A principal investigator at the University, with a grant from a federal agency, may transfer to a different institution. The principal investigator may request continued support from the federal agency for the research project. If the equipment purchased by the grant is needed for the continued work of the grant, the new institution has to request of the University release of the equipment. There will be an administrative review by the University, starting with Sponsored Programs Services, and, if appropriate, the equipment will be released to the new institution. Federal agencies differ in specific guidelines and the University will follow the specific guidelines of a grant.
If the principal investigator wants to take non-federally purchased equipment to the new institution, the new institution will have to purchase the equipment. Approvals are needed from the department head to remove the equipment because removing the equipment may disrupt the operations of the department.
The current procedure for equipment transfer is:
- Provide the following to Inventory Control:
- Name of faculty member and new institution
- List of tagged equipment that they are requesting to transfer
- Inventory Control will create a list of equipment with the book value for each piece of equipment and will provide the list to the department/faculty member. The book value provided will be the amount that the new institution will have to pay for the equipment, unless the book value is less than 10% of the original cost. The sale price of University purchased equipment shall not be less than 10% of the original cost. Equipment transferred with an open grant will be transferred at no cost to the new institution. If being transferred with an open grant, Inventory Control must be provided with the documentation of the grant transfer.
- After the faculty member has finalized the list, the Manager of Inventory Control will initiate an Asset Retirement Global eDoc that will route for approval to the following:
- Department Head (Department that owns the equipment)
- Director of SPS (if grant equipment)
- Controller
- Director of Purchasing
- Once these approvals are obtained:
- The department needs to create a Customer Invoice, if applicable, using the Accounts Receivable module in KFS (use a departmental unrestricted 4-ledger account + object code 4838). The invoice should be sent to the new institution. Please ad hoc the Manager of Inventory Control with an FYI on the Customer Invoice (currently Annette Pavone).
- Once the payment is received by the department from the new institution, the final approval on the Asset Retirement Global will be done by Inventory Control, and the equipment will be released to the new institution.
Department heads should inform incoming principal investigators that procedures similar to those above should be followed to bring equipment into the University. Usually, policies of other institutions are very similar to the University’s. The University does request a written release of equipment from the chief fiscal officer of the institution from which the principal investigator is coming from. If the University buys the equipment instead of transferring in, the usual purchasing procedures are followed. If the equipment is not purchased, it will be treated as a gift of property (see Gifts of Property to the University). The equipment purchased or transferred in is tagged if appropriate.