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3.1. Retrieving Patron Accounts
Last Updated 08/27/2025
Three Ways to Retrieve Patron Accounts
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Evergreen offers three methods to retrieve patrons: Search for Patrons, Retrieve Last Patron, and Retrieve Recent Patrons. To retrieve patrons via search, select Search for Patrons from the Search menu and fill in patron details in the search form. If a patron returns to the desk after you have closed their account, you can re-open their account by selecting Retrieve Last Patron from the Circulation menu. To retrieve multiple recent patrons, first configure the option in the Library Settings Editor. Once configured, the option to retrieve recent patrons will appear in the Circulation menu.
Method 1: Retrieve Patrons via Search
- From the Search menu, select Search for Patrons.
- If only the top line of the search form is visible, click the arrow next to the Search button to expand the form.
- Fill in patron details such as last name, first name, and year of birth OR scan card into the barcode field.
- Click Search.
- The grid below the search form will populate. Verify the correct patron and click the hyperlinked barcode to open their account.
Method 2: Retrieve Last Patron
If a patron you were helping returns to the desk after you have closed their account, and you have not opened any other patron accounts since closing their account, you can re-open their account directly by selecting Retrieve Last Patron from the Circulation menu.
Method 3: Retrieve Recent Patrons
In addition to retrieving the last patron you helped, Evergreen also allows you to configure your workstation to retrieve a set number of recent patrons without scanning cards or using the manual patron search. This allows staff to quickly navigate back into a patron account after closing a transaction, even if they have opened another patron account since closing the target patron's account.
Configuring Recent Patrons
Before you can use this feature, it must be configured in the Library Settings Editor.
- From the Administration menu, select Local Administration.
- On the Local Admin splash page, select Library Settings Editor.
- Scope to your library branch in the Context Location field.
- In the filter field, search for "Number of Retrievable Recent Patrons."
- Only one option should appear in the grid, but if your filter term was broader, you might have more. Locate the line for Number of Retrievable Recent Patrons. Click the Edit button.
- In the pop-up modal, change the Context to your branch and set the value to the number of recent patrons you would like to be able to retrieve at 1 time.
- Click the Update Setting button.
- A value of zero (0) means no recent patrons can be retrieved.
- A value greater than 1 means staff will be able to retrieve multiple recent patrons via the Retrieve Recent Patrons entry in the Circulation menu.
- The default value at the Cardinal level is 10.
Retrieving Recent Patrons: the Process
Once the library setting has been configured to a number greater than 1, the option Retrieve Recent Patrons will appear below the Retrieve Last patron option in the Circulation drop-down from the Menu Bar.
When selected, a grid will appear listing patrons accessed by that workstation in the current session. The length of the list will be limited by the value configured in the Library Settings Editor.
Note: If no patrons have been accessed, the grid will display "No Items To Display."