All UCSB purchase orders are placed through Gateway, the campus online purchasing system.  For detailed information on how to place MRL orders in Gateway, please see our Gateway FAQ section below.

Office and Research Supplies

Below federal guidelines, office supplies should not be charged to research contracts and grants.
Please see the lists below for examples of what are considered office supplies vs. research supplies.
If you need to purchase office supplies at a campus storeroom, please make sure that you have an approved recharge code on an unrestricted funding source. Please contact the MRL staff if you need assistance with purchasing office supplies.

Examples of Office Supplies

Please see the lists below for examples of what are considered office supplies vs. research supplies.

Writing instruments

Pens
Pencils – regular, colored, and mechanical
Pencil lead
Markers – black, colored, permanent, and dry erase
Highlighters
Correction fluid and tape
Erasers

Paper products

Loose paper
Regular notebooks and tablets
Post-its
Envelopes

Filing & Storage

File folders
Hanging file folders
Tabs
Filing trays
Binders
Folders

Adhesives and fasteners

Transparent tape
Glue and glue sticks
Staplers and staples
Staple removers
Paperclips & binder clips
Thumbtacks

Miscellaneous

  • Bulletin boards
    Calendars
    Dry erase boards
    Dry erase board cleaner
    Facial tissue
  • Hole punches
    Printer cartridges
    Rulers
    Scissors
    Sheet protectors
    Transparency film

Paper products

Laboratory notebooks
Computation notebooks

Labeling & Tap

Specialty tapes for sample labeling
Specialty tapes required for lab set up

Miscellaneous

Computer disks/compact discs
(CDs) for research data storage

Purchasing Procedures

Some purchase orders require additional paperwork and review.  These include the following:

  1. Equipment orders: For efficient processing of equipment orders, please attach a copy of the quote from the supplier to the Gateway Requisition.  Please make sure to note any special delivery instructions.
  2. If your order is $10,000.00 or above and will be on a federal funding source, the Source Selection and Price Reasonableness Form must be completed. This form is required to substantiate the appropriateness of source selection and price reasonableness in compliance with Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR). If “Sole Source” is selected on the checklist as the basis for the supplier selection, please complete the second page of the form and provide a detailed explanation for why it is necessary to place the order with a specific supplier.
  3. If your order is $100,000 or above, the Source Selection and Price Reasonableness Form must be completed in full. Orders above $100,000 will be competitively bid unless sufficient justification for the supplier selection is provided.
  4. If your order is for a restricted item, please note this on your Gateway Requisition.  Orders for restricted items require additional review by EH&S and/or Purchasing. 
  5. If your order is for a recurring service, please complete the Vendor Blanket Form located on the Gateway home page.

Source Selection and Price Reasonableness

f your package is shipped to the MRL, we will notify you when it arrives.  Please leave packing slips for all MRL orders in the tray above the counter in MRL 2046.  When you receive your shipment, please sign and date the packing slip. If there is any problem with your order (incomplete, damaged, wrong item ordered), please write this on the packing slip, or add a comment to the PO in Gateway to alert the MRL staff member responsible for your order. We require a signed packing slip indicating that the order is complete and authorizing payment for our files, and we must know of any changes to the original order to pay invoices.

The MRL staff has a UCSB FlexCard credit card that is available in limited circumstances when you need to place an order with a supplier who does not accept purchase orders.  To request a FlexCard order, please discuss the order with the MRL Purchasing Coordinator Mary McGuan.  Then please complete the FlexCard Authorization Form on the Gateway home page.

All purchases should be processed using a purchase order number. In an emergency or for other special circumstances, you may pay for the supplies personally and then be reimbursed. Submit the original, itemized receipt with the completed Expense Reimbursement Request form with your PIs signature.

MRL forms (Source Selection & Price Reasonableness Form, Expense Reimbursement Request Form) are available on the MRL Forms Site webpage.

