Capsa and Best Practices Heads of Groups meeting 18th April 2000

Heads of Groups: Best Practices Agenda Items for discussion 1. Best Practice -- effects on groups 2. Approvals 3. Security 4. Grants Administration 27-Apr-19 Heads of Groups: Best Practices

Background - Capsa organizations. The University has been set up as three-tier organization hierarchy: 1. University ( / Pension Fund / ???) 2. Department 3. “Cost centre” -- library, admin, workshop, research group … All employees are member of an organization, not necessarily at the lowest level. Everyone that uses Capsa has to be an “employee”, even if not paid by the University. 27-Apr-19 Heads of Groups: Best Practices

Heads of Groups: Best Practices Capsa will place a significant obligation on groups to abide by “Best Practice”. Best practices are required so that we can satisfy sponsors, HEFCE, and our auditors. Best practices require a real effort from the groups. Conformance to best practice is currently very variable. Some groups approach it very closely, others have a very long way to go. Capsa will facilitate best practice: best practice does not require Capsa, and should be a priority regardless of the Capsa implementation schedule. Capsa and best practice will inevitably lead to a convergence of approach between groups. Group structures may need to change! 27-Apr-19 Heads of Groups: Best Practices

Heads of Groups: Best Practices Group financial roles (Requestor) eventually most staff/students Buyer find supplier identify source of funds raise Purchase Order Receiver register receipt check goods register statutory items arrange returns Invoice approval receive invoices from accounts check, approve, update equipment register Miscellaneous quotes, expenses, credit cards Status of accounts grants non-grant -- overheads etc 27-Apr-19 Heads of Groups: Best Practices

Heads of Groups: Best Practices - financial roles Complications Timeliness -- very fast turnaround required on some matters, such as EEC reporting (11 days from receipts of invoice). VAT awareness Tax issues on expenses claims -- receipts etc (employee liable to income tax if not right) Tax issues when purchasing services (University can be fined £3000 if we get it wrong!) CIS24 records (construction work) asset register for items over £10,000 At present, these issues only surface when goods / invoice received. For many groups, problems cleared up by Accounts. In future (Capsa-era) these issues must be dealt with when order raised. The more complete and accurate the order is, the easier the rest of the process will be! 27-Apr-19 Heads of Groups: Best Practices

… further complications Accounting/legal (University) commitment is registered when order is placed, and will feed through to statutory accounts. The source of funds has to be identified at this time. There will be no “control” (suspense) accounts. Training Capsa is very powerful. It is not simple, but probably is not much more complicated than it needs to be. Capsa is probably not suitable for “occasional use”, at least not as a way of learning the system. Users will be professionally trained -- it is unlikely that users will be able just to “pick it up” by casual observation of another user. 27-Apr-19 Heads of Groups: Best Practices

Heads of Groups: Best Practices Purchasing models 1. Current model. Most financial functions exercised by a single person -- e.g. P&C (Meg Staff). The person needs authority to allocate expenditures to grants, overhead accounts etc. Requires excellent staff. 2. Centralised purchasing. We could set up a purchasing section in (say) Stores for all purchases increased bureaucracy goods would take longer to come someone would still have to allocate a source of funds for each purchase But improved efficiency reduced costs 3. Collaboration between groups. Groups that are too small to support someone like Meg Staff essentially full-time could share a purchaser / financial person. 27-Apr-19 Heads of Groups: Best Practices

Heads of Groups: Best Practices Approvals Capsa allows us to limit the amount that can be requested / committed by any individual without approval from a supervisor. 1. Do we want to use this facility? 2. If so, what should the limits be? 3. Who should be the approver? (approval only possible from inside the application). 4. Do we want to set a blanket upper limit for the department above which some approval is required? 5. If so, what it should be, and who should approve it? 6. What about absences? 27-Apr-19 Heads of Groups: Best Practices

Heads of Groups: Best Practices Security Two sorts of security: Organization: Employees can only see purchase orders etc generated within their organization. Key member / Responsibility: For Grants, employees can only see grants on which they are a named key member, or hold an appropriate grants responsibility -- such as “LK OptoElectronics Grants Admin”. Is this going to work for your group? If not, can you adapt? 27-Apr-19 Heads of Groups: Best Practices

Grants administration Access to grants controlled by “responsibility”: 1. RGCS Admin -- can see all grants. 2. Department Admin -- can see all grants in the department. 3. Department Accounts -- can charge expenditures to grants (as with journals in the previous system). 4. Group Admin -- can see all grants in the research group. 5. “P.I.” -- can see all grants on which he/she is a named member. Who should have Group Administrator responsibility? 27-Apr-19 Heads of Groups: Best Practices