Bu$ine$$ Matter$
May
2014
The monthly newsletter of OHIO Finance and Human Resources
New Stories ! ! !
Business Forum
1
Year-End Schedule
2
Budget Deadlines
2
Petty Cash / Change
Fund Recon
2
The April 2014 Financial Management System (FMS) close reports are now
available, to those of you who are report recipients, at:
http://www.ohio.edu/ebiz/ebiz.html.
Be sure to read below for important information related to your reports and
other Finance services. If you need assistance accessing your reports or
FMS in general, please contact the IT Service Desk at: 593-1222. If you
have further questions or comments, please email fmsreporting@ohio.edu.
Reappointment
Information
3
BobcatBUY FY15
3
PCard Distribution
4
Comprehensive
Master Plan
4
Print Responsibly
Billing Reminder
Helpful Hints
4
5
Monthly
Reminders!!!
5
Prior Stories!!!
Do you need to refer
to a prior story?
Click on the
New Stories
Business Forum
You’re invited! The first OHIO Business Forum will be held on Wednesday,
May 28th from 3:00 – 5:00 PM in Walter 135. This is a quarterly
meeting sponsored by the Finance and Human Resources (HR) divisions to
share information and enhance communication with any employees who
have respective responsibilities at the university. While we will be sending
email invitations to employees with responsibilities in any of the financial
and HR systems, please feel free to spread the word to any of your
colleagues who would be interested in attending.
Topics
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applicable month.
http://www.ohio.edu/fi
nance/gafr/business
matters.cfm
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for the May 28 meeting include:
Fiscal Year End & R12 cutover details
Independent Contractor processing
Human Resource Update
o Employee Service Center
o HR Liaison Program
o ACA (Affordable Care Act)
o I9 Processing
OIT: Update on Email change occurring this summer
Reminders
o Budget Reminders
o Intro to ALTOUR – the university’s new preferred travel
provider
o Purchasing Card (PCard) distribution reminder
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FY14 Year End Close Schedule
The FY14 year end close calendar draft (as of 5/15/14) is available on the Finance website at:
http://www.ohio.edu/finance/gafr/fiscalyearendclosing.cfm
Please refer to the calendar for important dates related to year end processing for Finance transactions.
Additionally, this calendar includes dates related to the Oracle R12 cutover
Close dates are as follows:
June - 1st Close:
June - 2nd Close:
June - 3rd Close:
July close
July
July
July
July
3
18
25
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Downtime for Oracle R12 upgrade:
Wednesday, July 30th through morning of Thursday, August 7th
Budget deadlines
The deadlines for submission of budget packets are:
June 13 - Group A
June 20 – Group B
June 27 – Group C
The FY15 budgets are scheduled to be loaded to Oracle by August 20, 2014.
Petty Cash Fund and Change Fund Reconciliations:
The General Accounting Office must have the correct balance of your petty cash or change fund as of June
30, 2014. This information is needed to finalize fiscal year 2014 for financial statement purposes.
The General Accounting Office will send an e-mail during mid-June to all custodians who maintain a petty
cash or change fund. Information, instructions and a reconciliation form will be included in this e-mail.
Your fund must be reconciled on Monday, June 30, 2014. The completed reconciliation form should be
submitted to Nathan Hogue at: hoguen@ohio.edu
Please Note: Petty cash funds must be in balance on June 30, 2014. To properly record your fiscal year
2014 expenses, you will need to process a Direct Payment form to replenish your petty cash fund to the
established amount, for the beginning of the new fiscal year.
If you have any questions, please contact Nathan Hogue: 597-3133 or hoguen@ohio.edu.
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Reappointment Information
Reappointment will open on April 28th and will close June 10th at Midnight. Reappointments must be
completed no later than midnight June 10th. Payroll will be offering open labs for reappointment processing
on the following dates and times in Room 254 at HRTC.
