Company assets??

[PsychoCannon]

Offff, OK I may have inadvertently landed myself in hot water over something stupid here.

Got a user moving from one position in our company that requires a Mobile to one that doesn't.

They requested to keep the number so we got managerial approval and provdied a PAC code for them to take the phone number off the company account to a personal one.

As the Blackberry in question is an old model valued at £3.08 and heavily soiled it will be binned and taken away by our recycling company at cost to us.

The user doesn't get a mobile in the new role as it does not justify the cost or providing a device but given she already HAS one and would like one and it will cost us money to take it away I suggested she simply keep it (Provided she give it to me to wipe it of all data from her old role) and then use her personal number (well the same number that she took ownership of) on it, sign the disclaimers to use a personal device for corporate mail etc and job done.

Only problem was I her old role is internal audit...and she's dobbed me in asking if this is acceptable practice....when she was the one who asked for it...
Am I likely to be in **** about this? I'm reading up on cooperate assets etc and it's giving me a headache.......
It's not like I gave it away, just told her to keep useing this device with her personal number rather than scrapping it *sigh*, I think she used the term mis-use of corporate assets....
You try to do someone a favour etc....

Any advice?
I think my boss will back me up and i've read and re-read all my communications and nothing dodgy,insisted she get her managers approval and sign disclaimers at every step, just want to know if anyone in the know has any idea if I can expect a nasty supprise for allowing a user to use a company owned device that should be scrapped as what amounts to a personal device....

[davepreston]

simple out for you mate
get prices for the cost of recovery and disposal (itemised) ,
im sure this will cost more than £3.08, present this as your reasoning, disposal would cost £7.50 compared to £3.08 return, therefore it was in the companies interest just to write it off, than incure other higher costs

you factored this into account and also arranged that data protection would be honnored by saying that you must see the device and wipe it

worst the can say is, we see your reasoning but you are not in a position to make these calls, and they will probably issue a memo to all in your department

then find a way to screw that b1tch

hth
dave

[PsychoCannon]

Thought so, thanks :)
Yeah it will cost us approx £5 to pay someone to take it away so it seemed stupid to me to take a phone off her because "we can't afford to give you a phone" when in fact we are paying to take it away in the first place! (it's a case of red tape clashing with reality)

To be fair to her she just forwarded it up the chain one stepto cover her bottom, probably a Internal Audit habbit...with the seeming innocent question, is this normal policy, I wouldn't want to mis-use company assets, which lead to a paniced email from her boss to internal services about residual value, misconduct etc etc etc..., which resulted in a lot of questions from Internal services to my boss and the problem is I can see this setting off a chain-reaction of bum covering that will leave me bending over with a thoughtful look on my face :p

Note to self, in future make sure I check what department a person is in when deciding how to respond to a not 100% official request =p

[BaP]

I hope common sense prevails here.

[PsychoCannon]

The problem with Common sense is it's not so common :)
I'm sure it will but you know how these departments write their mails, makes you feel guilty just opening the damn things so I'm sweating a bit!!!
Just lots of scary, sharp edge sounding words and implied threats of punishment for being naughty without actually saying anything or accusing anyone of anything =p

Anyone Daves suggestion sounds good! already done but re-assures me! Thanks

[Viney]

Go to her desk, pick up the BB, remove her sim card, leave that on the desk, take BB away and send it to whoever you do at the comapnies cost. When she then moans why her bonus isnt as high, say its to do with increased company costs of disposal of old phones and lack of common sense. The critisise her shoes

[BaP]

Go to her desk, pick up the BB, remove her sim card, leave that on the desk, take BB away and send it to whoever you do at the comapnies cost. When she then moans why her bonus isnt as high, say its to do with increased company costs of disposal of old phones and lack of common sense. The critisise her shoes

+1. As I said, common sense ;)

[SoulKiss]

You want to borrow that Mac-11 back?

I am sure Grinch will lend the other if you want to go in there all Gangsta on her.

I'm with Viney, write an email to YOUR boss, saying that you feel you may have made a mistake, with your reasoning as to why you did what you did in the first place, then go re-claim the phone and dispose of in the normal way.

Plan this so that you are taking the BB back BEFORE your boss can say "nah that was ok, nothing to worry about" so that she is going to be left phone-less.

[Winder]

I'm glad I don't work in an office with all this carp going on, what a waste of time and effort. Kick the phone up her a** and do some stealth bullying till she f**ks off to someother company were she can be an idiot all she wants.

[Brettus]

holy crap thats a lot of red tape! the company I work in is far too simple I guess, people regularly don't bother bringing old kit back and just get given new stuff (only chased if its worth chasing) only a small place though c.100 peoples so not too bad I guess.

Anyway, I can see the topic somewhere on the horizon, heading back to it.... Sounds like you haven't got much to worry about as davepreston put it, simple maths. Fingers crossed for the sensible outcome!

[454697819]

Providing you have acted in the best interests for the companies assets (i.e it would cost more to dispose of than to pass on FOC) then they cant really get arsey.

I just sold 11 old Dell machines to a second hand company for £250, I then handed the cash over to MD with a receipt and he was well happy, would have cost more for me to dispose of them through the weeeeeeeee directive.

[PsychoCannon]

well it's all going OK, looks like she won't be getting the phone OR number now as they are locking down just in case but no real consequence to me other than having to chisle a process into stone now for future cases =p

yeah tell me about it we recently had to PAY someone to take 100 desktops away, nothing amazing just some standard work desktops but still worth a few G's and we are paying someone to take them who will no doubt then sell them himself and laugh all the way!!! gah!!!

My old company had it down right!
Old kit, what old kit ;), now if you don't mind i have a transit van to move!
When we decomissioned our old data warehouse I think about a £1/4 million worth of Server,SAN and networking kit was "Skipped", but they insisted we save money by taking it to the skip ourselves..in our own cars....no need for reciepts =p

[454697819]

well it's all going OK, looks like she won't be getting the phone OR number now as they are locking down just in case but no real consequence to me other than having to chisle a process into stone now for future cases =p

yeah tell me about it we recently had to PAY someone to take 100 desktops away, nothing amazing just some standard work desktops but still worth a few G's and we are paying someone to take them who will no doubt then sell them himself and laugh all the way!!! gah!!!

My old company had it down right!
Old kit, what old kit ;), now if you don't mind i have a transit van to move!
When we decomissioned our old data warehouse I think about a £1/4 million worth of Server,SAN and networking kit was "Skipped", but they insisted we save money by taking it to the skip ourselves..in our own cars....no need for reciepts =p


I say receipt it was my pay pal transaction slip so he knew I was being honest about the monies, sure I could have stuck it in our slush fund but If he thinks he cant trust me with £250 that doesn't bode well for my future here...

[Lozzo]

All this worry over a £5 knackered old mobile phone? If my boss gave me any sort of grief over something as trivial I'd put my hand in my pocket and pay him the fiver, then start applying for as many jobs as possible to get the hell out of somewhere so small minded. Before I went I'd royally screw over the daft tart who got me into grief in the first place.

If I was your boss I'd just consider the phone lost and write it off.

[MisterTommyH]

Sounds like someone hasn't got enough real work to do.