*** UCIO Financial News ***

University News and Announcements

New Employee Financial Reference & Training Guide

In June, UCIO Financial Services will be rolling out the New Employee Financial Reference and Training Guide, which will contain current financial policies, procedures and processes that are specific to the UCIO organization and relate to the areas of Procurement, Customer Transactions, and Financial Management as well as other General practices. These policies are meant to assist new hires in learning and understanding the various financial policies, processes and practices that have been established within the Office of the University CIO and Harvard University.

In the next few weeks, all UCIO hiring managers and directors will receive a copy of the guide. Thereafter, whenever a new employee is hired, the hiring manager will receive a copy of the Financial Training Checklist & Table of Contents Form in order to determine which policies the new hire should receive. This form should be completed and sent back within 3 business days. Within a few weeks of the employee's start date, a copy of the Financial Reference & Training Guide containing the policies that the manager has preselected will be sent to him/her. It is the manager's responsibility to sit down with the employee to discuss how these policies specifically relate to his/her new job responsibilities.

Please feel free to contact your Financial Partner if you have any questions about this process or about any of the policies contained within the binder.

Important Dates and Reminders

FY08 Year End Deadlines

The year-end financial closing schedule was recently published by the Office of Human Resources (OHR) in the May Administrative Systems e-News on May 1st and contains strict guidelines, which must be adhered to. It is especially important that we process all financial transactions (e.g. capital, accounts payable, expense reimbursements, customer invoices, etc.) affecting fiscal year 2008 in a timely manner.

A separate memo detailing specific dates about the year-end closing was sent out by UCIO Finance on May 15^th. If your responsibilities include cash, capital, accounts payable, PCard, and/or billing, please refer to this memo as it contains important closing deadlines. If you have any questions, please contact your financial partner.

Policy Highlights and Updates

Revenue Recognition & Billing Periods

As year-end approaches, please remember that internal billing transactions should be processed as soon as possible after the goods or services have been provided. In particular, internal billings must be processed within the proper quarter and, most importantly, fiscal year periods.

Internal Billing transactions that are more than three months in arrears since the date that goods or services were provided may not be billed.

Please also remember that pre-billing internal Harvard departments for goods and services that have not yet been delivered is strictly prohibited. Requests from internal customers for pre-billing of products or contracted services is most commonly seen at year-end when departments have unspent dollars in their current operating budgets, but the goods/services cannot be delivered or provided until the next fiscal year. UIS/OAS businesses should deny all such requests and contact their Financial Partner if unable to resolve the issue with the customer. For more information, please see the "Interdepartmental Billing Policy" and the "Revenue Recognition & Billing Periods Policy".

We hope that this issue of the UCIO Financial News has been helpful and informative. If you have any questions, or would like to see a specific topic covered in a future publication, please email us at uisfin_news@harvard.edu