Arlington Public Library

Action Required for Your PIN and HOLDS

Library System Upgrade Completed

There are three steps you need to take action on - set your new password, thaw your holds and update your preferences.

See known issues due to System Upgrade.

1. Set Your New Password

Log In - Your PIN has been replaced with a temporary password. Follow these instructions to log into your account with your username and temporary password.

  • If your account includes a phone number, your temporary password is the last 4 digits of the phone number.
  • If you do not have a phone number in your account, your temporary password is the first 5 digits of the ZIP code in your account.
  • If you do not have a phone number or ZIP code, your temporary password is set to 1015.

If none of the temporary passwords work, you can reset your password if you know your library card number and the email address in your library account.

If none of the temporary passwords work and you don't know your library card number, please contact us for help.

Set Your New Password - After logging into your account, set a new password using the  account settings menu.

At this time, you can not set your new password via the Library App.

Library App - To access your account in the Library App, log in with your new password. You may see a warning message about your credentials being out of date. If so follow the prompts to update your saved password.

2. Review and Thaw Your Holds

Holds Pickup Service will begin at Central Library only starting Monday, June 15.

  • All Outstanding Holds Have Been Frozen - All holds placed before June 15 have been “Frozen.” Frozen holds keep their place in line but do not come ready. IMPORTANT: To receive these hold at Central Library, log into your account, click on “thaw” next to each item that you are ready to receive. Then change your pickup location to Central Library, if set to another location. Pickup location can not be changed in the Library App.
  • Holds Ready for Pickup - If you had holds ready for pickup in March when Libraries closed, these holds have been moved to the Central Library Auditorium and will be available for pickup starting Monday, June 15. No further action is required if you wish to pick up these holds. If you do not want these holds there is no need to contact the Library. Holds not picked up after 10 days will be reshelved.
  • New Holds - On June 18 you will be able to place new holds on physical items through the library catalog and app.

For more information about the Holds Pickup Service at Central Library, including hours, please see our FAQ.

3. Update Your Preferences

  • SMS - If you previously opted-in to SMS, you will now also need to select a carrier.
  • Auto-Renewal - You can now opt-out of auto-renewals.

Please Note - Fine payment will remain unavailable; please check back for updates.

All Library facilities are currently closed. Overdue fines are not accruing on materials currently checked out. Stay tuned for more news about the system upgrade and how these changes will affect your Library account. Updates will be posted to the Library Services News and Updates page of the Library website.

Questions? Contact us by phone or through Online Chat and Text.

As always, thank you for your continued patience and support.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Completely not working! I put in my username and attempted all 3 ways to login and set my password but nothing worked. I tried the phone number, zip code and 1015 and absolutely nothing. I will try again with my library card.

  2. Agree with the other comments. Tried three ways to login but was unsuccessful. And I didn’t want a new login password anyway. It’s not easy to remember these things and I liked the one that I had.

  3. I just logged in and updated my password to my old password on a computer. I first tried the last 4 digits of my home landline, which did not work. Then I tried the last 4 digits of my mobile number, which worked. Then I clicked Reset Password on the left panel of my Account page and reset my password back to what it was. Thank you.

  4. I would recommend those patrons with a long list of holds make a copy of them. I copied and pasted my list of holds to a draft gmail email message. I also used the button at the bottom of the Hold page to “Export to Excel” and saved the file to my computer hard drive.

    • Michael, we apologize for the confusion. After logging into your account, you set a new password using “Password Reset” function in the account settings menu. Please note: At this time, you can not set your new password via the Library App.

  7. The new system password reset also did not work for me. I tried all 3 ways, though the first should’ve been the functional one. Very frustrating. Now I can’t even check out ebooks.

  8. I’ve also tried every possible iteration of pin and have been unable to access my account

  9. I have updated with temp password but do not see where I can reset back to my old password

  10. I think I’ve managed to do everything, except that I don’t remember what SMS means. Please let me know. Thanks

    • Susan, SMS stands for “short message service,” and it refers to texting technology. You can turn it on if you want to receive information about your holds by text message.

