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What's New with Effort Commitment and Cost Share Tracking?

 8/24/06
 7/13/06

To assist users in determining the correct effort commitment percentage to enter, an Effort Calculator has been added to the Effort Commitment system.

On the Effort Commitment Maintenance entry screen, click on the search button next to the Effort field to access the Effort Calculator. The Effort Calculator includes entry fields for Academic Year Appointment, as well as Summer Salary. The Effort Calculator does not store any data; it simply assists the user in determining the appropriate effort commitment percentage that can be returned to the Effort Commitment Maintenance entry screen.

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Several enhancements are in the Effort Commitment and Cost Share Tracking systems as of 7/13/06:

• The Effort Commitment and Cost Share Tracking systems are now listed separately on the FIS Web Applications menu in Decision Support. This change was made to emphasize the fact that they are two separate systems, and to reduce confusion.

• Faculty lookups have been expanded to include all staff. Some projects involve non-faculty, so the lookups have been expanded to allow for this.

• Effort commitments can now be entered to two decimal places. Allows users the ability to enter effort percentages with decimals instead of whole numbers. When the effort percentage carries over to the Cost Share Tracking system, it will round to the nearest whole percentage point.

• A history log has been added to the Effort Commitment system. The log indicates what changes were made, as well as the author, date, and time of the changes. The log can be viewed by clicking on the View Update History link on the Effort Commitment Maintenance entry screen. The log should be helpful for PIs working in multiple departments as well as research administrators reviewing the transactions.

• User notes can be added in the Effort Commitment system. Notes can be added to an effort commitment entry by clicking on the Add Notes link under the employee’s name on the Effort Commitment Maintenance entry screen. This functionality can indicate why a change was made to an entry or additional information that may be helpful for others involved in the project.

• The Cost Share Tracking system no longer displays the chart and account entered in the Effort Commitment system. The chart and account in the Effort Commitment system are for the expense account on the fund, while the chart and account in the Cost Share Tracking system indicate where the expenses were actually charged (and must be cost shared from). Since these accounts are never the same, the information will no longer transfer.

• In the Cost Share Tracking system, improvements have been made to the Imported Transaction Approval page. On the Imported Transaction Approval page, the Reject All Transactions functionality has been changed to reject only the items showing on the page rather than all imported transactions. This enables users to filter down the list of transactions and reject only the desired results.

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