Year-End Closing Schedule
for Financial Transactions   back to top

Harvard's fiscal year 2001 will end on Friday, June 29. As in the past, we will close the books through a series of steps called "closings." In the paragraphs that follow, you will find closing deadline and submission information for the following financial transactions (click on a transaction to jump to that section of the e-News):

• Accounts Payable web vouchers
  • Petty cash fund settlement
  • New vendor setup
• Credit vouchers (cash receipts)
• Voided checks
• Stopped and redeposited checks
• Foreign currency drafts and wires
• U.S. wire transfers
• Purchasing card transactions
• Travel authorization forms
• Webex reports
  • Webex advance settlements
• General Accounts Receivable billings
• Manual journal entries
  • also offers information on journal naming conventions
• Interdepartmental billings
• Cost transfer requests on Sponsored funds

The deadlines provided are the last allowable dates to submit transactions.

Note that these are the Office of Financial Services deadlines. Since some departments have internal deadlines that differ from these, you should check with your department's financial office to obtain any departmentally defined deadlines.

Reporting tips are also included in this e-News. We expect exceptional reporting demands during the year-end closings. Following our suggestions on reporting will reduce the time required to run your reports.

Accounts Payable Web Vouchers    back  

To be included in FY2001, Web Voucher transactions must be entered and approved by the tub and the related invoices must be received by the Accounts Payable office by 5 p.m. on Friday, June 29, except for foreign currency drafts and wires and US wire transfers (see below).

If you purchase items late in the fiscal year that you want charged in FY2001, be sure to request immediate billing from vendors so that you can meet these deadlines.

Petty Cash Fund Settlement
If you maintain a departmental petty cash fund, you must submit your petty cash log for reimbursement to Accounts Payable by 5 p.m. on Friday, June 29 if you want the charges to be included in FY2001.

New Vendor Setup
New vendors that need to be set up in the system in order to process June web vouchers will be accepted by the Vendor Hotline (495-2000) until Thursday, June 28 at 5 p.m. When making a payment to a new University vendor or individual, you must obtain the required vendor information and call the Vendor Hotline at 5-2000 to set the vendor / individual up in the vendor file. To comply with IRS regulations, the Vendor Hotline must have required vendor information. Incomplete vendor information could result in a delay in payment to the vendor. To determine what information is required, refer to the Web Voucher online help web site.

Credit Vouchers (Cash Receipts)    back

Credit vouchers accompanied by cash or checks will be accepted by the Cash Receipts office until 12 noon on Wednesday, June 27.

Voided Checks    back

All checks that need to be voided and redeposited must be received by Cash Management by 5 p.m. on Friday, June 22 in order for the credit to be included in FY2001.

Stopped and Redeposited Checks    back

All checks that need to be stopped and redeposited must be received by Cash Management by 5 p.m. on Friday, June 22 in order for the credit to be included in FY2001.

Foreign Currency Drafts and Wires    back

Web Voucher payments to be made in foreign currency must be entered and approved by the tub and the related invoices must be received by Cash Management in Holyoke 453 no later than Friday, June 22 at 5 p.m. Note that these invoices must have a bank draft authorization form or a wire transfer form attached to the front of the invoice.

US Wire Transfers    back

Web voucher payments to be wire transferred must be entered and approved by the tub and the related invoices must be received by Cash Management no later than Thursday, June 28 at 5 p.m. Note that these invoices must have a wire transfer authorization form attached to the front of the invoice.

Purchasing Card Transactions    back

In order to ensure that as many PCard transactions as possible that were made in this fiscal year are swept in this fiscal year, there will be three PCard sweeps during the week of June 25.

PCard settlement system users will have until 4 p.m. on each sweep date to log onto the system and review transactions scheduled to be swept that day. However, users are encouraged to log onto the system the week of June 18 and early in the week of June 25 (on Monday and Tuesday) to review as many transactions as possible. Users should try to review all transactions to be swept on Wednesday, June 27 and Thursday, June 28 by Monday or Tuesday of that week.

Users should also review any transactions to be swept on Friday, June 29 as they appear on the system throughout the week. All transactions to be swept at 4 p.m. will be on the system that Friday morning.

