|
Policies and Procedures Technical Services
Date: rev. 6/2/03 Effective: Immediately Revised by: CPD
For the majority of our major continuation accounts, we issue substantial prepayments to earn interest or decreased service charges. The amount and timing of these payments is managed by the Head, Serials/Electronic Resources Dept. The usual vendor accounts are with EBSCO, Swets Blackwell, OhioLINK, and Harrassowitz. The names of the deposit accounts change each year to reflect fiscal year of expected expenditures
Once an amount is determined for these payments, the vendor is contacted and asked to provide a one line invoice in the amount requested. It is processed by A/P as a regular invoice. If no invoice is requested (or available), the prepayment can be requested on an OSU payment request (see Monograph Prepayment Accounts document). The expense is not charged to any fund in Felix. However, the amount is deposited in the appropriate prepay account in Felix and it should also be noted in the ledger (32501 011000 65702).
Menu Access:
Order and Receiving Subsystem (O) Steps:
Invoices are submitted by the vendor for individual titles and paid in Felix by the Serials/Electronic Resources Dept.. Once paid in Felix, the invoices are placed in the ASA prepayment files by vendor for processing. The next step is for the invoices to be checked by ASA against the posting register. The purpose of this check is to identify any split payments (i.e. titles on the prepay invoice which relate to any other external account other than 32501 011000 65702). If a split payment is identified, that split is noted on the invoice by the person checking the posting register. Then the invoice is put in the prepayment file for processing by the Head, ASA.
In order to track the balance of each prepay account, the expense is debited to the prepay account. The first step for the Head, ASA is to check the prepay account online to determine if adequate funds remain in the free balance of the account to process the prepay invoice against the balance. The invoices processed by SER are added as individual expenses or credits against the prepay account. These invoices should be processed at least monthly (just before the monthly accounting reports are printed).
After this transaction is entered, the following information should be noted on the bottom of the paper invoice: prepay account name, date, the word "prepay", and the initials of the person who entered the transaction (usually the Head, ASA).
If the vendor mixes other orders on the continuation invoice (i.e. any fund other than the "3" or "4" funds paid against the state budget -- 32501 011000 65702), that individual line must be sent to A/P for payment. Only the orders charged to the "3" or "4" funds paid against the state budget -- 32501 011000 65702 -- should be debited as noted earlier. If a split exists on the invoice, the invoice should be marked to reflect those titles to be paid on other accounts and given to the Account Clerk who does submission for payment to Accounts Payable. [Felix funds which are not on 32501 011000 65702 include dnys, sgals, bshrs, and bshjs.]
Each invoice is also entered in the appropriate Excel ledger by ASA. Invoices processed against the prepay accounts are listed on the ledger for the prepay account. Invoices (splits) which are processed against another account for payment should be listed on the ledger for that account.
Invoices are not sent to A/P since they are being charged against the prepayment. Instead, they are initialed, marked "prepay" and filed.
In order to keep the prepay account in balance, a copy of the ledger should be sent to the vendor by the ASA Account Clerk Supervisor anytime an additional payment or credit is processed against the prepay. The list of contacts for each vendor is available from the ASA Account Clerk Supervisor.
The final reconciliation step is to check the ledger with the Felix prepay account to be sure that the two match. This is done after the monthly prepay accounting report and ledgers are printed.
|