Order Capital Equipment

Orders for capital equipment are placed using Ariba Guided Buying 

For training and instructions on how to place orders in Ariba, please visit the Sourcing & Procurement website https://www.bu.edu/sourcing/

Capital Equipment purchases require additional steps when composing a purchase requisition:

Step 1:  Assess the purchase for Moveable Capital Equipment

Moveable Capital Equipment is defined any article of non-expendable tangible property (e.g., automobile, centrifuge, microscope, projector, network server) that meets the following capitalization criteria.

  •  The purchased item has a useful life of one year or greater.
  •  The cost of the item is $5,000 or greater, including delivery and installation costs, and including the cost of attachments required to operate the item when those attachments are acquired as part of the original equipment purchase.
  • Boston University has title to, is the custodian of or is held responsible to account for the item.

Should items in your order meet the capital threshold, continue with the following steps before submitting your purchase requisition (PR).

Step 2:  Input Equipment Information

  • Generally, lines in the PR are created to match the quote. 
  • For orders of more than one piece of capital equipment, please group the lines for each piece of equipment together and provide a comment if further explanation is required.
  • For complicated orders or orders with a large quantity of lines (over 25), please contact Property Management for an order assessment prior to submitting the PR.
  • Input General Ledger code GL code 510100 Non-capital Minor Equipment. The Property Team will adjust the GL to capital equipment.

Step 3:  Upload Attachments

  • Purchase requisitions that meet the $5000 threshold must include a quote unless the item is ordered is ordered through the Ariba catalog and a link to the catalog is provided in the PR

Step 4:  Add Comments

  • Provide a contact name or Principal Investigator in the Deliver To or Comment section.
  • If the order documents do not clearly state the type of equipment being ordered, describe the equipment in a comment.
  • If the delivery address is different than the equipment’s final location, add the address (including building and room number) of its final location in a comment.