We have an endless supply of computer garbage. There are the unused computers that have been replaced by newer models. There are old monitors, broken keyboards, mice, cables, power adapters, batteries, scanners, printers, and boxes of stuff we can’t even identify.
About three months ago the pile was beginning to take over a portion of our office. It was time to act.
We started off by selling stuff on ebay.
First, of course, we had to get our I.T. guy to clean off the old hard drives. You’ve got to be certain there isn’t any confidential data stored on the disks.
We then listed the computers on ebay and got reasonable bids. Truth be told, we would have paid someone to haul the stuff away so getting money for any of it was really a bonus for us. Listing and shipping the stuff was a bit of a pain, but we used it as a task for someone to do in her downtime. It took awhile, but she worked through most of the big stuff.
Shipping was probably the biggest challenge. We bought a bunch of shipping supplies and set up a serious shipping operation for a few months. We charged as much as $45 for the shipping. Some items sold for less that the the cost of the shipping. The stuff was well packed and protected.
We ran in to two situations with the eBay operation. We had two customers contact us and claim that the items they received were damaged. They both told us that the boxes were fine but that the items in the boxes were damaged.
I found that hard to imagine given the quantity of bubble wrap we were using. We refunded the purchase price to both customers. They both offered to ship back the merchandise. That, of course, was the last thing we wanted. We let them keep it. I smelled a rat in both of those transactions, but it wasn’t worth arguing over.
Given those two experiences we decided that eBay wasn’t worth the trouble for the small amount of money invoved.
Next up – Craigslist. We listed some items there, but really didn’t get many takers. I thought that we cold avoid the shipping issue by selling locally.
Now, we’re recycling. Our city government has a recycling program that accepts these items. Most of what we have left is just junk.
If we had it to do over again we’d probably have donated everything. There are many, many programs set up for accepting your old computers and reusing them. Our city government maintains a directory of agencies willing to accept the machines. I’m sure you can find an appropriate group in your neck of the woods.
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Lee Rosen has practiced family law for more than twenty years. With three offices, 
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