Guidance Notes and eFinancials Instructions
For the Financial Year 2015-16
The year end is an important financial milestone. This paper provides outline guidance regarding the processing of transactions for the Financial Year end and provides the relevant deadlines. It covers all Corporate Financial Systems andeFinancials procedures and deadlines for the submission of manual documents. The explanatory notes cover the following topics:
1Financial accounting periods and journal entry posting dates
2General Ledger (Journals andeITs)
3Accrual and Prepayments
4Restricted funds–Donations, Restricted and Endowments (“D, J and E” jobs)
5Reporting including Webfirst
6Timetable including Payroll and eTime deadlines
- Financial accounting periods and journal entry posting dates
Period 12 general ledger close down will be on the afternoon of 4 August, after which time the period 12 reports may be run / Schools should try to process all the normal financial transactions for 2015/16by Period 12 so that the financial reports at the end of this period give as full a picture as possible of the year end outturn. It is important that the deadlines for manual submission of vouchers for processing are adhered to in order to accommodate the high year end processing volumes.
Period 12 reports include all the normal month end entries including payroll, all purchase and sales invoices and credit notes received for processing by the cut-off dates and the final cash receipts for the year. Cash received online such as viaePay will also have been posted by this point.As with month ends it now includes POP automatic accruals for the cost of goods and services received but not yet paid for but where POP orders that have been GRN’d.
The ledger will be close will commence on 2pm 4August. An email from Systems Accounting Section will be sent to notify users when period 12 is closed and period 13 processing can commence. Reports should not be run however until a further email is received on 5th August confirming that the POP automatic accrual has been posted.
The Period 13general ledger closedown will commence at0800 hrsonMonday 15 August and we estimate full closeby mid-afternoon. Following that, final reports for the year may be run / Period 13is a catch up period which allows for the processing of the outstanding year-end transactions required to complete the University’s financial position. Only last minute adjustments and transactions should be processed during this time. Period 13remains open until 0800 hrs Monday 15 August to allow for the processing of following:
- Final accruals of expenditure including items not procured via POP orders and staff expenses
- Accrual of income due.
- Prepayment of expenditure recorded in advance.
- Prepayments of income received in advance.
- Expenditure settled in advance.
- Completion and posting of internal transfers that relate to the financial year.
- The final adjustments for any stocks valued by the department.
- Final transfers of unspent performance related condition (PRC) income out of Donation and Other Restricted Fund (“D, and J” job codes) to fund deferred income or reserves. Donations and Other Restricted Funds that don’t have PRC, but are restricted will be transferred to the restricted reserve.
- Final unspent funds out of Endowment “E” job codes to the reserves of the fund (or transfers from reserves where required).
Where purchase order commitments are reported these are removed (and if appearing should be ignored). Automatic accruals have been automatically posted for unpaid Purchase Orders. Any further commitment for goods and services not yet received is rolled to 2016-17.
Following the close down of the general ledger, a review of the year-end figures for each area may disclose a material misstatement or omitted entry. It is possible to make historical corrections up to Friday 19 August, to the 2015-16 ledger if these are significant. Such items should be notified and discussed with your College Finance or Management Accounts teams who will advise regarding the appropriate action.
Period 1 of the new financial year is a ‘shorter’ period for processing than normalas many normal processes cannot start until the year-end processes are complete and Period 13 closed. / As period 1 of the new financial year is shorter than normal please ensure you process transactions in good time as this is a busy time for all. You will have less time for submission of paper forms/manual payment requests.
In Period 1, accruals, including the POP accrualand prepayments of expenditure and income are reversed automatically and commitments will re-appear. Unspent restricted income with PRC is returned to Donation and Other Restricted Fund (“D, and J”) job codes from fund deferred income or reserves.
It is important that year-end cut off dates are adhered to, and that all data is forwarded to the Finance Department and your College Finance or Management Accounts teams timeously to assist with processing the documentation in line with the timetable.
