Author Topic: Does your corporation throw away useful stuff? How often and how much?  (Read 4697 times)

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Offline Zucca

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The sad part is when you want to be dishonest (garbage, ebay or whatever).
I still do not see a crime to take home garbage and then repair it or use it without harming anybody else (company or people).

I never did what brabus wrote, it will be just stupid. Sadly I can imagine stuff like this happens and it make me sad even more.
« Last Edit: May 25, 2020, 08:45:36 am by Zucca »
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Offline Brumby

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I once worked for an electronics retailer that would have products to be written off.  Previously, these items were just tossed into the skip bin, but these were sometimes raided.  On more than one occasion, the recovered, faulty items would find their way back through the front door for repair or replacement.

Once this action had been identified, a new procedure was put in place.  A representative from head office would have the list of items to be written off and would witness one of the staff physically destroy each item before ticking it off the list.

I know.  I was the one assigned to do the destruction on more than one occasion.  There was nothing left worth salvaging after that.
 

Offline Marck

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“Obtaining” toys during decommissioning or hardware refresh is a fairly common thing.  Usually for taxation reasons or the simple fact that the cost of processing selling and administration will outstrip any profit to be had this equipment is disposed of to waste. 

I have never had a problem with my guys taking anything that was destined for a skip with a couple of simple rules. I hate stuff being wasted if someone wants it or can use it or can get a couple of extra bucks salvaging metals for recycling if they want to put in the effort instead of it going to land fill.

1. It never turns up on eBay or gum tree.

2. If your going to sell it for scrap don’t use company assets to transport it.  Keep your sneaky side profit well away from your work life.

3. Share the love.  If someone wants a particular item to put it to use for hobby or education let them have first option on it before you sell it for scrap weight.

4. Don’t take more than you really need because someone that ends up with half a dozen racks of hardware will no doubt end up selling it on gum tree or eBay.

5. And most importantly don’t steal it.  Just ask for it.  And that’s because on rare occasion for whatever reason some things have to follow traceable disposal.  And most importantly I might get a slap on the wrist for letting someone take a bit of old kit that was on its way to the bin but if I don’t know someone has taken it and someone has a cry about it all of a sudden it’s theft and that’s how people loose jobs



M






 
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Offline Fred27

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Unfortunately this sort of mindless destruction goes on all the time. My brother used to have a removals and storage business. He had a publicly owned body pay him to store hundreds of (presumably excess) brand new printers they had bought. He stored them for a few years. Then they paid him to take them to a crusher and have them crushed - with one of their employees watching to make sure this happened. They were all boxed and unused. He couldn't persuade them to donate them to schools or anything. Maybe not quite as valuable or desirable as test gear, but a shocking and pointless waste all the same.
 

Online wraper

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The sad part is when you want to be dishonest (garbage, ebay or whatever).
I still do not see a crime to take home garbage and then repair it or use it without harming anybody else (company or people).

I never did what brabus wrote, it will be just stupid. Sadly I can imagine stuff like this happens and it make me sad even more.
10 years ago fished out some disassembled phones from garbage bin and put them back together (they were replaced under warranty to customers, then scrapped). There was a guy who's job was taking them apart and throwing into bin. We no longer were allowed to take them since there was scandal in recent past when such phone was brought back to warranty repair, and apparently repair was made under warranty so manufacturer paid for repair and obviously got IMEI number in the report :palm:. To not have the same issue with ones which I fished out, I erased part of IMEI code on the label under battery cover. Though I guessed they possibly could be brought back under warranty if reception was dumb enough to accept them anyway by simply looking IMEI in the menu. That was my main concern so I gave/sold them only to people who I knew personally.
« Last Edit: May 25, 2020, 12:17:41 pm by wraper »
 

Offline VK3DRB

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IBM destroyed about 10,000 excess top-of-the-line "butterfly" laptops with a retail value around $10K each in the 1990's. That is $100 MILLION dollars worth. They did not think it appropriate to donate them to underprivileged people or to poor countries. They thought it better to destroy them because they would not be profiting on them and I guess they could write them off. They might have been concerned they would find their way back onto the market, cutting into sales. With a character like Louis Gerstner at the helm, it was not surprising they were not used for any altruistic purpose.
 

Offline EEVblog

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When the big scope makers have trade-in deals they instruct their dealers to destroy the scope and provide evidence they have done so  >:(
Their reasoning is that every 2nd hand scope on the market is one less sale for a new scope.
 

Offline EEVblog

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BTW, I get asked many times about the legality of me taking stuff from the dumpster. Yes, it's legal. The dumpster is on private property (partly owned by me BTW), does not fall under council regulations, and it's actually against the strata policy (and collection company policy) for office owners to dump anything other than regular office waste into the dumpster room. No electrical stuff or furniture etc allowed.
 

