Frequently Asked Questions

Electronics recycling (e-waste recycling) is the process of recovering valuable materials from old or broken electronic devices while safely disposing of hazardous components. It prevents toxic materials like lead and mercury from contaminating landfills and recovers precious metals like gold, copper, and palladium.

We accept most electronics: computers, laptops, servers, phones, tablets, printers, monitors, cables, routers, networking equipment, gaming consoles, smart home devices, and more. Flat-screen TVs carry a $20 fee (any size). CRT (tube-style) TVs and CRT monitors are no longer accepted: use the Texas Recycles TVs program (for TVs) or Texas Recycles Computers program (for monitors), or your city or county household hazardous waste (HHW) program. Visit our accepted items page for a complete list.

Yes! We accept broken, damaged, and non-working electronics. Whether it's a cracked screen, water damage, or just outdated, we'll recycle it responsibly. The condition doesn't matter for recycling.

No minimum for drop-offs, bring as little as one item to our Sugar Land facility. On-site business pickups are reserved for office cleanouts and truckload-sized loads, evaluated case-by-case based on volume and equipment type. For smaller loads we may offer a paid pickup depending on volume and distance from our warehouse. Call (832) 777-3002 with what you have and we'll route you to the best option.

We serve the entire Greater Houston metro area including Sugar Land, Katy, Missouri City, Richmond, Pearland, The Woodlands, Cypress, Spring, and surrounding communities. For large commercial projects, we serve all of Southeast Texas.

We're open Monday through Friday from 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM. Saturdays are by appointment and we're closed Sunday, but a self-service drop-off bin outside our rollup door is available anytime for smaller drop-offs.

We're located at 10100 Belknap Rd, Suite B5, Sugar Land, TX 77498. We're easily accessible from Highway 90 and serve the entire Greater Houston area.

The safest route is a three-step process: back up anything you want to keep, wipe or remove the hard drive (or let a recycler sanitize it for you), and bring the computer to a reputable electronics recycler. In the Houston area, you can drop off computers free at our Sugar Land facility, and every drive we receive is sanitized per NIST SP 800-88. See our full guide on what to do with an old computer for step-by-step details.

Recycling through a reputable electronics recycler is the best option for most people. It keeps hazardous materials like lead and mercury out of landfills, recovers reusable metals, and, if the recycler follows NIST SP 800-88, documents that the data on the drive was sanitized or the drive was physically processed. Donation is a good alternative for newer, working machines, but only after the drive has been properly wiped.

Recycle it. A 20 year old computer has essentially no resale or donation value, but it still contains recoverable metals and hazardous components that should not go to a landfill, and its hard drive still holds readable data. Bring it to our Sugar Land facility, drop-off is free for computers of any age, working or not, and we sanitize or destroy the drive.

You shouldn't, and in many places you can't. Computers contain lead, mercury, cadmium, and flame retardants that can leach into soil and groundwater, many municipal haulers and landfills refuse them, and a discarded hard drive is a data breach waiting to happen since anyone can pull it from the trash and read it. Recycling is free for most items at our Sugar Land drop-off, so there's no reason to risk it.

Two kinds: environmental and data. Environmentally, circuit boards, batteries, and older displays contain lead, mercury, cadmium, and brominated flame retardants that contaminate soil and groundwater in landfills. On the data side, an intact hard drive in the trash can be recovered by anyone, exposing passwords, tax records, photos, and business files. Responsible recycling with documented data destruction addresses both.

Yes, for office cleanouts, IT refreshes, and qualifying business loads, evaluated case-by-case based on volume and equipment type. We send our truck and team to your location, handle all the loading, and haul everything away. Pricing is confirmed on the jobs we book, with no hidden fees. Smaller loads may qualify for a paid pickup depending on volume and distance from our Sugar Land warehouse, or are welcome at our drop-off (free for most items; $20 per flat-screen TV; CRT TVs and CRT monitors are no longer accepted).

No. EverTrade is a recycling and ITAD service, not a buyback program, so we do not purchase equipment. What we offer instead is free drop-off for most items and business pickup that is free for qualifying quantities, plus documented data destruction and certificates for business clients.

A little, but usually less than people expect. A typical desktop contains small amounts of copper, aluminum, and trace gold, worth a few dollars at commodity scrap prices, and recovering them safely requires specialized processing. The bigger value in recycling is keeping lead, mercury, and other hazardous materials out of landfills and having your data destroyed properly. Drop-off at our Sugar Land facility is free for most items.

You can schedule a business pickup through our contact form, by calling (832) 777-3002, or by emailing info@evertradeelectronics.com. We typically schedule pickups within 2-3 business days of your request.

Most business pickups take 15-30 minutes depending on volume. Our team handles all the loading, just have items gathered and accessible. We work around your schedule to minimize disruption to your operations.

Yes! Our Sugar Land facility at 10100 Belknap Rd, Suite B5 accepts drop-offs during business hours. No appointment needed for residential drop-offs. Business clients with large volumes should call ahead so we can prepare.

Most items are FREE to recycle, including computers, laptops, phones, tablets, printers, and cables. Flat-screen TVs carry a flat $20 processing fee per unit (any size). CRT (tube-style) TVs and CRT monitors are no longer accepted: please use the Texas Recycles TVs program (for TVs) or Texas Recycles Computers program (for monitors), or your city or county household hazardous waste (HHW) program.

Flat-screen TVs are $20 each, any size. That covers LCD, LED, OLED, QLED, and plasma sets. The fee covers safe disposal of hazardous materials like lead and mercury. CRT (tube-style) TVs and CRT computer monitors are no longer accepted: use the Texas Recycles TVs program (for TVs) or Texas Recycles Computers program (for monitors), or your city or county household hazardous waste (HHW) program.