- General Ledger (Journals and eITs)
eITs- Electronic Internal Transfers
Cut-off date for Month 13eITs is 11 August 2016 / Outstanding eITs should be completed where possible by Orderers and Suppliers with only unfulfilled internal orders left uncompleted. Please review the “all committed” eITs and where required complete the transfers for inclusion in 2015-16 before the month 13 cut off on 11 August. Webfirst Report “Transactions eIT Report (124)” can also be also used to review your orders. Final completed eITs will be posted on 12 August.eIT housekeeping procedures / eITs which have been outstanding for several months and which will not be actioned should be deleted or cancelled. Guidance on this process is available on the Year End Instructions website. eITs which will never be processed must be cancelled by the originator or email
2016-17eITs can be authorised or billed from 12 August 2016. Initial orders may be placed at anytime / eIT orders relating to 2016-17 should not be finally “completed” by the purchase authoriser until after 11 August, although the initial order and supplier parts of these transactions can be undertaken during this period. eIT bills raised for 2016-17 before 11 August should not be “purchase authorised” before this date to avoid them being credited to the wrong financial year.
eIT dates / Period 12 / Period 13 / Period 1
eIT Internal Transfers cut-off dates for inclusion of “completed” eITs in reports / 3 Aug / 11Aug / 2Sep
Recommence approving of eITs for inclusion in 16/17accounts / 12 Aug
3.Accrualsand Prepayments
All departments must submit returns for accruals of expenditure (and where appropriate prepayments of expenditure). Separate returns for any accruals of income (and where appropriate prepayments of income) may also be required. There is a separate form for each of the four adjustments that may be required at the year-end. If no adjustments have been identified a nil return for accrual of expenditure should be made. The forms must be submitted to the relevant College, Support Group or Management Accounts Finance team by the noon10 August deadline.
Accrual and prepayment adjustments should be made in order that the departmental ledger reflects all income or expenditure which ‘belongs’ to the year just ended. Guidance on completing income and expenditure Accruals forms and any income and expenditure Prepayments forma on the Year End Instructions website.
- Restricted Funds –Donations, Other Restricted and Endowments (“D, J and E” jobs)
The University’s accounting policies must comply with the new Statement of Recommended Practice (SORP) 2015 applying to Higher Education. This placesscrutiny on what income may be treated as a restricted fund. The University’s obligation to apply such income within a reasonable timescale. It is important that relevant expenditure is applied accurately to all restricted funds. Schools and Departments should consult their College Finance or Management Accounts team regarding the application of the rules to the funds they hold. The following guidance covers the related accounting entries only:
Donations and Other Restricted funds are accounted for on DXXXX and JXXXX job codes respectively. Whereall income received on a fund has not been fully expended by the year end, the unspent monies yet to be applied from the fund are carried forward to the next year at the year end close down on 15 August by an automatic “allocation” journal. It is important that only genuinely restricted monies are carried forward i.e. that these are unspent balance of monies received from an external sponsor where the future delivery of a specific service or outcome will be required by the application of those monies for restricted purposes of fund in the following year. Unspent balances on Jxxxx Restricted funds appear as an opening credit to the income of the fund in Period 1 of the new financial year. Unspent balance resources on DxxxxDonation funds will be made available as restricted budgets and appear at the foot of Webfirst reports in the new financial year..
In certaincases expenditure may have been incurred on an Other Restricted “J” fund activity in advance of the receipt of the funding. In these cases income due to the fund is accruedat the year end close down by the automatic “allocation” journal. The amount due will appear asan opening debit to the income of the fund in Period 1 of the new financial year. It is important that only amounts genuinely due from external sponsors for a specific service or outcome already delivered is accrued at the year end.
Endowments are accounted for on EXXXX job codes and investment income is applied to each fund throughout the year. The budget fields indicate the estimated income available to spend for the full year (593B) together with any unspent cash brought forward (591B) and departments may spend against this total budget. The exact actual income earned will be credited to each fund by 12 August. Any income unspent or overspent during the yearon an “E” Endowment job istransferred out to the accumulated income reserves of the fund, the balance of which is available for future expenditure.
- Reporting including Webfirst
Reporting is run from both eFinancials and WebFirst. The treatment of commitments should be noted particularly in respect of WebFirstPeriod 13 reports run by users which may include commitments as well as accruals over the period from 5 to 16 August.
