Records platform: intake, catalog, lookup and physical loan

Background

Paper files and scans did not share a case ID. Finding a volume meant walking the aisle. Loans were a paper sign-out. Custody of the vault was a trust exercise, not a log.

What we shipped

Intake, catalog, lookup, physical loan and vault custody with an audit trail.

What was breaking

• Electronic copies and boxes on the shelf used different numbering.
• Lookup depended on staff who remembered the cabinet.
• Loans left the room without a reliable return date.
• Vault access was not a first-class event in the system.

Approach

Every volume gets a catalog identity that points to both the digital object and the physical location. Intake posts the same day. Loans and vault events write an audit trail. We do not invent fill rates or retrieval scores.

Modules

• Intake and accession
• Catalog and case identity
• Digital lookup
• Physical loan and return
• Vault custody log