Laurie, Many wills are on microfilm/fiche and you can look at them immediately, assuming the 2 (I think) readers are not in use and working. If you have to get the physical will pulled from the archives storage, either because it is not in the time span that was filmed (I've got it written somewhere, but don't remember it) or the resolution on film is too bad for reading, it *will* take you two visits. There is no fee just to look at a will in either form. That's one of the problems with ordering by mail: if you just ask for "the will", that's all you get. While it may be cheaper, there are often other papers with the will that are valuable/interesting, like letters and inventories. However, many letters are just legal exchanges without any genealogical significance. If you order by mail and tell them to copy everything in the folder just to be sure you don't miss anything important, you could be paying for a lot of paper you will just throw out. The cost is completely in your control if you can look at the folder on site. Kind of a catch-22 situation for out- of -towners. jo > > Message: 4 > Date: Mon, 4 Oct 2010 11:55:40 -0700 (PDT) > From: Laurie <larzemail@yahoo.com> > Subject: Re: [PAPhl] Cost of Philadelphia will and obit (library) > issues > To: paphilad@rootsweb.com > Message-ID: <445213.47382.qm@web35905.mail.mud.yahoo.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 > > Jo, does obtaining a will still require two visits? > > Also, is there a fee just to LOOK at the will? For instance, if I'm not > sure I want the whole thing or have found the right one in the index, can > I request they be pulled, view them, and then decide if I want copies? > > Thank you. >