The first sweep in the new fiscal year will occur on Thursday, July 19.

Travel Authorization Forms    back

This year the Central Airline Billing Account at the Harvard Travel Center will not be shut down. This means that Travel Authorization Forms (TAFs) will be accepted at the Harvard Travel Center right through closing. However, it is important to note that any airline tickets issued after May 25 using a TAF will NOT appear in FY01 but in FY02. Approvers should not authorize Travel Authorization Forms after May 25 if it is important that charges appear in FY01.

Webex Reports    back

Webex reports not requiring tax pre-audit will be accepted by the Holyoke Travel Office until 5 p.m. on Friday, June 29. Webex reports requiring tax pre-audit will be accepted until 5 p.m. on Wednesday, June 27.

Webex Reports with Advance Settlements
Webex reports with advance settlements will be accepted by the Holyoke Travel Office until 10 a.m. on Wednesday, June 27.

General Accounting Receivable Billing    back

Accounts Receivable (AR) invoices for nonstudent related billings that are to be data entered into the AR system by the AR department will be accepted by that office until 5 p.m. on Wednesday, June 27. As a reminder, the AR department will process invoices for those areas that process less than ten invoices per month. Areas that process more than ten invoices per month are responsible for entering the invoices themselves.

Invoices to be processed by the tubs can be entered into the AR system until 10 a.m. on Monday, July 2.

AR feeds to be included in FY2001 need to be entered into the Oracle AR system by 2 p.m. on Friday, June 29.

Manual Journal Entries    back

Journals are now entered directly by tubs. Please keep in mind the following:

• During the first three closings, journals for the month of June will be posted into the General Ledger at 5 p.m. from Monday through Thursday. (The one exception is July 4, when the University is closed.) Therefore, journals must be entered by 5 p.m. in order to be posted and recorded in the Data Warehouse for the next day. Note that any June journals entered on Friday will not be posted until the following Monday at 5 p.m.
  
  
• During the month of June, the period of July 2001 will also be open. Be careful to select the proper period (JUN-01 or JUL-01) when you are entering a journal.
  
  
• Entries may not be processed to another tub after the second closing without authorization from the financial office of the tub being charged. Individuals processing journals have personal responsibility to ensure that they follow this requirement.
  
  
• A journal should only be reversed by the person who created the journal, or with the permission of the person who created the journal.
  
  
• Based on departmental activity and the reports you run through the month of May, please make any necessary adjustments as early in June as possible.
  
  

• Preparer's tub (UPPERCASE)
• Preparer's org/unit (optional, but preferred) (UPPERCASE)
• Preparer's initials (UPPERCASE)
• Purpose of the journal
• Date
  
  
  Example: CADM FBO CAB Seminar expense recovery 4-10-2001

Interdepartmental Billings    back

All interdepartmental billings -- whether on a journal or via a feed to the General Ledger -- must be processed by the end of the second closing. (GL billing feeds are generally submitted by service centers such as UIS and UOS.) An interdepartmental billing journal should be processed in the third closing only if permission has been obtained from the financial office of the tub being charged.

As described above under the Manual Journal Entries deadlines, during the first three closings, activity for the month of June will be posted to the General Ledger at 5 p.m. from Monday through Thursday. (The one exception is July 4, when the University is closed.) Therefore, journals and feeds must be entered by 5 p.m. in order to be posted and recorded in the Data Warehouse for the next day. Note that any June journals or feeds entered on Friday will not be posted until the following Monday at 5 p.m.

A journal should only be reversed by the person who created the journal, or with the permission of the person who created the journal. Interdepartmental billings should provide a name and contact number on the journal for questions or concerns you may have.

Cost Transfer Requests on Sponsored Funds    back

These dates apply to ALL requests for cost transfers to sponsored funds (funds in the range from 100000-199999). Note that these requests always require supporting documentation.

Cost transfer requests should be submitted directly to OSR. OSR will review the request and documentation for appropriateness. OSR will then enter the journals into the General Ledger.

