When a University Department decides that they no longer have use for a single item or a group of items, a Form 9 is filled out and forwarded to Property Accounting in FREH. All items purchased with Purdue funds must be listed on a Form 9.

After Property Accounting approves the Form 9, we will contact the department to schedule removal of surplus items. Once we pick up items, we decide if the item is sellable, and if it is, we place it on our sales floor and establish a price. If a department is interested in purchasing an item, a Form 13 is filled out. We will then charge the listed account number for the purchase.

If an item contains oils, or any other unidentified liquids, we will advise the department who they need to contact for removal of liquids. Hazardous items are not allowed to leave campus until they have been declared safe by REM. We work closely with Radiological and Environmental Management (REM) in identifying items that may contain asbestos, mercury, freon and even radioactive sources. We try to meet all EPA codes and standards.

Our team works hard to cover all aspects of warehousing and sales for departments. We assist departments with their needs whether it is storage or sales of departmental items. Through advertising, contacting of other Universities as well as our customer base, we work hard to meet your needs.

At times we get items such as restaurant equpment, lathes, mills, mowers, farm equipment, vehicles, etc. We establish a price and sell it in our store or we advertise in the Journal and Courier and accept sealed bids for a period of 2-6 weeks, depending on the item.

Many items that departments feel hold no value and would normally dispose of are items we have found homes for. Some of the more unusual items we have sold were a 1928 Buick touring car, 1960's fire truck, hang glider's and even a cadaver freezer (which wasn't the easiest item to find a buyer for).

Our general practice is to give back 70% of all sales over $100 to departments. Receipts for items selling for less than $100 are retained by Warehousing and Surplus Disposal. If we receive "truckload or several items" from one area at a time these items will be totaled and will be considered "lot" sales and the money will be returned to the departments at 70%. We estimate that we will return approximately $125,000 to departments in 2004-2005