Currently reading/circulation history tracking is controlled by settings in the Patron Categories with the Default Privacy options. Setting the Default Privacy setting to 'Default' means that keeping a reading history becomes an opt-out where a patron has to turn it off in their patron account from the OPAC. Setting the Default Privacy setting to 'Never' means that keeping a reading history becomes an opt-in where a patron has to turn it on through their patron account. This becomes a problem either way when working with patrons who are unable or unwilling to login to their patron account to select their preferred option. It would be nice to have an option in the patron account details that allows a staff member to flip the switch for the patron.
I believe the original intention here was to leave the choice up to the patrons only, without having the staff interfere. But maybe this could be a preference.
A system preference would be ideal. Our library deals with many patrons that are technology challenged and do not feel confident in using a computer. Current work around is to still adjust the setting for the patron by logging into their patron account. Very often they do not know their password either, so that has to be reset. The entire scenario takes much longer than it should.
*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 20605 ***