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April 2011

The Administrative Systems eNews is a monthly electronic newsletter for users of Harvard's financial, human resources, and reporting systems.

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Contact us at: admin_systems_enews@harvard.edu or via the UIS Helpdesk at 6-2001

University Financial Services Announces Changes to its Customer Service Model

In response to customer feedback and in an effort to streamline communication channels,University Financials Services (UFS) will be moving to a Subject Matter Expert model and elminating the current Cluster focus model effective Monday, May 9th. Users will be able to reach customer service for the following departments by calling one number and speaking to a Subject Matter Expert (SME):

UFS Customer Service Area If you used to call Now call Or e-mail
Accounts Payable 617-495-8500 617-495-8500 ap_customerservice@harvard.edu
HCOM ------- 617-495-8500 hcom@harvard.edu
Vendor Setup 617-495-2000 617-495-8500 vendordsetup_ufs@harvard.edu
Payroll 617-495-3001 617-495-8500 ufs_crt@harvard.edu
Nonresident Alien Tax Compliance 617-496-6800 617-495-8500 nratax_ufs@harvard.edu
PCard Administration 617-496-2273 617-495-8500 pcard@harvard.edu

Each area will now be answered by a customer service subject matter expert (SME); you will also have the ability to leave a voicemail for one of the SME's in the event that no one is available to take your call. Any emails sent to the above email addresses will also be answered by the SME's.

What's Changing?

  • Cluster phones and emails will be routed to the above phone numbers and emails and will be addressed by the SMEs for the respective areas
  • To allow for daily briefings we will be changing our phone/front desk hours and will be available from 9:15-5:00 pm daily
  • Implementation of Remedy support-tracking system to allow for better tracking of calls which will help us evaluate staffing and assess internal and external training needs
  • Ability to leave a voice mail message to avoid a long wait time during peak demand
  • Inclusion of "Tips and Tricks" during phone hold times

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Joanne Jordan (617-496-1994) or Marc Willis (617-496-5224). We welcome your ongoing suggestions and feedback.

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Human Resources Reporting News

  • CREW Report Spotlight - HRTRNDP232 - Departmental - Training Administration (Costing)
    • NEW report allows you to look up departmental training costs based on the department the employee worked in during the time the training was taken, including previous fiscal year data.
    • This report can assist with predicting year end training costs, as well as modeling future training costs and needs.
Category Production Date Report Name Description
Human Resources Rel 7.3 (3/21/11) HRTRNDP232 - Departmental - Training Administration (Costing) NEW report, gives departments the ability to look-up departmental training costs for employees based on the department the employee worked in at the time the course was taken.

Security Roles: HDW^HRUNV^TUB^Job No Comp
HDW^PUB^TUB^Reports User
HDW^HRUNV^TUB^Training Admin

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact the UIS Helpdesk at 496-2001 and ask the attendant to log a ticket to the HHR-Reporting Team.

Tag; CREW

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New Desktop Standards

Updated desktop standards for the University's administrative systems are now available on ABLE. They include the following:

  • Updates for minimum and recommended hardware
  • Internet Explorer 8.0 as the supported browser instead of IE 7.0
  • Addition of Windows 7/32 bit for operating system where applicable. The 32-bit restriction is necessary as current versions of Oracle Financials and PeopleSoft are not certified with 64-bit.
  • No change to the Macintosh operating system or Safari versions as these are the only versions that Oracle certifies with current versions of Oracle Financials and PeopleSoft.
  • Update to the version of the desktop JRE for the Financials to 1.6.0_24 as CAIT desktops will be on this version in April
  • Addition of desktop standards for the ID Card and PhotoApp applications

If you have any questions or concerns regarding the Desktop Standards, please contact the UIS Help Desk at 496-2001 or via email.

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New Travel Portal Website Available!

 

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Electronic Check Deposit Procedures and Guidelines

The Cash Receipts Office has been depositing U.S. checks electronically since September. This has resulted in some process changes and the office would like to update departments on new and existing guidelines on the preparation and submission of deposits.

