Reports Task Force March 13, 2002 Update

1. Reports Task ForceMarch 13, 2002 Update *Changes to the Project Detail Report *Quick Tips to assist with reporting

2. Workgroup Members: Neal Grandy Arts & Sciences Melissa Pelletier Business Office Florence Buchholz Facilities Management Steve Kimata Financial Administration Michael Boblitz School of Medicine Nancy Pace School of Medicine Angie Wooten Student Affairs

3. Progress to Report(changes effective for all users on April 1) The List of Values (LOV) for the Project Accounting Period has been revised so that only open and closed periods appear as choices (i.e. May 01 – current month). This will make the selection process easier and faster. The List of Values (LOV) for the Project Carrying Out Org has been revised so that only the organization number appears. This was done for two reasons. First, users may now enter only the org # and not have to access the LOV from the Parameter Wizard screen. Second, if an organization changes their name but not their org #, there will be no difficulty in accurately capturing their data on reports. The org # and org name will still appear on the actual report. Anyone experiencing difficulty with knowing their organization number may access the predefined report IS.FM_Organization List of Values to find this information. To date,two organizations have already changed their names and this LOV change has allowed their data to be accurately reported.

4. Current and History detail reports have now been combined into one report. Simply choose the report IS.FM_Expenditure Detail by Project and enter one or more Project Accounting Periods to retrieve the months you need. Note: This change is consistent with other FM reports as well. Current and history versions will be available in one report. The report IS.FM_Expenditure Detail by Project will have 2 tabs (a Detail With Comments version and a Detail Without Comments version). The Detail With Comments tab will have comments appear directly under the Employee/Vendor field. These comments will be pulled from Payroll detail as well as the Description field for P-card reallocations and POs/Requisitions. Oracle system users should always complete the Description field using data that will be meaningful on reports. Both tab versions will have a new field which lists Paid PO #s or Requisition #s (as applicable).

5. After much research, it was determined that the Expenditure Item Date field was not useful. Therefore, detail reports (both tabs) will now include a Transferred Date which is the actual date that the transaction transferred to the GL. Expenditure Item Date field has been removed. Note: If the transaction line is for a commitment, no date will appear in the Transferred Date field. The benefit of doing this is to allow payroll transaction data to rollup into one line item per batch. • Choosing Alternate Conditions and Parameters- Many users would like to run and print reports for specific projects rather than all projects within an organization. To run by Project # rather than Project Carrying Out Org, simply change the condition and parameters. Click “No” when asked if you wish to run the report as defaulted at startup. Go to Tools, Conditions, turn on Project #, turn off Project Carrying Out Org, click OK. You may now enter your project numbers as the new parameters. • The Reports Task Force has learned that many reporting problems experienced by users are the effect of incorrect data or lack of data being put into the Oracle system. Discoverer can only pull from data available in Oracle. If inaccurate data entry occurs or description fields are not completed, the data will not be available to capture and report. Users should make an attempt to see if the data appears correctly within Oracle before reporting problems with data captured by Discoverer.

6. PAYROLL COMMITMENTS(Including Fringe Benefits)*Monthly payroll is committed through May 24, 2002 for this fiscal year*Semi-monthly payroll is committed through June 9, 2002 for this fiscal year Payroll commitments are appearing incorrectly for many users and this is a very important issue to correct since year end closing is not too far away and Payroll is an important part of the budget for most departments. Here are some quick tips to resolving Payroll commitment issues: • Using detail reports, carefully review payroll commitments for each expenditure type • Make a list of all the “consistencies” of inaccurate payroll commitments • Make a list of “single employee” inaccurate payroll commitments • Run the Discoverer Report IS.LD_Employee Assignments & Companies • Make note of the employees’ assignment #s for your organization • Access Oracle, LD and pull up the labor schedules for applicable employees • Verify that the proper assignment #s were chosen when the labor schedules were created • If an assignment # has the wrong type of employee position description listed, then OPAS needs to be checked to determine that the employee was set-up properly with regard to Payroll

7. Also check the Expenditure Type that was chosen for each employee especially if you have parttime employees being paid at the 7% fringe benefit rate. Their Expenditure Type should have been one with the WOB (without benefits) option. If you have employees being paid at the 14.5% fringe benefit rate then their Expenditure Type should have been one with the WB (with benefits) option even though they may not have health insurance, they now have other types of benefits. • The Reports Task Force is aware that there are other payroll commitment issues to be resolved. We believe that most of these are related to Sponsored Programs. The group is currently defining the problems and needs input so that the issues can be discussed and resolution sought through the proper channels. If you have specific issues to share, please contact the Reports Task Force person for your area. In addition, a meeting has already been planned for several grants administrators to meet with members of the Reports Task Force to further investigate grant related issues.

