If staff are not too knowledgeable is this area, they should seek help from a telecommunication consulting firm. Most major vendors also have telecommunication specialists who can work with the libraries. The mechanism or formula used by a consortium to determine who pays what can be subject to endless and divisive debate. Most cost formulas take into consideration a library's collection size, circulation, and number of workstations. This works reasonably well for libraries of the same type but is less viable when different types of libraries are sharing a system, because of wide variances in these factors.
Some consortia seem to work harmoniously until the time comes actually to select a system.
At this point the process and the congeniality break down. Libraries may withdraw from the process, necessitating another price quote from vendors, or the withdrawals may cause the whole process to collapse. Again, compromise is a necessity. Shared automated systems offer many advantages to the participating libraries and the patrons they serve. This option should always be thoroughly explored as a library embarks on planning for an automated system.