I have several people who are interested in making long term equipment loans. Does anyone have a document template with the language and important details for these kinds of loans?
The only thing we do with loaned items is to add them to our asset register, including the name of the owner. Terms for loaning things are outlined in our Membership Guide.
Jess
Worth noting that a lot of spaces have had serious trouble with long-term equipment loans and no longer allow them.
Potential issues:
- Equipment damage
- Who is responsible (and allowed) to service the equipment
- Other members being blamed for damage to “their” equipment due to lack of training
- The loan-er leaving the space (and thus seriously affecting other members who now depend on the equipment)
- People “loaning” equipment that the space doesn’t really need/want, and it becoming a storage space
This is off the top of my head. In general I would not advise taking long-term loans, and instead see if the member would be willing to “sell” the equipment to the space for a small amount of money raised by a pledge drive.
That said, some spaces (small enough that everybody is tight-knit) can make it work, but be aware that issues can still arise with high-value items.
There is definitely also an insurance concern for the organisation who owns the kit loaning it to people.
To answer some of these:
- Damage - loaned items are on our asset register and thus covered by insurance - also the general breakage policy applies (with deferment to the owner for how to repair) - folks shouldn’t loan items if they don’t agree to it
- Team covering that area, owner if they state that upfront (tho we should probably document this one ourselves)
- Loaned items are treated the same as space items again, if you don’t agree, don’t loan it
- Yup… this is the only awkward one
- Loans need to be accepted in our rules, so don’t bring in unaccepted things unless you want them to end up in the lost+found bin
So far touch wood, we’ve had no issues.