BME Shared Equipment Policy

  • PURPOSE
  • - To facilitate collaboration and to ensure effective utilisation of our research facilities
    - To ensure that there is sufficient resource for the long-term upkeep of large equipment

  • MAINTENANCE OF THE EQUIPMENT
  • Regular maintenance of the equipment shall be conducted by the technician-in-charge. Training session(s) will either be provided by BME Department or the vendors to ensure that only qualified users may operate the equipment on their own. To become a qualified user, each user has to go through a test specific to the equipment concerned. A training session, which includes the qualifying test, may require up to 4 hours and each hour costs $250 (unless otherwise specified). The group of person-in-charge (PIC) or frequent users may assign one to two research staffs or research postgraduate students (RPgs) to facilitate the daily maintenance of equipment and/or practical troubleshooting from the users. For RPgs, this service duty is deemed equivalent to their teaching duties. The department may review their service hours and recognize their contributions by their service hours.

  • RESERVATION
  • Trained external users shall book the equipment through the BME website two weeks before the anticipated usage, whereas users from the PIC’s group may book the usage one month ahead. The booking may be changed or cancelled 24 hours before the anticipated usage. No show or cancellation within 24 hours will be charged according to the reserved usage x hourly rate.

  • USE OF THE EQUIPMENT
  • Trained users shall follow the instructions to use the equipment properly. Repair or maintenance due to damage(s) caused by improper usage of the users (either internal or external) will be charged to the users’ research group(s). Surveillance system, if not currently available, may be requested by the PIC’s group.

    * The policy and fee structure will be reviewed by the Department annually.

    FEE STRUCTURE

    The following hourly rates will be applied to external users:

    Category A, $HK 150/hour
    Category B, $HK 350/hour
    Category C, $HK 500/hour

    ** The charge will be by “per hour” and the discount rate to internal users is revised to 25%.
    ** Effective Date: 2022.1.1

    Application Procedure

    1. Check availability of equipment
    2. Read usermanual thoroughly
    3. Download the application form (Link: MS doc file type)
    4. Complete the form with approval of the superisvor.
    5. Submit your completed application form to bmebooking@cuhk.edu.hk (subject: Shared Equipment Booking) before every working day at 16:00.
    6. Check 18:00 every working day if your application is confirmed in the booking system excel sheet
    7. * We will update the excel sheet on booking system at 16:00 on every working day. If more than one application on same time slot, it is based on first come first served

      * If you want to change booking date and time, or cancel booking, please write down your requests on two horizontal lines in the application form and resubmit it to us before 16:00 working days

    Equipment Booking Availability