  1. There are different processing requirements for currency categories and each should be put on a separate credit voucher. The office will be revamping the credit voucher within the next couple of months to match the categories below. If you are unsure which category an item falls into, put the deposit on a separate credit voucher and the Cash Receipts Office will determine how to process it.
    There are 7 categories of deposit:
    U.S. cash
    U.S. checks
    Canadian checks in U.S. dollars
    Canadian checks in Canadian currency
    "Note Checks" - foreign currency drawn on a U.S. bank but check has no account or routing number
    Foreign checks in U.S. dollars
    Foreign checks in foreign currency
  2. Handwritten credit vouchers are often difficult to read. The preference is for users to type the data; this will help to insure that your data is correctly recorded in the general ledger. You can download an Excel version of the current credit voucher from Able/Forms.
  3. Populating the "Explanation of Credit" box or recording on separate lines checks that all have the same GL coding is not a requirement of the Cash Receipts Office. If you need to have an explanation in the GL for your own internal purposes, please keep it short. If you have multiple checks with the same GL coding, the preference is that you add them up and put the total on one line. This will save data entry time for the Cash Receipts staff and space in the GL.
  4. Please do not send backup with your deposit (i.e. check stub, invoice, letters, envelope that the check came in); this information is not needed by Cash Receipts. It should be kept in your facility. All that is needed by Cash Receipts with the credit voucher is the tape.
  5. Please do not staple or tape checks or currency. Attach your check(s) to the credit voucher with a paper clip.
  6. Cash Receipts prefers to receive your credit vouchers as soon as you receive the checks/currency. The office often receives an uptick in vouchers on the last day of the month and Cash Receipts cannot guarantee that those end of month deposits will be processed for that same month. If you meet the closing dates below, barring any snow day closures, the office will process your deposit within the same month. If your deposit is received after the guarantee date, the office will try to process it within the same month but cannot guarantee that it will happen.
    1. For regular deposits - the guarantee date is 5:00 p.m. 2 business days before the last business day of the month (i.e., 5 p.m. Wednesday if Friday is the last business day of the month).
    2. For Departmentals or Taxable Sales deposits - the guarantee date is 5:00 p.m. on the last business day of the month.

If you have any questions, please contact the Cash Receipts Office at 6-8332.

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Sponsored System Updates

GMAS

The next GMAS release (1_28) is scheduled for Saturday, March 12, 2011. Highlights of the release include:

  • A new dashboard on the GMAS homepage displays all sponsor notices received by the central, sponsored offices that have yet to be awarded.
  • Ability to search Grants.gov opportunities from the GMAS homepage and see if they are supported via system-to-system.
  • Rename <Initiate internal review> button to <Lock & route for signatures>. This new title clarifies the workflow of proposals from departments to approvers.

As always, details on the enhancements and bug fixes within the release will be available in the Release Notes posted on the FSS GMAS webpage.

HIRBERT

HIRBERT has a release (1.0.14) scheduled for Saturday, March 19, 2011. Details about the release will be made available in the Release Notes on the FSS HIRBERT webpage.

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Upcoming Releases

FINDINI Release Schedule

A software release to the Oracle Financial Applications, known as a "FINDINI release", is done every two to four months. Each upgrade introduces needed bug fixes, enhancements, and technical upgrades into Harvard's financial systems. Generally, releases are performed on weekends to assure maximum availability during the business week. Most outages occur from 6 pm Friday evening-6 am Monday morning.

The next FINDINI release, 3.2.14, is tentatively scheduled for the weekend of June 17-20, 2011. Details will be available in an upcoming e-News.

The Oracle Financial Applications are:

CREW FIN Releases

The Common Reporting Environment for the Warehouse (CREW) is a reporting system that draws data from a variety of sources which are updated on a nightly basis. Users can submit report requests for immediate processing or schedule reports to automatically run on a recurring basis. Types of CREW reports include financial, budget, receivables, HR management, benefits, costing, payroll, pension, security, grants management, and sponsored reports.

The next CREW FIN release, 3.2.14, is tenatively scheduled for for the weekend of June 17-20, 2011. Details will be available in an upcoming e-News.

HR (PeopleSoft) and CREW HR Release 29

The next PeopleSoft Release (HR 29) is scheduled for May 20-23, 2011. Details will be available in an upcoming e-News.

The CREW HR 29.0 Release is scheduled for May 20-23, 2011. Details will be available in an upcoming e-News.

CREW Reports

In addition to the CREW Financial and CREW HR releases which correspond with the FINDINI and HR releases listed above, changes and enhancements to new and existing CREW reports are also released the 3rd weekend of each month.

Release Number Dates Notes
7.4 4/15/11  
7.5 5/20/11  
7.6 6/17/11  
7.7 7/15/11  
7.8 8/19/11  
7.9 9/16/11  
7.10 10/14/11  
7.11 11/18/11  
7.12 12/16/11  

Sponsored Systems Releases

The GMAS release (1_28) was deployed on Saturday, March 12, 2011. As always see the Release Notes about releases to date.
The HIRBERT release was deployed on Saturday, March 19, 2011. As usual, please see the Release Notes for details about releases to date.

HUBS Releases

The Harvard University Budgeting Sytems (HUBS) is a set of web-based Oracle Hyperion Planning applications used for budget data entry, estimates, annotations, reporting, and submission associated with the annual budget and planning cycles.

The next major HUBS release, Release 1.0.10, is tenatively scheduled for June 2011. Details will be available in an upcoming e-News.

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About the e-News

The Center for Workplace Development publishes this electronic newsletter for users of Harvard University's financial, HR, and reporting systems, policies, and procedures. The e-News is generally published on or around the 15th of each month.

It contains:

  • updates on projects underway to build or improve University administrative systems;
  • information about new University 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: admin_systems_enews@harvard.edu.

For information about subscribing or unsubscribing to the eNews notifications, visit our who gets the eNews page.

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