Eligible reusable drives go through NIST SP 800-88-aligned data sanitization. Drives that are failed, retired, or not approved for reuse are physically disabled in-house so they cannot be reinstalled, then routed to responsible recycling. Business jobs receive a serialized Certificate of Destruction listing each drive.

NIST Special Publication 800-88 is the federal standard for media sanitization published by the National Institute of Standards and Technology. It defines three levels of data destruction: Clear, Purge, and Destroy. EverTrade follows these guidelines to ensure data is irrecoverable.

Yes! Every business client receives a detailed Certificate of Destruction listing device serial numbers, destruction method used, date of destruction, and responsible technician. This documentation is essential for compliance audits and regulatory requirements.

Absolutely. We maintain a documented chain of custody from the moment we pick up your equipment. Devices are stored in locked, GPS-tracked vehicles and secured in our facility until processing, staying in our documented custody the whole way.

Yes. SSDs and NVMe drives require specialized wiping techniques different from traditional hard drives. We use manufacturer-specific secure erase commands and cryptographic erasure for solid-state media. For maximum security, we also offer physical destruction of SSDs.

It's not required, we securely wipe all devices. However, if you prefer to wipe it yourself first, that's fine too. For business clients, we provide certificates documenting our data destruction process regardless.

Not reliably. On older computers with traditional hard drives, a factory reset removes the file index but leaves much of the underlying data recoverable with free software. On modern devices with encrypted SSDs it is more effective, but results vary by manufacturer and configuration. For anything sensitive, use a NIST SP 800-88 aligned wipe or physical destruction, which is what we perform on every drive we receive.

Back up your files first, then sign out of accounts like iCloud, Microsoft, and Google. On Windows, use Settings, then Reset this PC with the 'Remove everything' and 'Clean data' options. On a Mac, use Erase All Content and Settings. For traditional hard drives, dedicated wiping software that overwrites all sectors is more thorough. Or skip all of it: bring the computer to us as-is and we sanitize every drive per NIST SP 800-88 as part of recycling.

EverTrade is not a certifying body, and no vendor can make you HIPAA compliant on its own. We provide electronics recycling and data destruction for healthcare organizations to support HIPAA-related disposal workflows. Our process includes chain of custody documentation, secure data destruction, and Business Associate Agreements (BAAs). Visit our healthcare industry page for details.

We provide secure data destruction with documentation and chain of custody to support your PCI-DSS compliance for the secure disposal of cardholder data. We provide the documentation financial institutions and retailers need to demonstrate compliance during audits.

Our ITAD services support Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) compliance by providing documented data destruction, chain of custody records, and audit trails. Public companies can rely on our certificates to satisfy SOX Section 404 internal controls requirements.

Yes. We work with schools and universities to ensure student records on retired devices are properly destroyed per FERPA requirements. Our certificates provide the documentation institutions need for compliance verification.

No. EverTrade is not R2 certified and has not formally enrolled in the R2 certification process. We follow R2-aligned best practices internally and route all material through R2-certified downstream partners. Our data destruction follows NIST 800-88 guidelines, with full certificates of destruction provided for every job.

Electronics are sorted by type and material. Working devices may be refurbished and resold, extending their life. Non-working items are broken down to recover valuable metals (gold, copper, aluminum) and materials (plastics, glass). Everything is processed through certified downstream partners.

Our goal is landfill diversion. We work with certified downstream processors to ensure maximum material recovery. Hazardous components like CRT glass and batteries are sent to specialized facilities for safe processing, not landfills.

Electronics contain hazardous materials like lead, mercury, cadmium, and brominated flame retardants. We identify and separate these materials during processing and send them to EPA-regulated downstream partner facilities for proper treatment and disposal.

Every ton of electronics we recycle saves approximately 1.5 tons of CO2 emissions compared to mining new materials. We track our environmental impact and can provide sustainability reports for businesses that need to document their green initiatives.

Yes! Business clients can request environmental impact reports documenting weight recycled, materials recovered, and estimated carbon offset. These reports support corporate sustainability goals and ESG reporting requirements.

Yes! We serve businesses of all sizes, from small offices to Fortune 500 companies. Our enterprise ITAD services include dedicated account management, custom reporting, and the capacity to handle large-scale decommissioning projects.

Absolutely. We specialize in data center and server room decommissioning. Our team handles rack servers, blade servers, SAN storage, networking equipment, and UPS systems. We manage the entire process from removal to secure data destruction and recycling.

Yes! Many of our business clients schedule regular pickups, monthly, quarterly, or as-needed. We can set up a recurring service agreement tailored to your organization's disposal volume and schedule preferences.

We serve healthcare, financial services, education, legal, government, oil & gas, manufacturing, data centers, and more. Each industry has unique compliance requirements, visit our industries page to see how we address yours.

Getting pricing is easy and free! Call us at (832) 777-3002, email info@evertradeelectronics.com, or fill out our contact form with details about your equipment. We typically respond with a custom estimate within 2 hours during business hours.

Yes! Our ITAD services include secure data destruction, serial-level asset tracking, detailed reporting, and environmentally responsible disposal. We help businesses retire equipment securely while maintaining full compliance.

We provide comprehensive documentation including Certificates of Recycling, Certificates of Data Destruction, chain of custody records, and detailed asset reports with serial numbers. We support HIPAA, SOX, PCI-DSS, FERPA, and other regulatory requirements.