three hours. Never more than twelve.
On an iPad, turn on Guided Access (Settings → Accessibility) so the screen stays on the kiosk.

Who can open one: anyone with Open the self-serve kiosk — Owner, Manager, Committee and Staff by default. Loans made at the kiosk are recorded in that person's name: they decided to open it.

What a member does

Scans the member card on their phone (Apple or Google Wallet, or the portal's QR) — or types the code under the QR. The screen greets them by first name only and shows how many toys they have out.
Taps Borrow and scans each toy, or Return and scans the toy they brought back.
Before a return, they tick your confirmations — by default I have wiped this toy clean and I have counted the pieces and they are all here, plus any of your own (up to five). The screen shows the toy's piece list and how many pieces it should have. Pieces already recorded as missing are marked on the list and named above it ("1 × Wheel — no need to look for"), and the number to count to leaves them out.
If they can't tick a box, they tap Something's missing or broken, can say what, and the return still goes through — flagged for you.

The screen clears itself after a minute and a half without a touch, so the next family never sees the last one's details.

What the kiosk won't do

Everything the desk checks, the kiosk checks — membership, the balance threshold, loan limits (and weighting), tag limits, holds, waivers, recalls, missing critical pieces, overdue maintenance, party bookings. The difference is that nothing can be overridden at the kiosk: a member who hits a block is told, in plain words, to see a volunteer. It takes no payments; anything owing just follows your normal reminders. A member with a block can still return.

It also lends only to a family you have already verified in person. Someone who joined online and has never been checked in is asked to see a volunteer for their first borrow — at the desk, where lending them a toy checks them in as usual — and can use the kiosk from then on.

A returned toy that another family is waiting for tells the member to hand it to a volunteer rather than put it in the returns tub.

Keeping an eye on it

The Self-serve panel on the Loans desk shows what members did at the kiosk today: who borrowed or returned what, whether they ticked every box or reported a problem, and whether the toy has been counted yet.

Self-serve returns are recorded with no condition and no piece check, so a toy with pieces lands in the counting queue like any other return. There it is marked Self-serve — family confirmed all pieces (or reported a problem, with what they said), so whoever counts knows to count again before recording a piece missing against a family that said it was all there.
In Settings → Activity, everything done at a kiosk reads "A member at the self-serve kiosk (opened by …)", and the Person filter has Members (self-serve kiosk).

Closing it

It closes by itself at its end time. To close it earlier, press Close beside it in the Self-serve panel, or tap Staff: close self-serve at the bottom of the tablet's screen. Switching self-serve off in Settings closes every open kiosk for good — switching it back on doesn't reopen them (the tablet notices within a minute). Removing the opener's access stops their kiosk too.

Self-serve on members' phones

The same flow, with no tablet: members use their own phone. Switch it on in Settings → Loans → Self-serve on members' phones, choose when the poster works (below), then open Print the poster from the Self-serve panel on the Loans desk and put it up in the library.

A member scans the poster's QR code with their phone's camera and signs in to the member portal as themselves — so there's no card to scan.
They tap Borrow or Return and scan the label on each toy with the camera. Returns ask the same confirmations as the kiosk, and Something's missing or broken works the same way.
Everything the kiosk won't do, the phone won't either: no overrides, no payments, and no borrowing for a family that hasn't been verified in person yet — their first borrow is at the desk.

When the poster works — you choose, under the switch:

During opening hours (the default): from 30 minutes before you open until 30 minutes after you close. Closure days shut it, and special hours from a closure replace the usual ones. You need opening hours set under Settings → Locations.
During self-serve hours: hours of their own, for a room members can use outside staffed sessions — say 7am to 9pm every day. A full-day closure still shuts it.
Any time: for a room only members can get into, where the poster on its wall is presence enough. Closures don't apply. Anyone with a photo of the poster could use it from home too, so replace the poster if one gets out.

Nobody has to switch it on for each session, and outside the hours you chose, a link saved at home does nothing.

Running an unmanned library

Phone self-serve is the way to run without a volunteer on site. The tablet kiosk needs a team member to open it, and it closes by itself after at most twelve hours. Choose self-serve hours or any time so the poster works whenever members can get in.

Outside your opening hours members are told to contact the library rather than ask a volunteer. A toy that another family is waiting for asks them to leave it on the holds shelf, not the open shelves.
A reported problem is emailed straight away to everyone who can open the self-serve kiosk. The email names the toy, the family, what they said and which boxes they couldn't tick. Switch the email off under Settings → Notifications (Self-serve — a problem reported on a return) if your desk panel is enough.
Returns still land in the counting queue, tagged with what the family confirmed, so the next volunteer in counts them.
Loans and returns made on a phone are recorded as the member's own: the activity log reads "A member (self-serve on their phone)", with no team member named.
They show in the Self-serve panel marked on their phone, and phone returns get the same counting-queue tag.
Replace the poster (on the poster page) if a photo of it has been shared or a copy has gone missing. Every poster already printed stops working straight away, so print the new one. Replacing it needs permission to edit loan rules.