Disposal of Redundant I.T Kit

[GeekyGav]

Hi all,

 

Kind of lost touch with all of the GDPR regs and how to dispose of I.T kit.

 

I have a small amount of kit that I no longer have a use for, and have been apporoached by a member of staff's son who runs his own I.T business.

He said he could use the kit for spares.

 

Where do I stand legally if I wanted to 'donate' the kit to said individual?

 

I am understand that the HDDs / configs will need to be securely wiped and can easily do this internally.

 

Do I need to prove that the data was wiped and does the recipient of the kit need to provide anything to the school in terms of paperwork?

 

I am not aware of the recipient being a formal recycling company.

Just wanted to be sure where I stand before making any decisions.

 

Many thanks,

Edited July 30, 2018 by GeekyGav

[christhetech]

Whilst GDPR is a consideration if the kit includes anything that could potentially hold PII data, such as hard drives etc, the real concern here is WEEE regulations. I know that we have a policy here that simply does not allow us to donate kit at all. We have to dispose of all redundant IT equipment via a Tier 1 service provider, as there is a liability issue. Should this person use any of the equipment and injure himself or anybody else for that matter, you could find yourself in extremely hot water as ultimately the school would retain some liability for the equipment and it's safety. Definitely not worth the stress.

[GeekyGav]

Thanks for the reply.

 

Yes, I did wonder about WEEE regs.

 

I understand totally about liability.

 

So, hypothetically... If the recipient was aware of the risks, and signed something to say that the goods were donated out of good faith and the school accepted no responsibility for damages, blah, blah, blah. Where would I stand then?

 

Is there a definite legal requirement for the school to obtain a WEEE disposal certificate? I am reading all sorts of stuff on the net about this not being a legal requirement.

 

Hard to deciphers what the truth is.

 

The kit does contain HDDs, as I said... I am happy to wipe these prior to donation.

 

 

The liability risks make perfect sense. Just want to be sure about legalities.

 

Thanks for the advice so far.

[christhetech]

I'm not 100% sure whether or not it's actually a legal requirement, but I do know that in every school that I've either worked or been involved with over the past 15 years, they have had a really strict policy about not donating any kit under any circumstances.

I used to get loads of requests from a local charity, who offered to collect redundant kit from us and repurpose. They were strictly above board and I checked them out first, only to be told in no uncertain terms by the head that the answer was NO! The reason for his decision was purely the issue of liability and even with a clear disclaimer in place, he was not prepared to budge.

[Fazza]

Is there a definite legal requirement for the school to obtain a WEEE disposal certificate?

 

Without a certificate how will you be able to prove you have adhered to the WEEE Regulation that first came in to law in 2006? Not sure if it's a legal requirement to have a certificate but literally all WEEE companies issue one.

 

Donating, selling and disposing of are 3 different things. Donating is probably not a good idea, selling them 'sold as seen' for a nominal fee maybe better than donating (ensure all makes/models/serial numbers are recorded so if they end up being fly-tipped somewhere you have documents showing you sold them on and were not the last owner of the equipment).

[DavR]

GDPR requirement is that you have to have a contract in place with a certified WEEE company for disposals, BUT, I would argue that this is a donation not a disposal, so WEEE rules don't apply. WEEE would become an issue for the next guy.

 

As long as you've securely wiped the data, the only issue I would see is liability, I don't think there is a GDPR issue. Get a disclaimer signed and record the serial numbers of what you've handed over, and I wouldn't think it was a problem. Better the kit be reused as spares than scrapped. Make sure you get management approval though, just in case it is against school policy.

[synaesthesia]

As above, WEEE is not only, but primarily a concern for disposal. Transfer of goods is different; I would make a list of any hardware being transferred, serial numbers etc and *remove* hard drives from them. I hear all sorts of different things regarding transfer of goods in this way but usually a donation is required which only needs to be a token amount, i.e. £1; not sure on the purpose or idea of that, perhaps a financial auditing thing.

With everything signed off in that fashion there is zero comeback should anything go wrong just like as if you'd bought something at a car boot sale.

[difinity]

As above, WEEE is not only, but primarily a concern for disposal. Transfer of goods is different; I would make a list of any hardware being transferred, serial numbers etc and *remove* hard drives from them. I hear all sorts of different things regarding transfer of goods in this way but usually a donation is required which only needs to be a token amount, i.e. £1; not sure on the purpose or idea of that, perhaps a financial auditing thing.

