Ordering Against Future Allotment

Ordering Against Future Allotment

Thanks to everyone for using up this years’ allotment funds before the recommended cut-off date of September 30th!

After the June 2022 Parkland Libraries Council (PLC) meeting Parkland created an ordering process for physical items that will allow libraries to order items, with allotment funds, regardless of their publication date.

The process is as follows:

  • Libraries can create three types of allotment carts in ULS and CVS.
    • Cart A: Items published between January – November
    • Cart B: Items published in December and the upcoming year
    • Cart C: Items to purchase against next year’s allotment that have already been published, start date of December 1st.
  • Libraries submit carts to Parkland Finance Clerks. Cart B should be titled “Future Items”. Cart C should be titled “December orders for next year’s budget”.
    • Libraries MUST comment “future items” when submitting the carts.
  • Finance Clerks review carts to ensure items are in the appropriate cart.
    • If items are in an incorrect cart, they will request library staff fix the error.
  • Finance Clerks will process the submitted carts and adjust the over-encumber amounts in Polaris for Carts B & C.

If you have questions about this ordering process, please feel free to contact Finance at orders@prl.ab.ca and they will address them.

Important Notes:

  • Libraries should still strive to encumber current allotment dollars by September 30th.
  • If libraries would like to know the number of items they have ordered, they must track it themselves. Finance Clerks can only provide dollar amount of over-encumbered.
  • Digital ordering still has a cut-off of November 30th (order date and publication date)


If you still have 2024 allotment funds to use up before the November 30th cut-off date and would like some collection development support, please reach out to your Consultant.