Harvard's fiscal year 2018 will end on Saturday, June 30, 2018. As in the past, the University will close the books through a series of steps called "closings." Click here for a printable version of the Summary Schedule for FY2018 Transactions and Reporting.
Please note the FY2018 year end closing dates:
- First closing Friday, July 6th
- Second closing Friday, July 13th
- Third closing Friday, July 20th
In the following paragraphs, you will find closing deadlines and submission information for these financial transactions:
- Accounts Payable
- Vendor Setup, Maintenance & Reactivation
- Credit Vouchers (Cash Receipts)
- Credit Vouchers (Validated Deposit Slips)
- Massachusetts Taxable Sales Deposits
- Foreign Check Deposits on Credit Vouchers
- Voided Checks
- Stopped Checks
- Escheat Checks
- Foreign Currency Drafts and Wires
- U.S. Wire Transfers
- ACH Payments (Benefits/Tax)
- Purchasing Card Sweeps
- Web Reimbursement Travel Authorization Forms (WV-TAFs)
- Web Reimbursement Reports with Advance Settlements
- Concur Reports
- Central Accounts Receivable Billings
- Journal Entries
- Interdepartmental Billings
- Cost Transfer Requests on Sponsored Funds
- Chart of Accounts Maintenance Requests
- Year-end Reporting Guidance & Tips
- CAPS deadlines
- Fixed Assets
Note: In order to allow the tubs more time to process manual and spreadsheet (ADI) journal entries on the day of the first 3 closings, the manual/ADI journal entry deadline will be 2:00 p.m. Any journals entered into the General Ledger by 2:00 p.m. will be included in that close and will be available in the HDW the next day.
In addition, in order to provide the tubs with more timely information during the FY2018 year end, there will be 3 additional data refreshes to the Data Warehouse (HDW):
- Sunday night, July 1st
- Sunday night, July 8th
- Sunday night, July 15th
June journals entered after the June 29th nightly processing and before 6:30 p.m. on July 1st and those entered after the 2 p.m. deadline on the day of the 1st and 2nd closes and before 6:30 p.m. on Sunday night will be posted and reflected in the HDW on Monday morning. Note that there will not be a data refresh on Sunday, July 23rd after the 3rd close. Any regular invoice batches and invoice imports that have been processed by the Accounts Payable department from Friday, June 29th through Sunday, July 1st will be uploaded on Sunday evening, July 1st and reflected in the HDW on Monday morning, July 2nd.
These are the Central Financial Administration deadlines. Since some departments have internal deadlines that may be earlier than these, you should check with your local tub financial office to obtain any departmentally defined deadlines.
We are expecting high reporting demands during the year-end closings so we have included in this newsletter some reporting tips to help improve the efficiency of running reports and reduce the time required to run those reports.
Journal Entries
Please keep in mind the following:
- The University is closed on Wednesday, July 4th for the holiday. Therefore, there will be no journal vouchers posted to the General Ledger or recorded in the Data Warehouse on that day. Rather these journals will be posted to the General Ledger on Thursday, July 5th and will be in the HDW on Friday, July 6th.
- Any June journals entered on Friday, July 6th after 2 p.m. and before 6:30 p.m. on Sunday, July 8th will be posted to the GL on Sunday night and available in the HDW on Monday, July 9th.
- Any June journals entered on Friday, July 13th after 2 p.m. and before 6:30 p.m. on Sunday, July 15th will be posted to the GL on Sunday night, July 15th and available in the HDW on Monday, July 16th.
- The JUN-18 period will remain open and an option for journal preparers to select after the 3rd close at 2 p.m. on Friday, July 20th. This option remains until the 5th close on Wednesday, August 1st. However any journals uploaded using the JUN-18 period WILL NOT be automatically posted to the General Ledger but rather require manual posting by Financial Accounting and Reporting (FAR) staff in Central Administration. Only the tubs’ central financial offices can arrange with FAR to have a journal posted in the 4th and 5th closes. Any other journals uploaded by Oracle users will automatically get deleted by the automated deletion program 45 days after journal submission unless it gets moved to another period (JUL-18 or later) or is deleted before then by the submitter.
- Be careful to select the proper period (JUN-18 or JUL-18) when you are entering a journal. Beginning July 1st, the default period will be JUL-18 (FY2019). If you want to post a journal to FY2018 during July 2018 you will need to select JUN-18 as the proper period.
- IMPORTANT FY2018 CHANGE! If an interdepartmental journal needs to be processed in the 3rd closing, permission MUST BE obtained from the Central financial office of the tubs being both charged and credited. It no longer will be acceptable to have the approvals coming from tub departments. Individuals processing journals have personal responsibility to ensure they follow this requirement.
- A journal should only be reversed by the person who created the journal, or with the permission of that person.
NOTE: Based upon departmental activity and the reports you run through the month of May, please make any necessary adjustments as early in June as possible.
Interdepartmental Billings
- All interdepartmental billings, whether entered manually, via an ADI template or via a feed to the General Ledger, must be processed by the end of the 2nd closing. (GL billing feeds are generally submitted by service centers like HUIT and UOS.)
- IMPORTANT FY2018 CHANGE! If an interdepartmental journal needs to be processed in the 3rd closing, permission MUST BE obtained from the Central financial office of the tubs being both charged and credited. It no longer will be acceptable to have the approvals coming from tub departments. .
