Assets and equipment · EAM
Owner / CEO, CFO / Finance, IT Director / CTO, Operations Manager
Services and offices

Asset tracking for offices and service companies: laptops, phones and shared equipment

5 min read · Remanently team

In short

In an office or a service company, asset tracking records who holds each laptop, phone, monitor and piece of shared equipment, where it is and what happened to it. It prevents devices from leaving with former employees and removes the year-end scramble. Start with computers and phones, import the list from IT or finance, label items with QR codes and record every handover with a phone.

The situation before adoption

An office or service company has little heavy equipment. It has a lot of small, expensive, portable items: laptops, phones, tablets, monitors, docking stations, headsets, cameras, meeting room equipment, measuring devices for field staff. They move with people, and people move often.

Typical problems:

A laptop still assigned to a person who left. The record says one thing, the cupboard says another.
Two lists of the same equipment. IT has one, finance another, and the office manager a third on paper.
Hybrid and remote work. Devices sit in homes, and nobody is sure which ones.
Handovers by email. A new employee is told which device to take, but the record is not updated.
Shared equipment disappears. Projectors, cameras, test devices and loaner laptops are the first things nobody can find.
Year-end is a scramble. Finance asks IT for lists, IT asks employees by email, and the replies come back wrong.

The cost is quiet: replacement devices, hours of email, and an argument about who was responsible.

How the process looks with the module

Import. IT or finance exports the existing list, and it is imported into one register.
Label. Each device gets an existing number or a QR code or barcode. A phone is enough to scan.
Assign. Each item is linked to a user, a location or a team. Shared equipment gets a named owner.
Record handovers. Issuing a laptop to a new hire and taking it back at exit is a recorded step, not an email.
Count. A short count by office, floor or team compares the register with reality and shows differences immediately.

Remanently Assets keeps location, user and history, with documents and photos on each item, and reminders for warranty, policy and contract dates, which matter for leased laptops and software-linked hardware. The same asset continues into Remanently Tools, where reservations, check-outs, signatures and returns complete the responsibility history. For the exit process, see employee offboarding equipment return and a laptop assigned to a former employee.

Which items to track first

Group	Why start here	What to record
Laptops and tablets	Highest value, move with people	User, serial number, handover and return
Phones	Easy to lose, often below the capitalization limit	User, number, handover
Monitors, docks, headsets	Many small items, many moves	Location or user
Shared equipment	Nobody feels responsible	Named owner, booking or check-out
Furniture, fittings	Stable, little risk	Location only

Start where loss is most likely. Furniture can wait. For the broader approach in a small company, see asset management for small business.

What changes for each role

CEO or owner: a simple rule, one named holder per item and every handover recorded, with a way to check it. Fewer replacement purchases and fewer disputes.

Office or operations manager: a current list of what each team has, and a defined routine for new hires and leavers.

IT: one register for devices instead of a spreadsheet and email threads, with import from the existing list and phone-based scanning.

CFO and accounting: evidence next to the ledger. Remanently does not replace depreciation or the fixed asset ledger; it adds the physical truth. Where a device falls below the capitalization threshold, the register still tracks it for operations. How a loss is booked is a matter for your accountant.

Remote and hybrid staff

A device at home still has an owner and a location. Record it as such: user, "remote" as location type and the date of the last confirmation. A periodic confirmation, where the employee scans or confirms the device, keeps the register honest without a visit. When someone leaves, the register lists exactly what must come back, which turns offboarding from a search into a checklist.

How to start

Pick the scope. All computers and phones, or one office.
Import the list. From IT or finance, whichever is more complete.
Label. Print only what is missing. Use the asset tag template.
Assign owners. Every device gets a person or a team lead.
Run a short count. Review differences with IT and finance and fix the process.
Connect hiring and exit. Make the handover a standard step in onboarding and offboarding.

Mistakes to avoid in an office

Tracking by employee name in a spreadsheet that nobody updates when the person moves teams.
Skipping the serial number, which makes a lost device impossible to identify later.
Forgetting accessories that matter, such as chargers and docks, in the handover.
Leaving offboarding to the manager's memory. Make the register list the return items.
Counting once a year only. A short count of laptops and phones each quarter catches problems while they are small.

The best sign that the routine works is boring: a new hire gets a device with a record, a leaver returns exactly the listed items, and nobody has to write an email asking who has the projector.

A demo on your own data

The quickest test is your own device list. Book a demo and we will show import, assigned users, a handover and a count with differences on a sample of your data. You can start with a smartphone and basic records on the free tier, see pricing. For the category, read asset tracking software.

Frequently asked questions

What should an office track first?

Laptops, tablets and phones, because they have the highest value, move with people and are the items most often lost or kept by leavers.

How do we handle devices at home?

Record the user and a remote location, and ask for a periodic confirmation. At exit, the register lists exactly what must be returned.

Is tracking needed for items below the fixed asset limit?

Operationally yes, since losing them costs money. Keep them in the same register with a flag that shows which items are on the books. How to treat them in accounting is a question for your accountant.

How does this connect with onboarding and offboarding?

Issuing a device to a new hire and taking it back at exit are recorded handovers, and the history of responsibility stays with the item.

Do we need special equipment to start?

No. A smartphone is enough to scan QR codes and barcodes, and basic records are available on the free tier.

See your device list in a register
Book a demo on a sample of your own device list: assigned users, handovers and a count with differences.

Book a short Remanently demo See pricing

Module: Remanently Asset Management (EAM) · Pricing · Contact · Get started