Fiscal Year 1998 Closeout Instructions In Reply Refer To: Mail Stop 442 August 12, 1998 MEMORANDUM To: All Water Resources Division Offices From: Kelly L. Bradley Chief, Financial Operations and Reporting Section Subject: Fiscal Year 1998 Closeout Instructions Reply Requested by Tuesday, October 6, 1998 Reply Requested by Wednesday, October 7, 1998 This memorandum outlines several key areas concerning closeout policy and procedures for Fiscal Year (FY) 1998. Specific guidance on the processing of closing adjustments in the Administrative Information System (AIS) and the Federal Financial System (FFS) will be issued separately. The information in these Water Resources Division (WRD) memoranda and that contained in the Office of Financial Management's (OFM) closeout memorandum should be used together for complete guidance. The automated distribution of the September 1998 accounting reports is scheduled on the afternoon of Monday, October 5, 1998. These reports include the report numbers 286, 285, 316, 268, 271 and 289. Cost centers are encouraged to print their reports as soon as they are received. The information about report distribution and availability can be obtained by dialing (703) 648- 7253, or can be accessed in MOSAIC under http://www.usgs.gov: 8888/ops/finance/mthlschd. We plan to send an email message to all administrative officers when the reports have been distributed. We do not anticipate the need for many closeout adjustments this fiscal year as all sites: (a) are now using remote data entry; (b) should be reconciling and correcting data entry errors when recognized; and (c) will have additional time (beyond September 30) for the entry of documents into the FFS. We are requiring that offices enter their closeout adjustments twice (once in the Federal Financial System (FFS) and once in the Administrative Information System (AIS)); but, because the volume will be small, this should not be a hardship. The entry into AIS is necessary to create the Adjustment Drawdown Report. The entry into FFS is required to officially record the adjustment. This fiscal year some Cost Centers will be permitted to process the adjustment in FFS. Cost Centers who are approved to have this authority will be notified at a later date. Cost Centers will enter their adjustment documents on line in FFS, applying approvals and processing the document with a “V” for verification and “W”. Please be aware, if there are errors in the document it will not process. If the document is not processed with a “W” receiving a message “document accepted pass 2” the adjustment will not be reflected in your closeout balance. The due date for the entry of closeout adjustments (in both systems) is close of business Tuesday, October 6, 1998. Cost centers not authorized to process their adjustments in FFS will enter the data in FFS putting the documents on hold “H” for further processing by Headquarters. (Headquarters personnel will process the FFS documents after review of the supporting documentation.) The due date for the entry of closeout adjustments (in both systems) is close of business Tuesday, October 6, 1998. Hard copy documentation to support all adjustments must be received by the Headquarters office no later than Wednesday, October 7, 1998. This includes all cost centers including those with authority to process their documents in FFS. Please be sure to designate Kelly Bradley as the contact person with telephone number (703) 648-5040 on the express mail air bill. Your hard copy documentation should be numbered to agree with the AIS Adjustment Drawdown Report and a copy of the Adjustment Drawdown Report should be submitted with your hard copy documentation. The Adjustment Drawdown Report will reflect how each cost center believes they have closed after adjustments are processed. A negative response is required if an office is submitting no adjustments as well as an AIS Adjustment Drawdown Report must be populated and submitted. FFS Report 286A, Net Monthly Summary of Project and Customer, is the best report to scan for initial review of project and cost center financial results. It shows the status of authorizations, obligations and balances. Those cost centers with activity in more than one fund type should make sure that they have reports for all fund codes (0804, 0804D, 0804X, 1082, etc.). OTHER DIVISION CLOSEOUT DATES The Hydrologic Instrumentation Facility (HIF) closeout date is September 10, 1998. Any requests for equipment or warehouse supplies after that date will be charged to FY 1999 funds. Please contact Brenda Burke (blburke) or Shera Krieger (skrieger) if you have questions regarding the HIF. The National Water Quality Laboratory (NWQL) closeout date is September 11, 1998. Any samples or requests for field supplies received by the NWQL through close of business September 11, 1998, will be charged to FY 1998 funds. Any samples or requests for supplies received after that date will be charged to FY 1999 funds. Please contact Debi Treseder (treseder) if you have questions regarding the NWQL. The Ocala Lab closeout date is September 18, 1998. Any sample requests or services requested after that date will be charged to FY 1999 funds. Please contact Bob Kirkland (kirkland) or Ruth Lastinger (rlasting) if you have questions regarding the Ocala Lab. PAYROLL Payroll data through pay period 19 (ending September 12, 1998) will be available for adjustment through the Personnel Resource Utilization System (PRUS). Adjustments must be made by 3:00 EST on Friday, October 2, 