Surplus Property

 

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Surplus Property FAQs

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We will put questions asked by surplus managers of other surplus managers, generally, "how do you do it" type questions; these questions (for the most part) surfaced on the surplus managers listserv. Where applicable, we will try to give percentages which may or may not be helpful, "does your department return proceeds to the owning department" isn't a yes or no question so much as a percentage question (the response being, for example, of 40 people who responded, 28 said yes).

We may also edit response so it better addresses the question (mostly, chop it down). I expect to put several answers per page. I am not posting all answers or making judgements on which are "best ones" (we aren't taking tests), short answers on similar responses are favored for the most part.

This section is under construction, may not work or give correct answers while this message is here (while I create files containing the responses). I am working to incorporate a working poll in (maybe) the percentage columns. Which means I am asking Dylan to make a working poll... We will see.

Also, this is work in progress, please let me know how I can make it better.

Q. Does your department charge to dispose of monitors?

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• A. Most surplus departments are charged to dispose of monitors.




Yes, we are charged a flat fee of $5 each by our vendor to dispose of monitors; we charge $8. The “extra” amount pays for some of the extra handling costs we incur (counting, wrapping, loading).

Bil Burton
User Support /OSU

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Yes, before a department can declare a monitor surplus, we send them a label to fill out and affix to each monitor. The label asks for the Originating Department, the Responsible Party, their phone number and, most importantly, the budget number which Facilities will charge back to the department in the event the monitor is not ultimately sold and must be discarded (via a contracted local recycler). No more landfill for us either.

Lee
U Cinncinatti

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Yes, we’re looking at the same thing ($10 ea) when the well runs dry, so to speak, and we’re unable to sell all of our monitors as monitors. However, our safety division, specifically the hazmat unit, will pick up the cost. You might check with your unit on campus. It IS hazardous material, and that is their job, disposal of same. Wayne Gash, Surplus & Recycling

Washington State University
wcgash@mail.wsu.edu

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Here at Michigan State we sell all reusable monitors, those that do not work we ship to Unicor, a Federal Prison Industries Program. They will take just about anything; cpu’s, copy machines, faxes, keyboards, mice, etc. Cost.... we share the shipping which is about $600.00/semi. We ship every 4 months or so. We sell a lot of the monitors so it does take us a while to put together a load. So actually we are subsidizing this disposal cost for the University. It looks good on a report for the VP......what have you done lately to help the University.

Ruth
MSU Surplus

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No, here at the UW-Madison SWAP Shop we have a contract with ICRI (International Computer Recycling Incorporated-800-870-5996 where we send a semi trailer load of computers about every 7 -10 days and we don’t pay a dime! We get paid for all of it! Approximately 25,000 lbs per semi. In the past 2 ½ years that we have had this contract in place we have recycled over 632 tons of computers and electronics scrap. I talked with this vendor and his more than willing to take all of your computers if you want to give them a call. The only caution I would give you is that SWAP is in close proximity to them (Chicago) and we guarantee a semi load approximately every two weeks. We also palletize the items in a fashion that they can use them. i.e. monitors with monitors (cardboard between layers approx. 6ft. high) CPU’s with CPU’, Printers with printers, and misc. in Gaylord boxes. You may have to pay a slight fee for anything other. Call them and find out. The will pick-up anywhere in the U.S.

Tim
UWisconsin/Madison

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No, here at the University of Wisconsin Stevens-Point we are able to recycle these items without cost and actually get a few cents back. We use an outfit in Chicago called ICRI and they can be reached at 1-800-870-5996. Have been very good to deal with.

Larry Hutchinson, Surplus Property Office
University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point
lhutchin@uwsp.edu (e-mail)

Q. Does your department erase hard drives? If yes, how so?

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• A. Most surplus departments clean drives.



At this point, we require any department that sends a computer to surplus to clean the drives of everything except the OS. There is a form that we use, the Certificate of Data Inaccessibility, which stipulates the drives are free of any confidential or proprietary information. As the computers eventually end up in our store, my student “techie” ensures that the drives are clean before the computers go out onto the sales floor. We sometimes get calls from people saying that the computer won’t boot, etc., and I just require them to fill out the form and sign it anyway. This leaves the department with any liability that may arise at a later date. Our form can be seen at our website, www.stores.uconn.edu. Click the link for Surplus, and the next page will show the link to print the form.