Reporting Tips   back to top

Schedule your closing reports to run over the weekend whenever possible. HUDINI offers the option of running reports immediately or at a later date. To run an individual report over the weekend, enter the following parameters under "Schedule Options" when submitting your report request:

• for RUN REPORT, choose WEEKLY
• for TIME PERIOD, enter SATURDAY or SUNDAY
• for START DATE , enter Friday's date
• for END DATE, enter Monday's date

In AWS2, when you are at the "Create Reports" screen, choose "Schedule" rather than "Submit" and follow the same steps as above. If you take this approach, your reports will be waiting for you on Monday morning, and you can avoid the delay of running them during Monday.

If you would like closing results, closing periods will be available as selections in the Detail Listing. You will be able to choose the specific close (First Close, Second Close, etc.) from the report period picklist. Note that the start and end dates populated for these periods will display July dates. For these closing periods only, these dates refer to the actual entry dates of fiscal month June entries.

Examples:
First Close: Fiscal June entries from June 1 through July 6
Second Close: Fiscal June entries from July 6 through July 13

Enter all the chart segment parameters you can for a given report request to increase performance for yourself and the whole University. Never use your security view to filter your data. For example, let's say a user wants amounts for a range of objects within the tub and org for which they have a view. Because of their view limitation, the user will get the same result whether tub and org are entered as parameters or not.

However, not including tub and org will make the query take much longer to run, tying up system resources and slowing things down for all users. This is because security rules are applied after the data is retrieved. Therefore, by not specifying tub and org, the query looks for entries for the entire University that meet the specified parameters. The query then displays only the data you are authorized to see.

The most common omission is tub. You may not realize it, but you are searching through all tubs if you leave this parameter out.

You should only use transaction reports like the Detail Listing when you really need to see the transaction line detail. Summary level balances can be retrieved in reports like the Summary Actuals Listing Report, the PER (sponsored only), the Fund Summary Report, the Fund, Gift, & Unrestricted Unexpended Balance Report, and the Budget Variance Report.

Deleting unneeded reports will be a big help in keeping disk space available for report output. For reports you no longer need, you can use the functionality in AWS2 to delete multiple reports at once. This is especially important if you have report output that you know is large.

As of July 1, the Current Fiscal Year to Date option will reflect FY2002. To retrieve FY2001 year to date, you will need to select Prior Fiscal Year to Date from the period picklist.

Locations and Phone Numbers   back to top

• If the reimbursee spent the exact amount of his cash advance, then this new reimbursement will cancel out the cash advance and Travel will clear the account.
• If the reimbursee spent more than her cash advance, then she will be reimbursed for the difference.
• If the reimbursee spent less than his cash advance, then he should attach a check made out to Harvard University for the difference to the cover sheet (the WV Receipt Report or the Universal Form), and send the package to Travel office.

Q. How can I have a reimbursement issued as a direct deposit instead of a check?
A. Direct deposit functionality for reimbursements should be available in Web Voucher sometime in June. Once this feature is up and running, all you will need to do is choose "Direct Deposit" as the reimbursee's address when selecting the reimbursee in the Supplier field. If the reimbursee has a valid email address set up in the Web Voucher system, they will have an email sent to them notifying them of the amount credited to their account and the business purpose of the reimbursement (more information on this will be available in an upcoming e-News).

Q. Why can't I set up a 1042S vendor over the phone?
A. The Tax Department requires that all 1042S vendors (non-U.S. citizens) have a Foreign National Information Form or a copy of the Universal Expense Reimbursement form (which contains the required foreign national information) on file prior to the vendor being set up in the system.

Q. Should nonemployees be reimbursed through Web Voucher Reimbursement or through a standard Web Voucher with the NERF form?
A. All reimbursements, whether for employees or nonemployees, should now be processed by choosing "Create Reimbursement" from the Web Voucher main menu. If you are creating a reimbursement for a nonemployee, the NERF form is no longer needed. The "1042S" info that was captured on the old NERF (also found on the FNIF) is on the HUUEF. The vendor hotline will accept a HUUEF -- just as they did the NERF -- when setting up foreign individuals. NERFs should not be used after May 31, 2001.

Q. How do I handle credits on my AmEx bill?
A. To assign AmEx credits back to Harvard, use "Create an Amex Credit" from the WV main menu. Enter the amount of the credit as a positive number and the account coding that you would like credited. Multiple credits can be processed on a single AmEx credit voucher, as long as they're all for the same card.

