Where retired federal IT actually goes

If you handle property disposal for a federal agency, or you are a contractor holding government property, the route your equipment takes is decided by authority rather than by convenience. This page sets out the routes, what the governing bulletin actually says, and the one thing about proceeds that catches people.

Where retired federal IT actually goes, and it isn't one route

GSA Bulletin FMR B-34 points executive agencies through a preferred sequence, and its own operative verb is that agencies are "strongly encouraged" to follow it rather than required to. The condition-code limit people quote (codes 1, 4 and 7) sits inside the reuse-transfer-donation-sale paragraph; it doesn't scope the bulletin. Other provisions carry no condition-code limit at all, including the one directing non-functional assets to certified recyclers or refurbishers under abandonment or destruction authority, the sanitization provision, and the instruction that federal electronic assets shouldn't go to landfill or incinerators.

The order runs: reuse within the agency, including replacement through the exchange/sale authority; transfer to other federal agencies, or to schools and educational organizations under Executive Order 12999 and the Stevenson-Wydler Act; donation through GSA to states and eligible nonprofits; sale to the public; and, under the agency's abandonment or destruction authority, return to a manufacturer or vendor take-back program using a certified recycler.

For civilian executive agencies the pivot point is normally GSA. Once no activity within the agency needs the property, it's reported excess to GSA, which screens and offers it, approves transfers, and conducts sales.

DLA Disposition Services is the Department of Defense route. It provides the Military Departments and Defense Agencies with reutilization, transfer, donation and sale support, and reports property transferred to non-federal recipients back to GSA.

For civilian agencies the default pivot is GSA rather than DLA. A civilian agency can elect DLA Disposition Services instead, but the election is conditional rather than symmetrical: it runs on an Economy Act order that has to be renewed each October 1, the agency reimburses the full cost, sales proceeds go to the Treasury with no reimbursement back to the agency, and DLA sites reserve the right to refuse a turn-in on workload or resource grounds (32 CFR 273.15(c)(3)(ix)(M)). So it is neither closed to civilian agencies nor equally open. B-34 itself doesn't mention DLA at all.

One caveat worth stating, because it cuts against the tidy version: reuse and donation screening doesn't always come before a commercial buyer. Exchange/sale replacements and vendor take-back both place assets with a commercial party directly. Which is why the sanitization and certified-recycler requirements matter more than the route label does.

Whichever route applies, a commercial firm has to be registered in the federal award system at the time it submits an offer or quotation, not merely by award (FAR 4.1102(a)), and there are narrow exceptions plus one case allowing registration within 30 days after award. Registration takes up to ten business days to become active. Worth starting well before you need it.

The DLA computer turn-in guidance sets out the sanitization and documentation requirements for the relevant routes. It doesn't establish permission for a commercial recycler to collect or resell installation equipment, and no vendor should imply otherwise.

It also contains a line worth quoting to anyone who assumes the government's instinct is to destroy: "Hard drive sanitation is to be accomplished by overwriting or removal for equipment that is in serviceable condition or has reuse value when possible. Equipment that is degaussed or destroyed loses its useful life."

That is the government preferring, in its own words, exactly the order of operations this page argues for.

On proceeds, a caution

Federal exchange and sale rules restrict how proceeds can be used, and the current provisions exclude services from the replacement costs that authority covers.

So nobody should promise you automatic cashback or that disposal service costs can be recovered from proceeds. The responsible officials determine the applicable authority and route. 41 CFR Part 102-39

The certified-recycler question, answered accurately

You'll read that federal agencies are required to use certified recyclers. That isn't what the governing document says.

The relevant GSA bulletin, which remains in effect until canceled, says agencies are strongly encouraged to direct federal electronic assets to certified recyclers. The proposed rule that would have written it into regulation was never finalized. The EPA likewise encourages and recommends rather than requires.

What the bulletin does say is that the only certification programs currently recognized for disposal of federal electronic assets are R2 and e-Stewards. Under the same "strongly encouraged" umbrella it points agencies at the least destructive sanitization procedures where appropriate, and says federal electronic assets shouldn't go to landfill or incinerators.

That's a useful and true thing to know. It isn't a claim about us.

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