1998. The preliminary Report 268 will contain actual expenditure data for pay period 20 (ending September 26, 1998). Adjustments to pay period 20 data must be processed with a (4A) reversing accrual document, reflecting the account to be charged and the account to be credited. A standard voucher document (4S) must also be prepared and submitted to HQ along with your closeout package. The (4S) document will be processed in FY 99 after the 4A document as reversed. The data for pay period 20 is expected to be uploaded into FFS on October 2, 1998. Project account balances will not reflect this data until that date. Pay period 21 data will be automatically projected and entered into the FFS as an accrual for basic salary costs and related benefits for Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, September 27 through 30, 1998. This projection is 30% of the actual salary costs recorded in the basic salary object classes for pay period 20. (Refer to the OFM closeout memorandum for specific instructions on which object classes must be manually accrued because they will not be projected.) Adjustments to projected payroll costs for Sunday, September 27, 1998, Monday, September 28, 1998, Tuesday, September 29, 1998, and Wednesday, September 30, 1998, must be processed as accrued expenditures, (4A) document type. Salary costs for employees entering on duty and employees terminated must be accrued. Salary and benefits for intermittent employees should be reviewed and accrued for actual work performed. These projections are expected to be entered into the FFS on October 6, 1998. Project account balances will not reflect this data until that date. Cost Centers concerned with pay period 21 data being accurate for reimbursable customer reporting or to reflect correct data for employees working under the Alternative Work Schedule (AWS) should use the (4A) reversing accrual document to record the adjustment. The adjustment can be done at a summary level by account. ACCOUNT AUTHORIZATIONS Variances between account authorizations on the FFS Reports (286 and 316) and your local (AIS) records should be identified at the project, customer, and agreement levels. Corrections should be documented using the format provided in Attachment 1. All corrections must be given in both NET and GROSS funds. The NET funds are the amounts burdened in the FFS. The corrections should be made in the AIS and transferred by close of business, Tuesday, October 6, 1998. Due to the shortened closeout deadlines, funding adjustments will be processed on a best effort basis in order of magnitude. Adjustments less than $1K will more than likely not be processed. Cost center AIS funding reports MUST be submitted with the correction/change highlighted. Four funding reports are required to support each adjustment: (1) Cost Center Assessment Report, summary by parent account; (2) Funding by Account (FFS 286), summary in gross funds; (3) Customer Funds by agreement; and (4) Customer Funds by account. Attachment 2 shows a completed request for a funding adjustment. (Attachment 2 will only be distributed hard copy). The FFS reports that show gross funding will not match AIS gross funding because of the "double count" of the district overhead amount. The gross FFS reports (316B, 286B) appear to be overstated by the amount of the 999903D record (or the 88800 account). When comparing the FFS gross reports to AIS reports it will be necessary for cost centers to subtract this funding record from the total to derive the true cost center total. The net FFS reports (316A and 286A) should show the correct amounts. We encourage offices to use the 286A report when confirming funding and completing the closeout exercises. OBLIGATIONS The FFS Report 271, Monthly Object Class Summary, should be reviewed to make certain that object class 252G, Direct State Services, equals Direct State Funding. If these amounts do not match, adjustments MUST BE processed to bring these amounts into balance. If the project obligations shown on the FFS Report 271 are not correct, reference should be made to the corresponding Report 268, Detailed Status of Current Year Transactions. >From past experience, we have found that problems are most likely to occur in the following areas: 1. Unrecorded expenditure or obligation documents. This includes standard vouchers, Direct State Services vouchers, purchase orders, training orders, etc. 2. Expenditure or obligation documents posted to wrong accounts. 3. Standard vouchers posted but reversed algebraically. 4. Unidentified items charged or credited. An attempt should be made to identify the charge or credit and the cost center/project that should have been charged. To make this identification, the cost center should research the on-line FFS tables. The Division cannot process an adjustment to OFM that states, "This charge hit my cost center but it's not mine." All adjustment entries must contain both a debit and credit entry. If you have difficulty with this identification, please contact your Regional Administrative Officer or my office. 