Labs:
May 19th – open lab 9-11, Payroll available for assistance during all open lab hours
June 6th – open lab 2-5, Payroll available for assistance during all open lab hours
If you have any questions, you may contact the following payroll employees: Bridget Driggs (593-1861,
driggsb@ohio.edu) or Robin Zeisler (593-1857, zeislerr@ohio.edu).
FY15 Pre Entry in BobcatBUY
The July 2014 accounting period is now open in BobcatBUY (BCB) for “Pre Entry” of requests for the new
fiscal year. While the orders (catalog, non-catalog, Blanket, Service, etc.) will not be released until July 1 or
after, this will allow flexibility in entering your orders in advance over the next several weeks for the new
fiscal year. You will notice that the Accounting Date/Billing Date will be turned on temporarily as a
mandatory field that you must enter in BCB so as not to mix or confuse FY14 and FY15 transactions. This
will be disabled and return to normal after Year End close.
A few important notes about entering requisitions and direct payments (DP):
 Accounting Date is a mandatory field during this entry period.
o For an FY14 transaction, enter the current date for the requisition.
o For an FY15 transaction, enter July 1, 2014 as the accounting date. Do not enter the date of
the invoice as the accounting date.
 Workflow Processing:
o For items dated June 30th or prior, workflow processing will flow as normal.
o For items dated July 1st or later, all approval steps up to final funds validation will occur; however
the Requisition or DP will route to a special “Future Fiscal Year Approval” Bucket and will be
held until released by Procurement beginning 7/1/14.

NOTE: if the user mistakenly enters the wrong accounting date for FY14/FY15 expenditures, as
part of the workflow approval process, the Buyer or Commodity Manager will change the
accounting date as appropriate and add a comment for the user in the BCB request.
FY15 payments required by contract to be made prior to July 1st:
o Please contact Finance Customer Care for assistance. Only payments of $50,000 or above can be
accrued to the next Fiscal Year.
Beginning on July 1st and continuing through the first week of July, Procurement Services will begin
releasing staged FY15 requisitions and DPs in the order in which they were received.
o For requisitions, a Purchase Order will be created and sent to the supplier via BCB.
o For a direct payment, the request will assume its normal workflow into the AP Invoice workflow
bucket.
Finally, if a PO must be issued before July 1st in order to maintain a service or related contract, the funds
will be encumbered at the PO issuance in FY14 and the purchase order roll forward to FY15 with NO budget.
The unexpended funds will roll to the top level org account so be sure to check with your CFAO/FMG prior to
requesting a FY15 PO that must be issued in FY14.
Please do not hesitate to contact Finance Customer Care if you have any questions.
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PCard Distribution
Purchasing card (PCard) distribution begins on Monday, May 19th. As a reminder, all existing PCards and controlled value
cards, regardless of expiration date embossed on the cards, will expire on June 30. Cards are being distributed either in
the planning units, at Bobcat Depot in Baker Center, or at Finance Customer Care Center in WUSOC. Please refer to
http://www.ohio.edu/compass/stories/13-14/4/2014-Pcard-distribution.cfm for information about your planning unit’s
distribution method, along with the planning unit’s point of contact.
If you have a cardholder who will be away from campus during distribution period, please direct them to the unit’s contact
to make arrangements.
Update to Comprehensive Master Plan
The University will be updating our 2006 campus master plan and will be issuing a request for proposal
(RFP) for a consultant team to assist us. This effort includes three main objectives:
1. Update/refresh the 2006 Athens Campus Master Plan with consideration of capital plan vision,
existing planning initiatives and guidance of the University’s Strategic Plan.
2. Support near-term planning needs on projects that have a transformational impact on the overall
comprehensive plan.
3. Develop a master plan for our newly acquired campus in Dublin, Ohio.
We expect to have a consultant on board in July. We also anticipate this to be a year and a half process
that will engage university and community stakeholders.
Questions regarding this effort should be directed to Shawna Bolin, Director of University Planning and
Space Management.