Phil Martin, Assistant Manager,
Central Stores ,University of Connecticut,
philip.martin@uconn.edu

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Someone at our university has decided maybe we should be truly wiping our hard drives. They have contacted the company Infaworks that offers a product for $29/computer or a mere $24,000/year for an unlimited site license. At this price, we would be better used the sledge hammer. At the conference, I recall someone talking about shareware that does the same thing. I would appreciate any information/software you can forward on.

Dave Garcia
Washington State University
dtg@wsu.edu

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We just instituted a policy here at the UW requiring departments to electronically purge data from their hard drives and other electronic storage devices or destroy their hard drives. We are requiring a three-pass binary overwrite method. More information about our requirements - we have also developed a form requiring depts. to certify that they have used one of the approved methods - is available on our website at: http://www.washington.edu/admin/surplus/ Our Computing and Communications department developed a program for wiping computers that is available on the web at: http://www.washington.edu/computing/software/otherresources/autoclave/ Our Medical Center Information Services department has been using a shareware that is also available on the web at: http://web.mit.edu/network/pgp.html We implemented this policy after we were contacted by a client who had purchased computers from us that had confidential information left on the hard drive and who was also requesting the license agreements for the software left on them (after having first contacted Microsoft).

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At SWAP, we use the University of Wisconsin-Madison Microsoft license. If your University has a Microsoft license then you can use their “FDisk” program to wipe computer HD’s. There is also IBM “DiskManager” . There is a free shareware called “Zerowipe”

Tim Sell
U Wisconsin /Madison

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We don’t clean drives, it is responsibility of owning department. If I see something when testing the computer (if it actually boots) that is questionable, I delete it.

Bil Burton
Oregon State University
Bil.burton@orst.edu

Q. Can your employees shop are your sales?

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• A. Two part answers
• 1) Do you exclude surplus department employees?
• 2) Do you exclude any other employees?

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1) Yes, we exclude persons who are working the auction (“on the clock”) to bid during the auction they are working. We do not allow anyone who works for the department to purchase pre-priced items (to buy items at our garage sales).

2) No, OSU employees make up the majority of our customer base.



Patsy Hendricks
Oregon State University

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1) If you work the sale you can not bid.

2) Any one who attends and registers can bid. We allow other employees to bid. We have no way of knowing if they are on the clock or not.



Katrina Phillips
U of Alabama / Burmingham

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1) No

2) No



Ruth Daoust
Michigan State University

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1) No, since it is verbal we allow our employees to bid

2) No, anyone can bid



Laurie Rodriguez
University of Arizona

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1) ANYONE IS ALLOWED TO BID ON SEALED BIDS. WE DO NOT HOLD AUCTIONS.

2) NO, THEY ARE ALLOWED TO BID ON ANY SEALED BID SALE.



Patricia Chase
Arizona State University
Ph: (480) 965-1850 Fax: (480) 965-8519
e-mail: patricia.chase@asu.edu

Q. How do you assign a value to items you sell?

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• A. Varies (See below)

At UAB we use the historical sale value to know what items will bring at auction. We currently do not preprice sale items. We also try to regain about 5% of the original purchase cost. However, at a public auction we could make a lot more than the 5%. .

Katrina Phillips, Director Equipment Accounting
University of Alabama / Birmingham
kphillip@uab.edu

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Here at UC we’ve developed twenty years ago a formula for calculating fair market value. Although, with certain items, such as computers for example, it serves as more of a guideline that a firm rule. Our formula is based on original cost x an age factor x a condition factor

Age Factor Condition Factor
1 yr. 70% Excellent 100%
2 yrs. 50% Good 80%
3 yrs. 40% Fair 60%
4 yrs. 35% Poor 20%
5 yrs. 30%
+5 yrs. 25%

For example: A desk originally costing $650.00, 7 years old in good condition $650.00 x 25% x 80% = $130.00 Occasionally our fair market value assessment is still a bit unrealistic, so we throw in a third subjective category, “what would YOU pay for this desk?” and we determine based on pervious, similar sales. we assess a more palatable value.
Hope this helps.

Lee Leviton
U of Cinncinatti

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Here at ISU I normally price things by past sales. If I get something in that we haven’t seen before or feel we could get a good price for I have gone and checked the online auction sites (Ebay, LabX, etc.) If we get something’s in that might generate alot of interest I will do a sealed bid (Antique furniture, vehicles, farm equipment, shop machinery and equipment, airplanes, etc.)

