Questions and Answers !
I am the Chair of a department, and I would like to have all our Research Assets tracked and tagged. Who can do this?
For the moment, Procurement Services can only start tracking and tagging incoming Research Assets with an acquisition value of $10,000 and above (and $5,000 and above for Research Assets funded by American granting agencies). We are seeking the necessary resources to lower this threshold and track and tag “in stock” research assets, sometime in the future. In the meantime, if your department does have the resources (personnel) to help with this task, we can provide you with the tools and guidance to start collecting your asset information. Please contact asset.coordinator [at] mcgill.ca for additional details.
What kind of information are you entering into the University’s Central Asset Management System? Should I be concerned?
There is no confidential information held in this system, nor any kind of information pertaining to the research objectives or activities associated with any particular asset. We are only collecting information on the asset itself pertinent to the asset management program objectives, such as the date of purchase, the value of the asset, its current location, the name of the manufacturer, the model number etc.
Who has access to the Central Asset Management System?
For the time being, only a few designated staff in Procurement Services and IT Services have full access (read and write) to the system. Other units such as Student Housing and Hospitality Services, the NEURO, Facilities (Parking Services) and Risk Management have restricted access for recording or viewing certain assets in the system.
When will everybody have access to the Central Asset Management System, to see what assets may be available for sharing?
It is our plan to provide an open “viewing” access to our community members. This would show what the University owns (i.e. type of equipment, department and model number) and who to contact to find out more. We hope to enable this function in the near future.
We have a lot of things we would like to track, in our department, but some of these items might not qualify as “assets” because:
1. They aren’t very valuable (they are worth less than $ 1,000)
2. They don’t fall under IT Assets
3. They don’t contain refrigerants
4. They don’t need to be audited by third parties, for environmental, health and safety purposes.
Can we still have them tagged and put into the system?
McGill University cannot have “Non-asset” items in its Asset Management System and still keep the database sufficiently organized to achieve the program’s objectives. However, we do recognize that many units or departments may want to tag, track, and even lend out some items. We have a few different options to help you with this. Please refer to the “Non-Asset Items” section for further details.