- Interdepartmental billings should provide a name and contact number on the journal for questions or concerns the tub being billed may have.
Cost Transfer Requests
- These dates apply to ALL requests for cost transfers to federally sponsored funds (funds in the range from 100000 - 199999). Note that these requests require supporting documentation.
- Cost transfer requests should be submitted directly to OSP. OSP will review the request and documentation for appropriateness. OSP will enter cost transfer journals for departments during the year-end closing process, if necessary, due to school specific closing deadlines.
Charts of Account Maintenance Requests
Disable Requests:
Thursday, June 7th (MAY-18 close) is the last date that values will be disabled in FY2018. Any CSMA requests not successfully disabled on June 7th will be held until the final JUL-18 close.
Requests to disable CoA values that require approval should be submitted through CSMA before 5 p.m. on Thursday, May 24th. Disable requests that do not require approval should be submitted through CSMA before 5 p.m. on Tuesday, June 5th.
Funds and sub activities with the status of "Ready to be disabled" in GMAS will be sent to CSMA on Wednesday, June 6th for processing. This is the last time sponsored funds and sub activities will be sent to CSMA to be disabled in FY2018. The next time "Ready to be disabled" sponsored values will be sent to CSMA is September 4th.
Add / Modify / Re-enable Requests:
Requests to add, modify, or re-enable CoA values submitted through CSMA will be processed according to the normal daily schedule (7 a.m. - 5 p.m., Monday - Friday) throughout year-end. CSMA requestors wishing to specifically designate for the JUN-18 period any CoA changes entered from July 1st through August 1st should enter 30-JUN-2018 as the effective date for their request.
GMAS will continue to send Add/Modify requests as usual during year-end. Requests to re-enable a sponsored fund or sub activity should be sent to the OSP Financial Analyst for approval by the OSP Portfolio Team Manager.
Tips and Tricks for Using OBI for Financial/Grants Management Fiscal Year-End Reporting; HUBS Reporting Application Actuals Updates Following Scheduled Year-End Close Dates
As the fiscal year end comes to a close, many individuals have additional reporting responsibilities. Creating financial reports is few peoples' idea of a good time. Here’s how to make your fiscal year-end reporting using Oracle Business Intelligence (OBI) a bit easier.
System Availability
- The Data Warehouse nightly loads run from 8 p.m. to 7 a.m. Do not run dashboards during this time, as an incomplete nightly close process may provide you with incomplete data.
Performance Tips
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For speedier results, consider using the Transaction Listing All-Lite dashboard.
- The dashboard includes only child object codes in order to find your chart values faster!
- It has the newly added Fiscal Year prompt to make it easier to obtain your FY18 or FY19 entries.
- You will still be able to take advantage of all the OBI features you love: exclude columns, subtotal, move columns to prompts and sections, export, print, save customizations and send bookmark links!
- If using the Transaction Listing dashboards, use the Period prompt to obtain your results faster.
Period to Period Prompt: Use Carefully!
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During the fiscal Year-End, after Saturday, June 30th two fiscal years will be open, and this will affect the results that you get when using the Period to Period prompts. This means that:
- OBI will see the current fiscal year as FY19.
- The Prior Fiscal Year selection will return FY18 data.
- The Current Fiscal Year to Last Closed Period will not return any data because there is no closed period in FY19 until the July 2018 close.
- The Current Fiscal Year to Current Open Period will show transactions posted to the month of July 2018.
Closing Selection Prompt
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The Closing Selection prompts work a little differently than they did in CREW.
- Use the Closing Selection prompt in conjunction with the appropriate Period prompt selection(s) for faster results.
- When you select one of the Closing Selection prompt ranges, you get everything that was posted during that time frame, whether it posted to June or July. Use the Closing Selection prompt in conjunction with the appropriate Period prompt selection(s) to ensure you are getting only the data you want.
CAPS Fiscal Year End 2018 Deadlines
To ensure that all necessary approvals are in place and all accounting entries are completed on time, appropriate CAPS forms must be submitted to Central Administration by your School/Unit's Authorized Requestor through the CAPS automated system by the dates set forth as follows.
- Monday, May 25th - Completed Project Proposals (PPs) and Construction Authorizations (CAs) submitted by this date will be processed, and CIP activities enabled, where applicable, for FY2018. This date is being extended one week to compensate for the temporary CAPS shut down detailed below.
- Monday, June 18th - Completed Construction Close Requests (CCRs) submitted by this date will be processed, and CIP activities disabled. Please note that Oracle Assets (OA), GL and CCR balances must be equal and have no future charges pending and no invoices in Mass Additions.
Forms submitted after the dates listed above will be held in a queue and processed in FY2019 when the CAPS system re-opens for approval by Friday, July 6, 2018.
Temporary Shutdown of CAPS System for FINDINI Enhancements (5/11/18 - 5/21/18)
CAPS will disable CAPS workflow at the end of day on Friday, May 11th. Projects in workflow on that date will either be approved by May 18th or Returned for Edit to CAPS requestors. This process is necessary to deploy the enhancements to the CAPS system for the automated CAPS funding and close processes. CAPS will re-enable workflow on Tuesday, May 22nd so that projects can be submitted to CADM before the year-end deadline.
Oracle Assets Fiscal Year End 2018 Deadlines
The following dates represent the deadlines for activity related to or in the Oracle Assets sub-ledger.
Who to Contact List for Closings