Offline Mr. Scram

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BTW, I get asked many times about the legality of me taking stuff from the dumpster. Yes, it's legal. The dumpster is on private property (partly owned by me BTW), does not fall under council regulations, and it's actually against the strata policy (and collection company policy) for office owners to dump anything other than regular office waste into the dumpster room. No electrical stuff or furniture etc allowed.
The best advice is probably to check your local laws and situation. In some places it's legal as stuff thrown away is considered abandoned. In other places it's still considered property and therefore theft.
 

Offline Mr. Scram

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This exact topic is like menstruation. It comes every once in a while, and is bound to come again. Plus it leaves some heat lasting for days.
You must be pregnant a lot.
 

Offline SiliconWizard

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BTW, I get asked many times about the legality of me taking stuff from the dumpster. Yes, it's legal. The dumpster is on private property (partly owned by me BTW), does not fall under council regulations, and it's actually against the strata policy (and collection company policy) for office owners to dump anything other than regular office waste into the dumpster room. No electrical stuff or furniture etc allowed.

If I understand correctly, office owners dumping electrical gear is per se not allowed. Your getting ahold of some of it actually helps the collection company not to have to deal with it.

Still wondering whether some office owner could not one day get you in trouble if you ever get ahold of anything (like computers) that could contain confidential information (although obviously if some company trashes stuff with confidential information, they would be pretty dumb.)
 

Offline vk6zgo

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Back when I worked at a TV Studio, 75 ohm terminations were "at a premium".
We used a large number of them, & we were always battling to find enough for any given job.

We were getting rid of a bunch of stuff, & as part of our "corporate good citizen" policy, we laid them out on tables & invited the local hams to dig through them, prior to disposing of them.
As a ham myself, I had a look before they were scheduled to arrive.

I was surprised to see that virtually all the stuff still had the terminations on them.
I got a reasonably sized cardboard box & half filled it with terminations which went straight back into service!

I found many other occasions to repurpose really good quality parts from redundant equipment, within the company.

It was often far more economical to dig through the forgotten parts for some long gone equipment & find a part which could be used somewhere else, rather than go down the rabbithole of trying to obtain the "correct" part from a supplier on the other side of the globe!

After all, I was being paid for my technical skills, not my skills as a purchasing clerk!

Of course, that sort of thing would be frowned on today by the "suits".




 

Offline olkipukki

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My corporation (+30k employees)

Am I wrong?
Yes and No.

... I would love to see local hackerspaces, universities, or fellow hobbyists using it.
...and your corporation would "love" to see headlines such as "Warhawk Corporation donated toxic equipments with dangerous lead metals to our local university students"  ;D


What to I miss?
Yes, you do, in short - "liability.legal.insurance."
 

Offline TimFox

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I remember a problem decades ago when the University of Illinois (IIRC) obtained some surplus heavy-duty transformers and used them in a student project.  Unfortunately, the transformers contained PCBs, as this was shortly after they were banned.
 

Offline james_s

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Back when I worked at a TV Studio, 75 ohm terminations were "at a premium".
We used a large number of them, & we were always battling to find enough for any given job.

We were getting rid of a bunch of stuff, & as part of our "corporate good citizen" policy, we laid them out on tables & invited the local hams to dig through them, prior to disposing of them.
As a ham myself, I had a look before they were scheduled to arrive.

I was surprised to see that virtually all the stuff still had the terminations on them.
I got a reasonably sized cardboard box & half filled it with terminations which went straight back into service!

I found many other occasions to repurpose really good quality parts from redundant equipment, within the company.

It was often far more economical to dig through the forgotten parts for some long gone equipment & find a part which could be used somewhere else, rather than go down the rabbithole of trying to obtain the "correct" part from a supplier on the other side of the globe!

After all, I was being paid for my technical skills, not my skills as a purchasing clerk!

Of course, that sort of thing would be frowned on today by the "suits".


I've seen quite often one department is throwing away things while another department is buying more of those same things. The left hand doesn't talk to the right and most people simply don't care, it's not money out of their pocket. Drives me nuts though, I hate waste, and corporations are often incredibly wastedful, yet they're happy to cut amenities and benefits to save a few bucks.
 
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Offline james_s

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Unfortunately this sort of mindless destruction goes on all the time. My brother used to have a removals and storage business. He had a publicly owned body pay him to store hundreds of (presumably excess) brand new printers they had bought. He stored them for a few years. Then they paid him to take them to a crusher and have them crushed - with one of their employees watching to make sure this happened. They were all boxed and unused. He couldn't persuade them to donate them to schools or anything. Maybe not quite as valuable or desirable as test gear, but a shocking and pointless waste all the same.

I would have invited the local news media to witness it and very publicly shamed the company. Actually my personal ethics would prevent me from actively participating, they'd have to hire someone else to come retrieve the equipment from me. In cases like that I don't care about the money, I don't like senseless destruction of usable equipment and would much rather see or assist in the destruction of corporations and people who authorize or engage in such practices. Any time I hear of such things that company goes on my blacklist and I will never give them a dime.
 

Offline thm_w

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I've seen quite often one department is throwing away things while another department is buying more of those same things. The left hand doesn't talk to the right and most people simply don't care, it's not money out of their pocket. Drives me nuts though, I hate waste, and corporations are often incredibly wastedful, yet they're happy to cut amenities and benefits to save a few bucks.