With everything signed off in that fashion there is zero comeback should anything go wrong just like as if you'd bought something at a car boot sale.

 

Sorry, but nothing like buying from a boot sale. He is an IT business and this is WEEE waste, therefore he needs a waste handling license. The school would also be liable for not disposing of the waste properly.

No ifs, buts or selling for £1. The law is very clear. He needs a license to transport waste, buy, sell or dispose of waste or arrange for someone else to buy, sell or dispose of waste.

 

I know, as I have one.

[synaesthesia]

I don't agree that's true, sorry. Yes, aware he's a business. This equipment is not WEEE until it is at the recycling stage. Reduce - Reuse - Recycle; this is in stage 2 and not at the recycling stage. (2 years doing the refurbishment and recycling for one of the countries first WEEE specialists).

Yes he, or anyone needs a license to transport waste, but it's not yet at that stage hence transfer of goods.

[Rob_D]

I'd agree with @synaesthesia, remove the hard drives. Even when we dispose of kit, we pull the drives and send them for shredding.

 

Sorry, but nothing like buying from a boot sale. He is an IT business and this is WEEE waste, therefore he needs a waste handling license. The school would also be liable for not disposing of the waste properly.

No ifs, buts or selling for £1. The law is very clear. He needs a license to transport waste, buy, sell or dispose of waste or arrange for someone else to buy, sell or dispose of waste.

I know, as I have one.

 

But how do you define waste? I mean, sure there's a legal definition of WEEE Waste that mot IT kit falls under. But the PC on my desk isn't classified as waste (yet). So if the equipment were to be donated, surely it would be "rehoming older IT equipment".

To go full reductio ad absurdum, I don't need a WEEE licence to buy IT kit from our suppliers.

I'm not saying your wrong. I just think there's a leap of logic or some nuance of law that we're (or I'm) missing.

[difinity]

If it's not classed as waste why is the school disposing of it ?

When you purchase kit from suppliers it's not waste you're purchasing.

[synaesthesia]

No, but it used to be.

So, ICT Direct purchase waste computers which are WEEE classified as the company no longer requires them. They are WEEE, and the machines would go to ICTDirect via a WEEE registered carrier under their relevant license. The moment they are refurbished and reclassified they are no longer WEEE.

If a machine has already done that stage prior to going to a 3rd party, they are not waste hence not classified as WEEE.

The school isn't disposing. It's transferring. Complicates matters when you obviously think of a waste transfer license but at that point it's not waste, it's a transfer of assets.

[difinity]

No, but it used to be.

So, ICT Direct purchase waste computers which are WEEE classified as the company no longer requires them. They are WEEE, and the machines would go to ICTDirect via a WEEE registered carrier under their relevant license. The moment they are refurbished and reclassified they are no longer WEEE.

If a machine has already done that stage prior to going to a 3rd party, they are not waste hence not classified as WEEE.

The school isn't disposing. It's transferring. Complicates matters when you obviously think of a waste transfer license but at that point it's not waste, it's a transfer of assets.

 

I would think ICTDirect or one of it's entities would have their own license but understand how waste is turned into non waste (it's one of the things I do).

 

The definition of waste from gov.uk "A material is considered to be waste when the producer or holder discards it, intends to discard it, or is required to discard it."

 

Clearly it is waste as the school wants to dispose of it but you propose to classify it as assets and sell off cheap to a business even though they have demonstrated a lack of understanding of the law.

Even if they are classed as school assets, aren't there procedures and paperwork in place for this sort of thing ? A school selling off a load of assets on the cheap smells funky to me.

[djrscally]

I would think ICTDirect or one of it's entities would have their own license but understand how waste is turned into non waste (it's one of the things I do).

 

The definition of waste from gov.uk "A material is considered to be waste when the producer or holder discards it, intends to discard it, or is required to discard it."

 

Clearly it is waste as the school wants to dispose of it but you propose to classify it as assets and sell off cheap to a business even though they have demonstrated a lack of understanding of the law.

Even if they are classed as school assets, aren't there procedures and paperwork in place for this sort of thing ? A school selling off a load of assets on the cheap smells funky to me.

 

Surely selling / donating something isn't the same as discarding it, or ICT suppliers would count as discarding stuff whenever someone bought it from them.

[Brixy]

All reputable computer disposal/recycling companies should be registered with the Environment agency and have a minimum of a T11. Disposal of your kit can have a cost involved so before dealing with any company it is worth doing your homework.

