Item Types in Koha
One of the key components of your library's collection will be the Item Type designation. Item types are a way for your patrons to identify what the item is and more importantly to Koha how this item circulates in your library.
Here is a link to the Koha manual about Item Types in Koha.
Item Type Set-Up
Within the Administration Module, under Basic Parameters, one will find the library's Item Types.
Each item type that exists in your system will appear in this list. All item types have a code (10 digits or less, no spaces or special characters), a description and other information associated with that item type.
Setting up a new Item Type
Under the Item Type page, a button to add a new item type exists. Once this is clicked, the library can fill out the form to create a new item type. The two required fields are the Item Type (this is the code 10 characters or less). The description is what the staff and public will see. The code will only be needed when creating reports and various other database things.
Search Category - item types can be grouped together for searching. If you wanted Books and Large Print Books to appear in the same search, a search group could be created through the Authorized Value, ITEMTYPECAT, and linked through this page.
Images - Koha provides multiple groups of images that a library can choose to use for illustrating an item type.
Hidden in the OPAC - Marking an item type 'hidden from the OPAC' will remove this value from the Advanced Search feature in the OPAC. This will not remove the items associated with this item type to show in the OPAC.
Not for Loan - Marking an item type 'Not for Loan' will make these items not able to be checked out. This item type will still be seen on the OPAC and staff client.
Rentals - If your item type has an associated rental charge, there are several options that can be used here.
- Rental Charge
- Daily Rental Charge
- Daily Rentals use calendar
- Hourly Rental Charge
- Hourly Rentals use calendar
More information about setting up Rental charges - see the Koha Manual.
Default Cost & Processing Fee
Koha allows libraries to set up default replacement costs and also include a processing fee for an item type. These costs will be applied to the patron's account when an item's is set to Lost.
Checkin Messages
If an item type needs a specific check-in message, this can be done for all items in this type as a default.
Library Limitation and more
If this item type is used only for a specific branch, then this branch can be chosen in the Library limitation option. Multiple branches can be chosen in addition to a single branch.
Circulation Rules
If your library has recently created a new item type in Koha, don't forget to set up Circulation and fines rules for this item type.
Deleting an Item Type
If your library is looking to get rid of an existing Item Type in Koha, a report is needed to find all the items that are assigned this item type. The items will need to be reassigned before the item type can be deleted.
Here is a handy SQL report to allow the library to find all items associated with a specific item type.
SELECT items.barcode, items.itemnumber, items.dateaccessioned,items.itype,items.itemcallnumber,items.barcode,biblio.author,biblio.title, biblio.copyrightdate
FROM items
LEFT JOIN biblioitems ON (items.biblioitemnumber=biblioitems.biblioitemnumber)
LEFT JOIN biblio ON (biblioitems.biblionumber=biblio.biblionumber)
WHERE items.itype=<<Item type|itemtypes>>
The Batch Item Modification Tool is very helpful to change item information in Koha.
Why Can't I Delete an Item Type After Deleting All of its Items?
Koha has some guard rails in place to prevent deletions that would impact system functions, and one of those guard rails is that item types that are in use cannot be deleted, since item types are so integral.
If a library attempts to delete an item type in use, libraries will see an error message reading: "Cannot delete this item type. This record is in use. Deletion is not possible." It may be confusing to see this error message if a library has already deleted or changed item types to a new category, so why is this message showing?
Item types appear in a couple places on a bibliographic record. The first one, and the place that is most intuitive, is in the item holding data - if this record has three items on it, each item has an item type; they're often the same, but not always depending on local cataloging practices. This is the first thing librarians probably modified.
The other place on a bibliographic record that has an item type is in the 942$c, the biblio-level item type. This lets Koha know if a record is eligible for record-level holds, and it sets a default item type for any new items added to that record. In general, bib-level item types and item-level item types often match, but if a library has been creating new item types or phasing out old ones, records may have items with a new item type, while the bibliographic record is still using an old item type.
This is why a library cannot delete that item type - individual items may no longer be using it, but at least one record in Koha is. Here is a sample report to find records using a particular bib-level item type for this situation.
SELECT biblio.biblionumber, title, ExtractValue( metadata, '//datafield[@tag="942"]/subfield[@code="c"]' ) as 'Bib-level itemtype'
from biblio
left join biblio_metadata on (biblio.biblionumber=biblio_metadata.biblionumber)
WHERE ExtractValue( metadata, '//datafield[@tag="942"]/subfield[@code="c"]' ) = <<Item Type|itemtypes>>
Pair the report of biblionumbers with a Marc modification template to update that 942$c, and voila, a library can batch update those records and finally clear out that item type no longer in use.
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