5.1Month 12 Reports
The purchase order accrual routine will commenceafter 2pmThursday 4 August. This automatically moves commitments into Period 13. This means that users, who run their own monthly reports, will have to run month 12 reports on 4August if these are to include commitment information. If anyone is going to have difficulty running their reports on this day, please contact Tel. 502387 before 3August, and the reports will be run centrally and sent out by e-mail
5.2Month 13 Reports
The commitment update routine will be run overnight on the 16August, one working day after the year-end rollover. eFinancials users will therefore only have the 16 August to run Month 13 reports with commitments in them. However, anyMonth 13 reports issued by the Finance Office to Planning Units and Colleges will not include departmental commitments in the actuals figure, but will instead include accruals and prepayment postings. As noted above, the raising of orders to be charged to funds for 2015-16, prior to 1 August, may result in your budget for 2015-16 appearing to be overspent on reports run that include commitment figures. It is for this reason that the commitments are excluded from year end income and expenditure monitoring reports issued by the Finance Office.
- Timetable including Payroll and eTime deadlines
The dates for the financial year-end cut-off are listed below. The dates given are the last dates for processing and the ledger closure dates. All vouchers should be processed promptly prior to these dates.
The full Section timetables are:
Accounts Payable Cut-Off Dates
Transaction Types and submission deadlines / Period 12 / Period 1Manual Vouchers: Invoices, CPVs, Stipend and Student payments and manual expense claims via FPM / 29Jul / 28 Aug
Manual Foreign Payments (Pink Forms) / 25Jul / 26 Aug
Foreign Santander On-line / 28Jul / 26 Aug
Exceptional Voucher submission NOT via FPM / 28Jul / 29 Aug
e-Expense claims / 28Jul / 29Aug
Payment Runs / 04Aug / 09Aug
Finance cut-off (sub-ledger close) / 05Aug / 05Sep
* No P13 (Payments will still be made to suppliers)
Purchase Ordering (POP, SciQuest and PECOS)
Period 12 / Period 1Last day for entering GRNs / 04 Aug by 2pm
Last day for entering 2015-16 POs / 04 Aug by 2pm
Automatic Accruals (eFinancials Generated) / 05 Aug
First day for entering GRNs relating to goods received after 31st July / 05 Aug p.m.
Invoices on automatic accrual paid / From 9 Aug
POP Stock and eStores
Month 12Stocktakes and restricted access to eStores29July
Income Section -Accounts Receivable and all Sales Ledgers
Period 12 / Period 13 / Period 1Manual (GL214’s) and Requisitions / 22 Jul / No P13 processing / 26 Aug
Invoice writer batches / 29 Jul / No P13 processing / 30 Aug
Closedown all sale ledgers / 4 Aug / No P13 processing / 5 Sept
General Ledger
Period 12 / Period 13 / Period 1Schools cut-off for cash-lists and banking to reach Finance / 25 Jul / 25 Aug
eITs (5.00pm) / 03 Aug / 11 Aug / 01 Sept
Finance department last posting date for Journals Entries including Finance GL Close commences (14.00) / 05Aug / 15 Aug / 05 Sept
Payroll upload / 28 Jul / 26 Aug
Cut off for submitting Accrual and Prepayment forms to College & Management Accounting teams / 12.00Noon
10Aug
Month 13 - cut-off for submitting Manual Stock valuations to Management Accounts, Chambers Street / 9Aug
Reduced Access to eFinancials / 15 Aug
Allocations on “D”,”J” and “E” codes (see section 7 above) / 15 Aug
Schools run report with commitments / 05-06 Aug / 15 Aug / 05 Sept
Commitment Update Routine overnight / 05 Aug / 15Aug
Reports Available / 16 Aug / 06Sept
Payroll
Final July2016 payroll:
Deadlines for the submission of overtime sheets and other Payroll input documents for guaranteed inclusion:
Overtime forms / 06 JulGuaranteed Hours to be notified forms / 06 Jul
Accommodation services Guaranteed Hours / 14 Jul
eTime - Double authorised by Administrators in advance of the upload date / 14 Jul
Payment Payroll / 06 Jul
Where inclusion of later items is sought please contact the Payroll Office at .
Guidance Notes & eFinancials Instructions2016