Q. What does the error "supplier must not be an employee" mean?
A. You have tried to enter an employee into the supplier field of a regular web voucher. Since regular web vouchers are only intended for vendor payments (and nonreimbursement payments to employees need to be tracked differently for tax purposes), the system has stopped you from submitting that voucher.

• If you are trying to reimburse an employee, you should use "Create Reimbursement" from the WV main menu
• If you are trying to pay an employee for a special service, you should use the extra compensation form so that it goes through payroll.

Q. Where should I send WebEx forms? What records need to be stored in local files?
A. All appropriate cover sheets and receipts for Web Voucher reimbursements, AmEx payments or credits, or advance requests should be sent to the Travel Office, 373 Holyoke Center. Duplicate copies of these may be kept locally at the discretion of your local financial office.

Q. What field indicates payment to AmEx, so that AmEx gets paid and not the traveler?
A. The name in the Supplier field identifies whom the check will be sent to.

Q. Which fields are case sensitive?
A. The approver and cardholder fields are case sensitive and names are listed in the form of "Lastname, Firstname." The vendor field is not case sensitive. When searching the vendor field for an individual, it will be in the form of "Firstname Lastname." For a corporate vendor, it will be in the form "ABC OFFICE SUPPLIES."

Q. What is my initial login?
A. Your initial login is your Harvard ID number; your initial password is the first four letters of your last name, followed by the day of the month your were born, followed by the year you were born (for example, COOK311962). The login provides access to both vendor payment and reimbursement screens in Web Voucher.

Q. What does "pl/sql error" mean?
A. This error message usually appears if you enter any punctuation in the Supplier field.

Q. How do I get rid of all of these extra notifications?
A. Purely informational notifications that say a voucher "…has been forwarded to" or "…has been approved" will be automatically deleted after five days. To get rid of other types of notifications, or to get rid of the above sooner than five days, click on the notification to open it and then click the "Close" button to remove it from your system.

Q. Why do the billing lines disappear when I click on Copy Line?
A. You are probably not clicking on Apply Changes before you click on Copy Line. If you don't apply changes first, the system doesn't know what to copy and blanks out all of the lines. You can often get the old data back by using Netscape's Back button.

Q. Do I need to click Apply Changes between every copy line?
A. If you want to create a voucher with many lines, you can click on Apply Changes after creating the first line, then click on Copy Lines as many times as needed, as long as you haven't made any other changes to the web voucher.

Q. How do I reassign a voucher to another approver?
A. Open the notification for that voucher and click on the "Reassign" button at the bottom of the screen. A new area will appear that lets you choose whom you want to reassign the voucher to. Click on the list of values button to open a search window, then enter the last name of the new approver in the search field. After finding the right person, click on their name.

Q. Is there a way to reprint a voucher?
A. You can reprint a voucher by choosing "Reprint Unapproved Web Voucher" from the WV main menu. This will work for both vendor payments and reimbursements, but only until the voucher has been approved.

Q. Can approvers print unapproved web vouchers?
A. Yes, but not after they've approved the vouchers. Prior to approval, web vouchers can be reprinted using the "Reprint Unapproved Web Vouchers" option from the main menu. If an approver makes changes to a web voucher, it is recommended that they use the Netscape print option to print a copy of their approval screen before clicking on Approve.

Q. Why doesn't the approval screen automatically go back to the worklist after I approve a Web Voucher reimbursement?
A. This gives the approver a chance to print the approval screen, thereby capturing any changes they may have made. The printout can then be attached to the cover sheet.

Q. What STAR forms need to be used in the WebEx world?
The American Express Corporate Card Application and Missing Receipt Affidavit are still usable in the Web Voucher reimbursement process. The NERF and STAR Check Request Forms will be obsolete after May 31. NERF is no longer needed as all reimbursements (whether for employees or nonemployees) should go through "Create Reimbursement" on the WV main menu, and the functions of the check request form are handled when the preparer chooses the reimbursee's address in WV. All other WV forms relate to vendor payments, not reimbursements.

