The purchasing of all supplies by members of the Chemical Engineering department is coordinated through the department. All purchases must be properly recorded in the University's purchasing system. For information on other purchasing prodecures and options, visit the Graduate Handbook here.

Credit Card Purchase Procedure

Julie Tilton, the Buyer for the department, can make purchases under $2500 on a purchasing credit card (p-card). Credit Card purchases will only be made for standard items available from the vendor catalog. Most specialty or fabricated items, repairs, and/or services will all be paid for using a Purchase Order. All services regardless of dollar amount require approval from the University Contracts Office prior to purchase. Any items on the Particularly Hazardous Substances (PHS) list cannot be ordered using a p-card. Please check the list here to see if your material is a PHS. To make a purchase via credit card, complete and submit the form located here. Your computer must be logged onto the Carnegie Mellon network either directly or via the VPN in order to access the order form. You will need the following information to make a p-card purchase:

• Requestor name
• E-mail address
• Campus telephone number
• Complete name of company
• Company phone number
• Company URL
• Shipping method
• Office/Lab where equipment will be stored or used
• Order information:
  • Item number
  • Vendor Part Number
  • Complete Description
  • Unit of Measure (UOM) - e.g. grams, case, pack
  • Price
  • Total Price
  • Grant/Account Number paying for the item(s)
• Purpose of Purchase

Please note the following:

1. Shipping methods will most often be standard ground, 2-day, or overnight. If this field is left empty, standard shipping will be used.

2. Purpose of Purchase is a quick description of what you are buying and what project the purchase supports. For example, "item(s) x is being used to study abc for project xyz". Keep it concise and use the name of the project whose account number you are using. A good example is "Polymer used to study adsorption for the NSF Surfactant Project".

3. If you are ordering software, you must submit the software licensing agreement to Julie Tilton with your purchase request. The contracts office must approve all software licensing agreements prior to purchase.

Once you receive your order, inspect it for accuracy and make sure any equipment is in good working order. Immediately send an "okay to pay" notice to Julie Tilton at jrtilton@andrew.cmu.edu. Include the vendor name, and items that were received if it was a partial shipment. If your order contained chemicals or compounds, enter your material into your Chemical Inventory using Chemtracker.

Online Purchase Order Procedure

All Chemical Engineering Purchase order requests are handled through e-mail. The purchase order request form can be found here. Your computer must be logged onto the Carnegie Mellon network either directly or via the VPN in order to access the order form. You will need to provide the following information:

• Requestor name
• E-mail address
• Campus telephone number
• Complete name and address of company
• Phone number and fax number of company
• Campus shipping address (DH B211)
• Office/Lab where equipment will be stored or used
• Order information:
  • Item number
  • Vendor Part Number
  • Complete Description
  • Unit of Measure (UOM) - e.g. grams, case, pack
  • Price
  • Total Price
  • Account Number
• Special Instructions

After the requisition has gone through the proper channels and been approved, the information will be entered into the University purchasing system (Oracle) where a purchase order will be generated. (Please allow a three-day turnaround time for purchase orders.) This purchase order will be printed and returned to the requestor. It is only at this time that the purchase may be made. A hard copy of the purchase order will also be mailed to the vendor. If you wish to speed up your order, you may fax the purchase order to the vendor, but be sure they realize that a hard copy will follow in the mail. We must be careful that the vendor does not duplicate the order.

Preliminary steps that you must take before submitting a purchase order requisition:

Is the vendor set up in our Oracle system? In order for a purchase order to be created, the vendor's name and pertinent information (address, billing terms, etc.) must be accessible in Oracle. Commonly used vendors will already be in Oracle. If you are uncertain as to whether or not a vendor is new, either check with other graduate students in your group, or check with Julie Tilton, the Chemical Engineering buyer. If you are using a new vendor, you should fax or scan/email the US or International Supplier Information form to them before submitting the purchase requisition. Forms for this purpose can be found here. Print the forms and fax or scan/email them to the vendor or instruct the vendor to visit the site. The completed forms should be returned to the Purchasing Department.

The university recommends that you use a preferred vendor when making all purchases. Preferred vendors have agreed-to terms and conditions with the university and the required paperwork is considerably less than using a nonpreferred vendor. To view a listing of preferred vendors by both name and commodity visit the purchasing department’s web site here.

Does my order require extra forms? A "PO Checklist and Bid Summary Form" must accompany all federally-funded purchase orders > $2,500. This form requires the solicitation for three quotations/proposals. Go online here to retrieve a copy of this form. This completed, hard-copy form with accompanying quotes should be delivered to Julie Tilton immediately after submitting the purchase order requisition. If you are using a preferred vendor, the checklist/bid summary is not required.

If the purchase is greater then or equal to $30,000, then visit the same forms site (as above) and print the "Supplier Certifications Under Federal Funding" form that must be completed by the supplier.

Does my order require an agreement or contract? All services regardless of dollar amount are required to have a contract executed with the University Contracts Office (UCO) prior to purchase. If you are making a purchase from a Preferred Supplier, the university has a signed contract already on file. If you are making a purchase from a supplier with a Master Service Agreement (MSA), the university has a signed contract that agrees to terms and conditions. Check here to see a list of MSA's on file. You will still need a statement of work, however, that covers pricing. It is imperative that you do not sign any document provided to you from the vendor. These documents must all be forwarded to the UCO for signature.

If you have checked the Preferred Supplier and MSA sites noted above and your vendor is not listed, you should check with Julie Tilton to see if the department has an agreement on file with the vendor. If not, all of the pertinent information (vendor name/address, type of service, length of service, amount, etc.) should be provided to Julie and she will initiate the contract request through the UCO before the purchase order can be created. Please allow at least 7-14 days for this process.

What do I do once I receive my ordered items? Once the purchase has been received, and has been determined to be correct and in good working order (considered "okay to pay") immediately deliver the packing slip to Julie Tilton in DH 1208. Send an "okay to pay" notice to Julie at jrtilton@andrew.cmu.edu. The notice should include the PO#, the vendor name, and the office or lab where the item(s) will be used/stored.