Mark Ludwig
ISU Surplus

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For equipment and donations etc...we generally ask the manufacturer when we can, i.e. if Intel Donates equipment we ask for a value at the time of donation. If it's a private donation, we check closed sales on eBay and other auction sites to see what the same model sold for.
For Land, we check the tax assessors office.
We have hired a consultant to get historical costs and fair market values for our buildings, site improvements and infrastructure then we will maintain them after the initial valuation and apply the applicable depreciation.
One of our current discussions at this point is "how many cost fields do we need?"


• Historical Costs
• Fair market value
• Accumulated Depreciation
• Current Value Minus Depreciation
• Replacement Cost



For example:
Our Aviation program gets a Cesna Q310 Plane for $2000. So we book the historical cost at $2000. Normal life span of this type of aircraft (according to the IRS) is 7 years so we would divide $2000 by 7 for an annual depreciation of $285. So each year the value of the plane would be minus the $285 (and that amount goes into our accumulated depreciation account each year).
Simple right?
But.....Our Aviation Main tenace program says this plane will have a useful life to our College of 15 years...so we recalculate that, Now, since this aircraft never flys and the program rebuilds it every year, it actually is in better shape than most planes it's age due to no flying miles. By looking on eBay and the Plane Trader magazines, we see this year and model of plane sells on the market for $175,000....
Big difference in how the costs appear on the books from actual to replacement...and we have 16 of these types of planes so you can see why we are asking these questions.


Ken Nelson
Portland Community College

Q. How do you handle pick up and deliveries?

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• A. We Don't

Q. Does your department return proceeds of surplus sales to the owning department?

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• A. Some do, some don't

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We will keep between 1% and 15% of the sale depending on how much the sale is for. We typically do not take more than $400/sale. Again it depends on what was sold, how much it sold for and what our cost of selling it was. Net sales are returned to a designated account given to us by the specific department.

Ruth
Michigan State
Ruth.Daoust@usdwp.msu.edu

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Below is the breakdown of the rates at which proceeds of sales for non-government funded equipment are split between surplus sales and the originating department: Sales from $1 to $100 = 100% of proceeds are retained by surplus sales Sales from $101 to $500 = 50% of proceeds are retained by surplus sales, 50% is credited to the originating department Sales from $501 - $2,500 = 40% of proceeds are retained by surplus sales; 60% is credited to the originating department Sales greater than $2,500 = 5.81% is retained by surplus sales, the balance is credited to the originating department.

Ivonne Bachar
Stanford
ibachar@leland.stanford.edu

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We (at OSU) feel strongly that returning money directly to the department is important—incentive; we take the first $20 after which we have a sliding scale, returning 60 percent for items under $350 and at the top end, for items $10,000 or more, returning 90 percent.

Bil Burton, User Support
Oregon State University
Bil.Burton@ORST.EDU

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At Northern Arizona Univ. we keep the first $100 from the sale of individual items then give back a percentage of the remaining balance to the originating dept. No money is returned on indiv. items that sell for less than $100 or from lots (desks, chairs, etc.). NAU depts. are almost all state or locally funded so everyone needs whatever money they can get their hands on to replace equipment they turn in to us for disposal. On average, I transfer 40-60% of the Surplus Property revenue generated each year back to the originating departments.

Delia Moder
Northern Arizona University
Delia.Moder@NAU.EDU]

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At this point, none of the proceeds from our sales go back to departments. All are deposited in a general fund account. Our Central Stores, which is the parent to our Surplus operation, is partially funded by tuition funds.

Phil Martin, Assistant Manager
University of Connecticut, Central Stores
Phone: 860-486-6298 Fax: 860-486-3061
e-mail: philip.martin@uconn.edu
web: www.stores.uconn.edu

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All sales go back into a general kitty here at Temple U. The departments don’t like it because they bought the equip. under their departmental account so they think they should reap the rewards of any monies received for the sale of the equipment.

C.W. Hutchinson
Temple University
email: HutchinC@mail.temple.edu

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We do not return any sale money to the departments (much to their disdain). SMSU’s surplus sale proceeds are placed into an account that we use to pay for the disposal of hazardous waste.

Duane Teale
drt586t@smsu.edu