[enjay]

I appreciate this is a zombie thread, but an interesting thing I discovered recently is if staff members want to buy old equipment from the school, they have to pay a "fair market value" for it - no giving it away, no selling it for £1, no giving it in exchange for a charitable donation to the school. This applies even if the equipment is no longer of any value to the school and would otherwise be going to recycling.

[synaesthesia]

I appreciate this is a zombie thread, but an interesting thing I discovered recently is if staff members want to buy old equipment from the school, they have to pay a "fair market value" for it - no giving it away, no selling it for £1, no giving it in exchange for a charitable donation to the school. This applies even if the equipment is no longer of any value to the school and would otherwise be going to recycling.

 

I looked into this a while ago, and unless anything has changed (would like to see some official information on this) "market value" has no real meaning for equipment that is EOL. The school is usually not in a place to define the market value for an item, especially when researching shows they often go unsold on Ebay or Facebook Marketplace, or given for free. I've always worked on the nominal fee basis, although then again I've not sold anything to staff/students since. Re-use is still ahead of recycle in the WEEE chain though!

 

Edit: I suppose if the school started a company called "WeSellAnyOldCrap" and followed the WeBuyAnyCar market, then they could happily, with legal precedent, sell an entire block of the building for £3.50

Edited November 11, 2024 by synaesthesia

[enjay]

"market value" has no real meaning for equipment that is EOL.

 

No longer useful to us doesn't necessarily mean EOL. In this case, it was a Surface 6 tablet which has poor battery life so is no longer fit for intended purpose, but if you mostly work plugged in and only short periods away from your desk, it would be okay. I did a quick eBay trawl and found what "parts only" Surfaces were selling for (surprisingly high actually, over £100!), and offered the staff member that. They declined.

[synaesthesia]

No longer useful to us doesn't necessarily mean EOL. In this case, it was a Surface 6 tablet which has poor battery life so is no longer fit for intended purpose, but if you mostly work plugged in and only short periods away from your desk, it would be okay. I did a quick eBay trawl and found what "parts only" Surfaces were selling for (surprisingly high actually, over £100!), and offered the staff member that. They declined.

 

Yes, and is ebay a reliable method of judging market value? I'd say no - it's as much as people are willing to pay. I'd still use the reuse>recycle thing - only exception really would be where rebate packages could fetch a value such as the HP brighter futures program or recycling companies that would offer rebates.

[HarryMonkey]

When we had a bunch of "too old for school use iPads", I offered them to staff for the amount that Apple would have given us as trade-in. I seem to recall it was about a tenner.

[PotNoodleTech]

I too would like to know where you are getting the market value information from.

 

Generally a company writes off 100% of the value of it's equipment within three years (often 1 year) which then has a value of zero I.e it's scrap. How can something which is written off as being worth zero then go on to have a fair market value of £100?

[enjay]

Yes, and is ebay a reliable method of judging market value? I'd say no - it's as much as people are willing to pay./QUOTE]

 

Is there a difference? If people are only willing to pay £2.50, then that's what it is worth. More importantly, that's how much the school could have got for it had we bothered to list it ourselves.

 

I think the key thing is to ensure we could can prove we didn't give the person a crazy price, especially as it was the device's "owner" who had requested the upgrade and was asking to buy the old one.

[enjay]

Generally a company writes off 100% of the value of it's equipment within three years (often 1 year) which then has a value of zero I.e it's scrap. How can something which is written off as being worth zero then go on to have a fair market value of £100?

 

Because that's not how depreciation of assets works. Also, if you buy an item outright rather than capitalise it, you have to use alternative means to determine its market value. What the same item would sell for on eBay is as good as method as any - it's how much the school could get for selling the item, and it's what a similar item would cost the person if they wanted to buy one elsewhere. If I sold you my car for £10K, when your insurance company asks you the value of the car, would you not say £10K?

[Cat_Jam148]

This isn't something we've ever done but I do seem to recall our old Business Manager mentioning that if we sold our old equipment to staff, they would also have to pay the VAT on the original cost of the item? Due to it being VAT exempt when the school first purchased it?

 

I don't know if that is correct or not, not my field!

[synaesthesia]

This isn't something we've ever done but I do seem to recall our old Business Manager mentioning that if we sold our old equipment to staff, they would also have to pay the VAT on the original cost of the item? Due to it being VAT exempt when the school first purchased it?

 

I don't know if that is correct or not, not my field!

 

Yes that sounds about right - what we did for a pound was literally 83p + 17p VAT