Never stiff your employees over a few dollars unless you are firing them immediately after the fact.
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Offline vk6zgo

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I've seen quite often one department is throwing away things while another department is buying more of those same things. The left hand doesn't talk to the right and most people simply don't care, it's not money out of their pocket. Drives me nuts though, I hate waste, and corporations are often incredibly wastedful, yet they're happy to cut amenities and benefits to save a few bucks.

Never stiff your employees over a few dollars unless you are firing them immediately after the fact.

Another slightly divergent angle, is the way different industries often use the same equipment, but have no inkling of this.
A case in point, was where a TV Studio was spending big bucks sending the wheels off camera dollies back to the UK for retreading with appropriate "magic" stuff.

This was expensive, incredibly time consuming, & meant the dolly concerned was out of service for long periods.

One of the Techs (not me) checked around, & found that a local company used the same material for the wheels of hospital trolleys, tables, etc.
The upshot was that they could get all four wheels on the dolly done locally for the price of one wheel done in the UK, with a two week maximum turnaround, compared to two plus months.

One of my jobs, for my sins, in a previous job was to fix "dehydrators".
These were used to pressurise large coaxial feeders with dry air to prevent moisture ingress.

They had a lot of black nylon tubing between various parts & for the outlet.
As they came, they used brass fittings wnich included "olives"as a vital part of the sealing function.

The "olives" were effectively "consumables" as after one use, they usually would no longer seal.

We quickly used up our inadequate quota of spares, so, armed with a handful of "petty cash", I set off to the last place we had bought such bits.
They didn't have any that size, & couldn't tell when they were likely to get some more, so I was cast back on my own resources.

Looking through the "Yellow Pages", I found a likely contender.

They didn't have the parts, but pointed out that "the world had moved on", & the brass fittings had been replaced with nylon self locking fittings.
These were a "dream" to fit, so we went over to them.

When I changed employer, the TV Studio were in the process of moving & upgrading their Earth Station, which used the same sort of dehydrators.
Unfortunately, they also still had the brass fittings.

This company had their own "pet" source of the fittings, so, again, I set out with a handful of petty cash. (as a "noob"in this firm, I didn't care to "make waves" & bring up the new type in discussion).

Same story :- "Sorry, out of stock, dunno if we will stock them again!", so I went to the other place & bought the nylon ones.
I returned to work in some trepidation, however, they not only approved, but were enthusiastic about the change.

 

Offline EEVblog

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Still wondering whether some office owner could not one day get you in trouble if you ever get ahold of anything (like computers) that could contain confidential information (although obviously if some company trashes stuff with confidential information, they would be pretty dumb.)

Get me in trouble with who?
The police? Nope, not their concern.
The council? Nope, not their concern.
The strata? Good luck with that, I'm on the executive committee. They'd get more in trouble for dumping their illegal office stuff in the dumpster room in the first place.
Could they sue me for some reason? Sure. Anyone is free to attempt to sue anyone at any time for any reason. Good luck.
 

Offline Brumby

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Still wondering whether some office owner could not one day get you in trouble if you ever get ahold of anything (like computers) that could contain confidential information (although obviously if some company trashes stuff with confidential information, they would be pretty dumb.)

Get me in trouble with who?
The police? Nope, not their concern.
The council? Nope, not their concern.
The strata? Good luck with that, I'm on the executive committee. They'd get more in trouble for dumping their illegal office stuff in the dumpster room in the first place.
Could they sue me for some reason? Sure. Anyone is free to attempt to sue anyone at any time for any reason. Good luck.

The person who should be worried would be the one who put any such confidential content out in the wild.

That is just sheer stupidity.
 

Offline vk6zgo

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Still wondering whether some office owner could not one day get you in trouble if you ever get ahold of anything (like computers) that could contain confidential information (although obviously if some company trashes stuff with confidential information, they would be pretty dumb.)

Get me in trouble with who?
The police? Nope, not their concern.
The council? Nope, not their concern.
The strata? Good luck with that, I'm on the executive committee. They'd get more in trouble for dumping their illegal office stuff in the dumpster room in the first place.
Could they sue me for some reason? Sure. Anyone is free to attempt to sue anyone at any time for any reason. Good luck.

Use your position on the executive commitee to pass a strata "by law" that all non complying rubbish will be seized & sold to the highest bidder.
As no one else is likely to be remotely interested, bid 1 cent, & it is all yours free & clear!

"No skin off the noses" of those who are non complying, either, so they will.continue with the practice.
 

Offline 0culus

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I guess I'm lucky because my workplace has a deal with a local auction house to auction off surplus equipment (T&M and a lot of other stuff) once it has sat in reapplication for a while. This has two benefits. (1) at work, it can be possible to score some very expensive equipment  you need for your project for no cost from the reapplication stash and (2) if you see something you want for yourself, just keep an eye on the upcoming auctions in the next couple months.
 


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