what information do the auditors need for IT equipment

[grumpy_git]

I think our insurance excess is about £100 quid anyway - so recording a £2 mouse is pointless!

[User3204]

We only have to have items that are over £500 per device listed, so officially the only things in the school are:
1) The hall projector
2) The Lens in the Hall projector.
3) The servers;
4) The A3 colour printers;

What we actually have is a bunch of spreadsheets, with the serial numbers that the suppliers send to us in the despatch note. I usually don't keep exact track where the units are kept. Fingers-crossed, we have yet to have any serious thefts.

[plexer]

What about software that's an asset too and can be expensive?

Ben

[enjay]

I usually don't keep exact track where the units are kept. Fingers-crossed, we have yet to have any serious thefts.

I would address that, if I were you. If something got nicked, it seems like the only way of providing the Police and insurers with serial numbers would be to go round the entire school with you list of serial numbers to identify which one is missing.

[srochford]

I would address that, if I were you. If something got nicked, it seems like the only way of providing the Police and insurers with serial numbers would be to go round the entire school with you list of serial numbers to identify which one is missing.

It certainly does make sense to record which machines go where (stick it as a field in Active Directory or add the computer name as a column to the spreadsheet) but I don't think that the police are likely to go looking for equipment with particular serial numbers. As I understand it, what happens is that they recover (say) an HP 2530 laptop with serial number 12345; if you can say "Yes, I bought serial number 12345 on date ...." then that proves it belongs to you.

[plexer]

If something gets stolen you need to provide details of it to get a crime number and for your insurers so that a claim can be processed.

You can't just say we had 20 pc's knicked and expect them to cough up for replacements.

Ben

[SteveBentley]

We only have to have items that are over £500 per device listed, so officially the only things in the school are:
1) The hall projector
2) The Lens in the Hall projector.
3) The servers;
4) The A3 colour printers;

Where are you buying IWBs from for less than £500?

[enjay]

I don't think that the police are likely to go looking for equipment with particular serial numbers. As I understand it, what happens is that they recover (say) an HP 2530 laptop with serial number 12345; if you can say "Yes, I bought serial number 12345 on date ...." then that proves it belongs to you.

Not quite. When something is stolen, you provide the Police with the serial number, which they record somewhere. Of course, they don't actively look for the item, but they do check back any serial numbers when they recover stolen items in a raid or whatever. If the serial number is listed against your site, they go "we found your projector" and charge the culprits with the break-in to your school and any associated crimes (e.g. anything else which went in the same theft, the criminal damage to the door they kicked in, etc). If the number isn't listed, they go "that's a shame" and move on, they won't call you and say "we recovered a Hitachi EDX12 projector and we thought it could be the one you had stolen".

At least, that is how it worked when we filed a Police report a few months ago.