  11. Hi, thanks for working on repairing the issue. I am not frustrated at all, just flagging that at this point, noon Thursday, the problems are still there.

    cheers.
    Tom

  12. I have followed the instructions several times and it doesn’t work. I have tried the last 4 digits of my phone number, my zip code, and the 1015 number. Every time it just sends me back to start over.

  13. It worked perfectly for me! I think that consolidating all your holds (physical and ebooks) on one site makes a ton of sense. Thanks to the library staff for all their hard work!

  14. I was able to reset my pin but realized that my old phone number had been used so I went to correct that. I tried to change the phone but leave the contact email. However, I consistently get this error:

    “You have not filled out all required fields. Please fill in all missing fields and resubmit”

  17. I was able to login to my library account and revert my PIN back to what it was before this disruption, so that’s good.

    HOWEVER, the research portal is broken. E.g., I cannot access Morningstar or ValueLine from the research portal. I tried both PINs (i.e., the one the library set for me by default as part of this disruption AND my original PIN, which I had already reset my PIN to). Neither works. Today is the biggest one-day drop in the stock market since early May, and I cannot access stock research! Can someone please add this to the list of issues?

    • This is a known issue and we’re working to solve it as quickly as possible. In the meantime, you may be able to log in by using a different browser.

  18. Password reset worked fine. When looking at my Hold list, many titles had placed
    me in the number one position. Before, there were a few, but not so many. I don’t want to jump the queue.

    • Kenneth, glad to hear that you have had a good experience!

      You didn’t actually jump the queue with holds, you’ve just unfrozen yours first – the other people ahead of you haven’t unfrozen their holds on the same titles yet. And they might not, so you might stay number 1, but they might unfreeze their holds, and push you back down the queue again.

  19. I am happy to report that the reset worked smoothly for me. I wanted to make a comment on the new hold list layout – FWIW – I prefer to have fuller information on my place in line for a hold – as in : number X of Y total holds. I can’t present a compelling reason except that I like it. I just thought I’d share. Thank you.

  20. My Log In and Reset went fine. My question regards Holds. Do your instructions to undo their frozen status refer only to physical Holds? My OverDrive Hold does not appear to be frozen. Is there some action I need to take on this? The only thing I saw was a highlighted “Cancel Hold”, but I was afraid to click on that for fear it would, indeed, cancel my Hold. Also, reviewing my Account, previously I had been recording my checkout history, but when I clicked on it, it showed zero History. Is that record lost? Thank you.

    • Carol, only print holds have been frozen, because they are the holds affected by pickup location. Your eCollection holds continue to function as they always have.

      In regards to your checkout history, I will inquire tomorrow.

  21. I need to have something notarized. When & where is the earliest I can accomplish this ? Thank you.

    • Deborah, unfortunately at the moment I don’t have an answer for you.
      We are aware of the community need for many of the services that the Library traditionally provides, and will provide an update as soon as we are able.

  22. I was able to Log In and Reset for my daughter but not for myself. I have tried 1015, zip code and phone number for my library card but none of them worked.

    • Ayla, please contact us Saturday before 2 through Online Chat or Text so that we can try to help solve the issue.

  23. Tried your latest re-set, which doesn’t work.
    Also have received no responses to earlier requests.

    • Maureen, please contact us Saturday before 2 through Online Chat or Text so that we can try to help solve the issue.

  24. I was able to reset my password, but can not figure out how or where to reset my PIN. All links point me to password re-sets. If that is something we are required to do at this time, please advise where on the site. Thank you

    • Deborah, I apologize for the confusion. The prompt at the top of the catalog page is for people who arrive in the library catalog without having first read our email or the blog post about setting a new password.
      We’re using PIN and password interchangeably here, because our old system used four digit PINS to secure your account. Now we’ve update to a system that allows you to set a more complex, and therefor more secure, password made up of letters, numbers and characters. So once you have reset your password, you’re all done.

  25. Unable to login to set a new password as of today, June 15.

  26. It’s June 19 and I still can’t place a hold. The HOLD button appears on the page with the selected book, but this appears when I click it –
    Your hold could not be placed. libraryNotPickupLocation

    I can’t find a way in account preferences to manually change my hold pick-up location from my branch library to Central.

    Just don’t know where to look for other options. Help, please?

    • Phyllis, I understand how frustrating this is. Please contact the Library by phone, text or chat so that we can help you.

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