Q. How do I process a credit memo?
A. Credit memos should no longer be processed using the credit memo form. All credit memos should now be entered into the Web Voucher system using "Create Credit Memo" from the WV main menu.

If you have other Web Voucher questions, please call the Helpdesk at 6-2001 or send them to Accounts Payable at fad_askap@harvard.edu. Future issues of the e-News will present other frequently asked questions.

Three New Financial
Accounting Papers Announced   back to top

At their early May meeting, the Financial Deans approved three new or revised University financial papers. They are:

Use of Object Code Series 8450: Expenses Ineligible for Federal Reimbursement
This is a restatement of an existing policy. It simply clarifies which 4-digit object codes are in the series (in the past there was only class 46) and details the reason / background for this. An appendix listing the most common expenses is included. The full text of the policy is available here.

Telecommunication Service Payments
This replaces the ACTTS paper entitled Internet Service Provider Payments, dated March 1999. The policy was expanded to include payments made by Harvard on behalf of an employee for telecommunication services including cellular phones, personal computers, and Internet / cable television service. Language was added to address tub local policies since several tubs make their policy more restrictive (i.e., not allowing Internet charges, etc.) The full text of the policy is available here.

Independent Contractor Payment Processing
The paper carries forward the policies / procedures regarding these types of payments, which were previously addressed in the SNERF and NERF papers. With the decommission of STAR and changes in Web Voucher these papers are no longer current and will be pulled from the VPF web site. It is a companion to Individual Independent Contractor / Consultant Classification and Procedures. The full text of the policy is available here.

Key point: Even though independent contractors / consultants may prefer to be separately reimbursed for expenses because it simplifies their own tax filling, it is standard industry practice to combine professional fees and reimbursable expenses on one invoice. This is more efficient for Harvard since it reduces the number of transactions and imaged documents required.

Registration Open for FAD Training
Classes through August 31   back to top

Earlier this week, registration opened for FAD Training classes offered through August 31, 2001. Please use the table below to find out about the courses we currently offer and how to sign up through your local training registrars.

About the e-News   back to top

The Financial Administration publishes this semi-monthly electronic newsletter for users of Harvard University's financial systems, policies, and procedures. Generally, the e-News is published on the 12th and 26th of each month.

It contains:

• updates on projects underway to build or improve University financial systems;
• information about new University financial policies, procedures, and forms;
• reminders about upcoming deadlines and cut-over dates;
• tips and tricks for working more easily or productively.

We welcome questions and suggestions for improvement from readers. If your questions are of general interest, we will answer them in future issues.

Please send comments, questions, or suggestions for improvement by email to us at: fad_communications@harvard.edu

How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe from the e-News    back to top

The e-News, including all back issues and an index by topic, is available to anyone with internet access at: http://vpf-web.harvard.edu/training/enews.html. No subscription or password is needed.

When we publish each issue, we send out a notification email to all users of Oracle financials, STAR, the Budget Tools, and the Data Warehouse. Because there are nearly 5,000 users, we compile and maintain this "listproc" in an automated way. The Harvard Data Warehouse and the STAR security module are queried for all registered users. Twice a month, the queries are re-run to pick up new users. Disabled or terminated users automatically drop off. Duplicates between systems are eliminated. As a final step, email addresses are pulled from the HUID system, which is fed by the UIS Telecommunications Directory.

If you do not actively use Harvard University financial systems and find the semi-monthly notification email bothersome, you should ask your local security administrator or financial office to disable your financial system access. This is the only way to get off the listproc.

If you are an active user of Harvard financial systems, but do not receive the notification email, it is likely there is no email address listed for you in the UIS Telecommunications Directory. You can submit an email address, or change it, in three ways:

1. Via the directory coordinator for your department. This contact -- often, but not always, your department administrator -- is responsible for updating directory information throughout the year, whenever staff contact information changes. This info is fed into the online directory and to the telephone operators the next business day.

2. On the update directory page on the UIS web site.

3. FAS faculty and staff should update their records via the FAS Portal. The Portal requires a Harvard University personal identification number (PIN). PINs and supporting documentation are available on the PIN Administation site at www.pin1.harvard.edu.