5. Items posted to an object class other than the one specified on the document. Adjustments should NOT be processed for an object class change unless the adjustment is for Direct State Services. REIMBURSEMENTS AND WORKING FUNDS Any over-obligation in Reimbursable and Working Capital Fund customer accounts by agreement will be charged to Federal Program funds (via the 0001X Default Customer distribution). Efforts should be made to make adjustments where necessary to limit the amount of over-obligation incurred against reimbursable customer accounts. It is always better to be under-obligated than over-obligated. Under-obligations can usually be corrected much easier than over-obligations. The fourth quarter billings for cooperators and other federal agencies are to be prepared after receipt of the September FINAL monthly reports. Those reports are tentatively scheduled for release on October 19, 1998. Upon completion of the final bills, please review all unbilled or delinquent balances to determine if bills have been issued and credited to customers erroneously and to ensure that OFM processes the bill and subsequent payment. Direct State Service certifications (vouchers) should be obtained from customers and sent to OFM as soon as possible after the close of the fiscal year (FY 1998). It will be necessary to provide an explanation to regional offices for any unbilled amounts (which include Direct State Services) that exist six months after the close of the fiscal year. SEPTEMBER FINAL REPORTS Please take the time to ensure that all adjustments are shown on your final reports and that the ending balances agree with your local records. Any discrepancies should be reported. It is important that we review not only current year project activity but prior year activity as well. This process starts with the review of the final reports. GENERAL GUIDANCE FOR ADJUSTMENTS Review your financial reports immediately upon receipt and forward your adjustments to the Financial Operations and Reporting Section, Mail Stop 442, within the time frames requested. Be aware that you will ONLY have two work days to complete your review of the preliminary reports. Reconciling all transactions that appear on the pre-preliminary Report 268 that will be available around September 21, 1998 can reduce this work. That report will include all transactions processed into the FFS through September 18, 1998. There is no dollar limitation on expenditure adjustments. The dollar limit for submitting funding adjustments is $1K. Caution should be taken to process larger dollar adjustments first because of the limited time available. Once an obligation is recorded in the official records of the Survey, it cannot be deobligated without a valid reason. Deobligations should be processed through your servicing contracting officer and the reason coordinated with your Regional Administrative Officer if there is uncertainty regarding the validity of the deobligation. No new obligating documents can be created or processed during the closeout period solely for the purpose of reflecting additional obligation of funds. Additional accruals for overlooked charges that are for the period ending September 30, 1998 will be accepted and those charges should be adjusted. In most cases, the correction of errors will require substantiating documentation (i.e. copies of invoices, purchase orders, Report 268, Accrued Expenditure screen-print of the documents 4A, 4C, 4B, and 4U from FFS, standard vouchers with backup documentation, etc.). It is acceptable with the correction of accruals to cite administrative error as the reason for the correction. If you are correcting an error that requires an expenditure debit to one account and a credit to another account (even if between cost centers), please make sure that a standard voucher is prepared and forwarded to my office with your other adjustment documentation. It is the responsibility of each cost center to ensure that documentation is provided to the Headquarters staff promptly for every adjustment. This documentation must accompany the closeout data provided by the Headquarters staff to OFM. It is the responsibility of the cost centers processing their own adjustment in FFS to ensure the document as been accepted. Confer with your Regional Administrative Officer regarding their requirements to receive copies of your adjustments. All original documentation should be sent directly to the Financial Operations and Reporting Section, Mail Stop 442. We believe that this procedure will provide a better means of ensuring that all necessary adjustments are made and fully substantiated. Any questions concerning the submission of the electronic adjustments or the supporting documentation should be addressed to your Regional Administrative Officer or to me. We appreciate your cooperation and assistance in working toward another successful closeout. Attachment 3 is a calendar that shows important dates for closeout. (Attachment 3 will only be distributed hard copy.) Attachments Attachment 1 Account Authorization (Funding) Adjustments Cost Center _______ Show each agreement as it is recorded in AIS and in FFS. Agreement Customer Account Gross Net DOTSC% Explanation Number Number Number Funds Funds As shown in AIS: As shown in FFS: Agreement Total: Agreement Total FY 1998: Questions with these adjustments should be addressed to _____________________ at telephone number _______________. NOTES: For JFA agreements show both sides or state that the agreement is unmatched. Annotate amount that is direct state services. Show all account numbers associated with the agreement even if they require no adjustment. Cost center AIS funding reports MUST be submitted with the correction/change highlighted. Four funding reports are required to support each adjustment: (1) Cost Center Assessment Report, summary by parent account; (2) Funding by Account (FFS 286), summary in gross funds; (3) Customer Funds by agreement; and (4) Customer Funds by account.