Print Responsibly Billing Reminder
Print Responsibly billings occur quarterly in July, October, January, and April of each year. Files are released to
CFAOs and FMGs for review prior to the upload to Oracle. Please contact Chad Burkett if you have any
questions at Burkett@ohio.edu.
Helpful Hints and Shortcuts:
When creating any accounting transaction, please verify the account numbers in advance. We have created the
“Account Verification Tool” that will check your multi-line form account numbers for you. You can access this
tool via the following link. http://www.ohio.edu/finance/gafr/gafr.cfm
IMPORTANT: DO NOT SAVE THE ACCOUNT VERIFICATION TOOL TO YOUR DESKTOP AS IT
IS UPDATED WEEKLY AND YOU WILL NOT HAVE UP TO DATE INFORMATION!!!
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Another handy tool available on the web is Cost Center Lookup (cclookup). You may search by project number,
by a combination of an account number, or by word. Example: Project UN0000000, Combination 010-040018010, or the word ‘Provost’. You can access cc-lookup via the following link,
http://portal.finance.ohiou.edu/cclookup/cclookup
Both tools will allow you to see all segment combinations that are listed as valid in our system at the present time.
If you have any questions or concerns please contact the General Accounting and Financial Report office at:
finance@ohio.edu.
Monthly Reminders!
TRANSACTION DEADLINES:
 All Accounting Corrections are due in Finance within 60 days of the FMS effective date. Example: A
transaction posting on FMS January 31, 2012 should have an Accounting Correction completed by April
1, 2012. If the correction is past 60 days an exception request form MUST be completed.
 All invoices for payment, Internal Billing Authorizations, External Billings, etc. are due in Finance within
30 days of the date of service. Example: An Internal Billing for a service performed on January 31, 2012
should be completed by March 1, 2012.
 Departments that do not bill in a timely manner (i.e. within 30 days from the time of service) may be
subject to losing that income. If the billing department has extenuating circumstances that prevent billing
within the 30-day time frame please contact general account and financial reporting at: finance@ohio.edu
 Please note that grant accounts have stricter deadlines and the department with responsibility for the grant
account should make sure departments charging those accounts submit the billings within the allowable
timeframe for the grant.
FINANCE ONLINE TRAINING: Visit our Finance Training web site.
You will find Finance Online Training demos, Practice Your Skills and handouts. The training topics include
PCard/Concur, Travel, Financial Management System (FMS), and WorkForce. The Finance Training web site
contains information on accessing and using Oracle FMS, applying for a purchasing card, reviewing travel
policies and forms, Purchase Order Lookup, Invoice Payments, approving Work Force timesheets, and more. We
are currently working on additional training demos covering other Finance topics which will be available soon.
You may access the Finance Training web site at: http://www.ohio.edu/finance/customercare/training.cfm
REPORT DISTRIBUTION MAINTENANCE: If someone in your area changes jobs or leaves the university
please ask your planning unit’s FMG to complete a report distribution maintenance form or email any questions
to: fmsreporting@ohio.edu . The report distribution maintenance form is located at:
http://www.ohio.edu/finance/customercare/controller_forms.cfm
ACCOUNT MAINTENANCE/ADDITIONS: If you need any type of account maintenance (accounts or cost
centers added, or disabled) please complete a new account/account maintenance form and submit to
fmsreporting@ohio.edu. The new account/account maintenance form is located at:
http://www.ohio.edu/finance/customercare/controller_forms.cfm
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ACCESS TO FMS: Please contact fmsreporting@ohio.edu to request online access to FMS. This request
should come from the supervisor. Departments are responsible for making sure the employee completes the
online training modules PRIOR to accessing the system.
PREVIOUS ISSUES OF BUSINESS MATTERS: Previous issues of Business Matters can be found at:
http://www.ohio.edu/finance/gafr/businessmatters.cfm.
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