8. Using Reports with Multiple Tabs – if you do not wish to run the report using the tab that is the default tab at startup, choose “NO” and then a blank sheet will open. Click on the tab that you need and a notification box will now ask you if this is the report to run. Choose “Yes”. Using Refresh option – to run the same report that you have open but with different parameters, click on the Refresh arrow on the toolbar to see the Parameter Wizard box and reselect parameters. You do not need to totally close the report and reenter. Also choose the refresh option by selecting Sheet and Refresh Sheet. Deleting Columns – if you have determined that there is a column of data that you do not need (and deleting it will not affect the other data you see), click on the column, highlight it, and hit the delete key. Or, highlight column, choose Edit and then Delete Item. Note: You may immediately undo your delete by going to Edit, Undo Delete Item. Rearranging Columns – click on the column heading until it is highlighted, hold and then drag it to the desired heading location. Dragging Column Headings to the Page Item Section – click on the column heading until it is highlighted, hold and then drag it to the Page Item section. The most common headings which are brought to this section are Award and Incurred by Organization. You then have the opportunity to limit the type of data you see without changing the entire report. Simply toggle or select from the drop down boxes to make choices from your several Page Items. Note: Be careful of the ordering of your Page Items. They are relational which means that the Grand Total of your report may be different depending on the order of your Page Items. Dragging Page Item Headings Down to the Body of the Report – Click on the left side of the Page Item heading until the down arrow appears. Then, drag down to the desired heading location. QUICK TIPS

9. Print All Combinations of Report – Go to File, Print and then check the box – All Page/Detail Combinations. This will allow every Page Item combination to print automatically without the user manually selecting the different combinations. Edit and Find – To quickly find a transaction #, vendor/employee name, $ amount, etc. - select Edit, Find and enter the desired information in the Search text box. Then, select Find Next. Autosizing Columns – to enlarge or reduce column size so that it is the same width as the longest reported data, place the mouse pointer on the right hand line of the column heading and double click. Or, you may also highlight the column, select Format, Columns and Autosize. Renaming Columns – right click on the column heading, select Item Properties and type a new heading. This is a way you can adapt your report to match your department’s terminology. Query Governor – In order to reduce the chance of receiving an error message about “query timed out or did not retrieve all rows”, go to Tools, Options and Query Governor. Increase the time limit for query retrievals and also increase the number of rows to be retrieved. Or, another way to be sure all rows are retrieved is to select Sheet, Retrieve All Rows. Understanding the Transaction # Field – If a transaction line references a commitment, the LPO #, Requisition # or Unapproved Voucher # will appear in this field. If the transaction line references an actual, the Invoice # and Voucher # (if applicable) appear in this field. Note: Paid LPO or PO numbers are referenced in the new Paid PO# field. Print Preview – Before wasting paper with reports that may not fit on one page, try a Print Preview to be sure the report looks the way you want. Choose File, Print Preview and pay attention to the last column being captured.

10. Saving Reports with your Specifications – Now that you have your report looking the way that you want, save it so that you don’t have to make these changes again. Go to File, Save As, choose My Computer, Save and choose a location and name for the file to be stored. Reminder: If ISP makes changes to the predefined reports, your saved versions will not pickup the changes until you pull up the new version from the database and resave. Reports Training – Most users now have the basic knowledge needed to run reports and many want to know more (i.e. adding additional fields, making other format changes, etc.) This training can be obtained through the ODSV and ODS1 courses. Users may retake a course as a refresher. Logon to the ISP website and go to Training to learn more about these courses and how to register. The Reports Task Force plans to address labor distribution reports in the near future.