The Blind and Visually Impaired Users Service Procedure
CHAPTER 1.
GENERAL PROVISIONS
1. The Procedure for Servicing blind and visually Impaired users (hereinafter referred to as the Procedure) is developed in accordance with the Law of the Republic of Belarus No. 262-3 of 17/05/2011 "On Copyright and Related Rights", the Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works for Persons Who Are Blind, Visually Impaired, or Otherwise Print Disabled (hereinafter referred to as the Marrakesh Treaty), the Law of the Republic of Belarus of 07/05/2021 No. 99-3 "On the protection of personal data", the charter of the state institution "National Library of Belarus" (hereinafter referred to as the Library), the rules of use of the National Library of Belarus, the order of service in the scientific reading room and uses the terms defined by the Marrakesh Treaty.
2. The Procedure outlines the parameters under which the Library will provide services to users who are blind or visually impaired (hereinafter referred to as beneficiaries).
3. Beneficiaries are provided with services through consulting, reference and bibliographic support of information activities and giving access to the Library's information resources.
4. Consulting, reference and information services for beneficiaries include:
supporting with consultation when using the Library’s information resources and equipment;
compiling literature and preparation of a list of documents on the topic;
searching and ordering necessary documents, including interlibrary loan;
providing data about events, facts, persons;
updating factual and bibliographic data.
5. Beneficiaries' access to the Library's information resources is provided by:
distribution of Braille-printed documents for use in the reading room;
provision of special equipment and tiflotech solutions for working with flat-print, electronic and audio documents in the reading room;
conversion of documents to electronic accessible formats (hereinafter referred to as accessible formats);
electronic document delivery.
6. Library and information services are provided to beneficiaries free of charge on the basis of a visually impaired person’s ID card or a document confirming a relevant visual impairment.
7. Beneficiary services are provided in the scientific reading room and remotely.
CHAPTER 2.
BENEFICIARIES SERVICES IN THE SCIENTIFIC READING ROOM
8. Servicing of beneficiaries in the scientific reading room is carried out on the basis of a reader's card, which is issued upon registration at the Library.
9. For registration, you must present a document confirming your identity: passport, residence permit in the Republic of Belarus, refugee certificate; for admission to the scientific reading room – a certificate of a visually impaired person’s ID card or a document confirming a relevant visual disability.
10. Employees of the scientific reading room or an employee on duty accompany beneficiaries in the Library. You can call the attendant at the points of user registration and informing desk.
11. You can work with documents from the scientific reading room's subsidiary collection without placing an order, but it is necessary to do so if you want to use documents from the major collections, which include publications printed in Braille.
12. Documents are ordered from the electronic catalog independently or upon request by the librarian on duty. The ordered documents are delivered to the reading room within 30 minutes.
13. For independent work of beneficiaries with flat-print publications, audio documents and electronic resources, the reading room is equipped with automated workstations equipped with tiflotech solutions:
a screen magnifier that projects the pages of a printed document onto a computer screen in an enlarged format;
a “Screen Magnifier” software built into Windows that magnifies electronic data;
an on-screen access program that voices electronic text from the monitor screen in Belarusian, Russian, and English;
and headphones.
14. In the reading room, you can get consulting assistance in working with the Library's information resources, personal computer, tiflotech solutions available in the reading room, place an order for electronic delivery of documents and converting documents to available formats.
CHAPTER 3.
REMOTE SERVICING OF BENEFICIARIES
15. Remote servicing of beneficiaries is carried out by phone (+375 17) 293 27 23, e-mail: tiflo@nlb.by and other communication channels.
16. The right to remote service is provided by an electronic copy or photo of a visually impaired person’s ID card or a document confirming a relevant visual disability.
17. The following information shall be submitted by e-mail in order to register as a remote user of the Library and is determined in line with the legislation of the Republic of Belarus, local acts, achievement of the set goals and include:
Full name;
date, month, year of birth;
education, academic degree, academic title;
place of study (faculty, course, form of study);
place of work, position;
data on registration at the place of residence and/or place of stay;
data on disability (disability group, validity period);
phone number;
e-mail address.
18. Personal data is processed in accordance with the Law of the Republic of Belarus No. 99-3 of 07/05/2021 "On Personal Data Protection" and the personal data processing policy approved by the Library, without the consent of the personal data subject (paragraph 20 of part 1 of Article 6 of the Law of the Republic of Belarus No. 99-3 of 07/05/2021 "On Personal Data Protection", sub-item 2.2, item 2, Article 137 of the Culture Code of the Republic of Belarus) only for the purposes of remote library and information services for beneficiaries.
19. At the request of beneficiaries, consultations, bibliographic and factual references, orders for electronic delivery of documents and conversion of documents to available formats are carried out remotely.
CHAPTER 4.
ELECTRONIC DELIVERY OF DOCUMENTS FOR BENEFICIARIES
20. The Electronic Document Delivery Service provides digital copies of pieces or complete documents in accessible formats to the beneficiary's email address.
21. At the request of the beneficiary, converted copies and electronic copies of Library documents, open sources of information and documents obtained under the interlibrary loan are delivered in accessible formats.
22. Documents from licensed databases and obtained under the interlibrary loan are provided in the format and volume determined by the resource owners.
23. Delivery is carried out within three days. The delivery time of documents for which an interlibrary loan order or conversion order is issued depends on the time frame for completing these orders.
CHAPTER 5.
CONVERTING DOCUMENTS TO AVAILABLE FORMATS
24. Conversion of documents to accessible formats (hereinafter referred to as conversion) is the creation of copies of documents in formats usable by beneficiaries:
graphic (pdf), accessible for visually impaired beneficiaries using a screen magnifier;
text (word, txt), accessible for working with screen access programs and text-to-speech;
audio (mp3), digitized or voiced with a synthesized voice.
25. At the request of beneficiaries, documents from the Library's collections, databases that the Library provides access to, open sources of information, and documents obtained under the interlibrary loan can be converted.
26. The format, scope, and terms of submission of documents from licensed databases and obtained under the interlibrary loan are determined by the resource owners.
27. Conversion orders are executed on a first-come, first-served basis.
28. The deadline for completing conversion orders without editing recognized texts (hereinafter referred to as editing) is up to 7 days. The terms of conversion with editing depend on the number and complexity of orders received, the volume and quality of sources being converted, and are set in agreement with the beneficiary.
29. Conversion orders with editing are accepted only for documents of socio-humanitarian orientation and fiction.
30. Each converted instance bears a mark indicating that it was prepared for a user with a visual impairment and is meant for that user's personal use. The mark is created in the conversion format-compatible format.
31. Converted copies are provided for use in the reading room, exported to an electronic medium, or delivered to the beneficiary's email address.
32. Beneficiaries are liable if the received copies are used for purposes contrary to the legislation of the Republic of Belarus.
User service issues that are not regulated by this Procedure are resolved individually by contacting the head of the Library Services Department and the Deputy Director General-Director for Information Resources and User Service.
