Acquisitions Acronyms, Initialisms, and Terminology

A/V---Audio/Visual materials. Special format materials such as CD's, CD-ROMS, and videos.
AMA, AMZN---Amazon.com. An online bookstore.
B & N---Barnes & Noble.com. Barnes & Noble's online bookstore.
BC---The code assigned to UMBC is the University System of Maryland and Affiliated Institutation's catalog.
BIB---A bibliographic record. A library catalog entry for an item.
BBS---Blackwell's Book Services. The overarching name of the company to which our primary vendor, Blackwell North America, belongs. BHB is the British Division of BBS and BOB is the online retail division of BBS.
BNA---Blackwell North America. Our primary vendor for all books published in North America.
BRF---Book Request Form. The small order slips that are submitted to Acquisitions. Also the World Wide Web order print-outs.
CM---Collection Manager. BNA's (Blackwell North America, our primary vendor) library database and ordering system.
DUP---Duplicate. An order which duplicates an item already in our collection.
FEID or FEIN---A federal identification number, assigned to all US company's. The State of Maryland requires that we obtain companies FEID or FEIN when doing certain types of transactions.
IL---Inquiry Letter. A letter sent to a publisher or vendor to get information.
IMC---International Media Center. A UMBC center housing media, such as sound recordings and videos, from other countries, and equipment on which to play them.
ISBN--International Standard Book Number. A unique number assigned to a book to uniquely identify it.
Media---The Library Media Center, located on the 2nd floor, housing videos and music CD's, and providing equipment on which to play them.
MUB--UMBC's OCLC code. We put our code on records for books (and other items) which we own. If a record says MUB we likely already own the item.
NYP---Not Yet Published. Books or other materials that haven't been published yet. We regularly receive orders for not yet published materials because publishers begin advertising long before books are published.
OCLC---Online Computer Library Center. An online union catalog that is the world's largest database of library bibliographic information. We download most of our bibliographic records from OCLC, and derive our order records from them.
OP---Out-of-print. Books and other materials that are no longer being published. Only second-hand copies are available.
OS---Out-of-stock. Books and other materials which are being published but either our vendor or the publisher no longer has any in stock.
OSI---Out-of-stock indefinitely. Books and other materials that are supposedly still being published, but the publisher has none in stock and has no definite plans for publishing more. We treat these as out-of-prints.
PA---Price Availability Inquiry. An inquiry into the price and availability of an item usually done via the vendor's website. Done less frequently via a direct e-mail, phone contact, or a letter either faxed or sent via regular mail.
PO---Purchase order. A confusing term because we use it to refer to two different things. Most commonly it refers to the orders printed out here in the library. Less commonly it refers to a Purchase Order generated by the campus procurement office to authorize a purchase.
RCLC---Resource Center for Language and Culture. A UMBC center housing books related to language and culture. Items owned by RCLC are listed in catalogusmai. If RCLC already owns an item, we consider the order a duplicate.
USMAI---The group of 16 Maryland Libraries that shares the catalogusmai.
XPO---Exported. A record has been exported from OCLC and loaded into the library catalog.