Gateway Purchasing FAQs

Gateway is UCSB’s online purchasing system that allows for quick and easy purchasing of lab supplies and chemicals from your favorite vendors right from your lab. Vendors whose catalogs are hosted through the Gateway system will already have contract pricing and product descriptions included. Equipment purchases are also be processed through this system.

Please note: we recommend using the Google Chrome or Firefox browsers, as Gateway and Safari are incompatible.

Below are tutorial documents and instructions for Gateway FAQs. For any questions that are not answered on this page, please contact MRL Purchasing Coordinator Mary McGuan or the Gateway help desk at help@gateway.procurement.ucsb.edu.

  • Placing an Order
    • ​Need assistance with placing an order or searching for an item? Check out: Placing an Order in Gateway
    • Placing an order with Office Max for the first time? You will need to request a PIN. After clicking on the Office Max vendor icon, please follow the prompts to receive your PIN. Once the PIN has been issued you will then be able to shop their catalog and add items to your cart.
      • Please note: Office supply expenses are not allowed on research contracts and grants. Unrestricted funding sources, such as gift funds, must be used for office supply purchases.
  • Shipping & Delivery Options
  • Document Search
    • Click the "document search" tab and there will be options to search for your requisitions, purchase orders, and invoices.
    • If you have specific search criteria, select the type of search you want from the drop down menu (e.g., requisition, purchase order, etc), and enter the information into the search form and select "Go".
  • Searching for suppliers
    • ​Not all suppliers are available in Gateway yet, so we suggest that you do a quick search prior to placing an order: Search for a Supplier
  • Adding a supplier to Gateway
  • Adding notes, comments, and attachments
    • ​Once you have finalized your cart and are ready to checkout, you can leave comments for both internal and external use, as well as uploading attachments, such as quotes. Check out: Adding notes, comments, & attachments
  • Cancelling an order
    • If a PO number has been issued and the order has been placed:
      • Contact the vendor directly to cancel an order.
      • Please ask for documentation showing that the order has been cancelled.
      • Next, let your department buyer know that you cancelled the order (e.g., by forwarding the documentation showing that the order has been cancelled), and they will contact Purchasing to have the order cancelled in Gateway.
  • Cancelling a requisition
    • If you have submitted your requisition for approval and a PO number has not been issued:
      • Please send an email (referencing the requisition number) to your department buyer letting them know that you would like to cancel your requisition.
      • They will then "reject" the order, which will cancel the requisition in Gateway.

Shipping Samples Out of UCSB

Researchers who wish to send material out of the country must comply with the following procedure before the material may be sent:

  1. Notify Rachel Behrens in writing of your need to send the material. Include in this notification a scientific description of the material, the quantity to be sent, and to whom it will be sent.
  2. Please check the Commerce Control List to make sure your samples are not on the list. Send to Rachel Behrens a statement by e-mail that you didn’t find them on the list.
  3. Rachel will work with the exportcontrol [at] research [dot] ucsb [dot] edu”>UCSB Office of Research to help you to determine if an export license is required for shipment. Rachel will notify you when you have permission to ship the material. Based on our experience, we would estimate that it will take approximately one or two weeks to obtain approval.
  4. Please get a signed MTA (Materials Transfer Agreement) by the UCSB Office of Research if necessary.
  5. For samples shipped in US you don’t need to check the Commerce Control List or get an export license but you should consider MTA.

A Material Transfer Agreement (MTA) is a contract that governs the transfer of tangible research between two organizations, when the recipient intends to use it for his or her own research purposes, and when no research collaboration between scientists is planned. 

An MTA is important because it sets out the parameters under which the research material may be used. MTA received from other organizations may include terms that affect the researcher’s ability to publish or control his/her discoveries or may carry heavy administrative burdens. These terms must be removed through careful negotiation.  Please note: Individual researchers are NOT authorized to sign MTAs.

For guidance on when an MTA is required, please go to MTA at UCSB.

For assistance with MTAs, please contact Jenna Nakano, the MTA Officer for UCSB.