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DPA MEETING NOTES
September 2002

TOPICS

PROPERTY MANAGEMENT TOOLS AND DISCUSSION
INVENTORY UPDATE
OCTOBER DPA MEETING
AUDIT UPDATE
GOVERNMENT FURNISHED EQUIPMENT
ENGRAVING SERIAL NOS.
RESP PERSON ON NEW FADB RECORDS
FYE02 FADB CHANGES
FYE02 DEPRECIATION
FY03 FADB CHANGES

PROPERTY MANAGEMENT TOOLS AND DISCUSSION - We are required to tag and track all assets for which UCAR is accountable and remove them from the active FADB records as soon as disposal occurs. The asset portion of UCAR's financial statements and the annual and closeout property reports to Sponsors are based on data in the FADB so it is critical that the data be accurate.

It is standard practice for all corporations to perform regular inventories to verify the integrity of their asset records. OMB A-110 requires a 100% physical inventory at least every 2 years. "Physical" indicates that we must access the physical asset to confirm it still has the PPEtag and verify that the serial no. on the physical asset matches the serial no. in the FADB record. Those are the two unique identifiers that tell us the item we are looking at is, indeed, the item represented by the FADB record. OMB A-110 also requires that we verify the utilization of and continued need for the equipment.

No one has the authority to dispose of UCAR-accountable equipment without first obtaining authorization from the Property Office through their DPA. A reminder of this was in the July 24th TW Today and DPAs have been asked to remind their division staff of this as frequently as necessary.

Because division staff do not always comply with the requirement to notify their DPA before any disposals, the Bi-annual Responsible Person Update was instituted. (See the Sept 2001 Meeting Notes for more detail.) If done properly, this ensures on a bi-annual basis that items on the active asset list are accurate. That accuracy is critical for closeout reports and annual statements and reports.

---After laying the above foundation we had a very productive discussion about how to better encourage division staff to inform their DPA about property changes, primarily disposals. Kathy Sharpe (JOSS) suggested that we put a label on each fixed asset reminding users to notify their DPA before disposal. All agreed this was an excellent idea. (Thanks Kathy!) The Property Office will work on the layout for such a tag and give an update in the October meeting.

INVENTORY UPDATE & ISSUES

DIV	INVENTORY SCHEDULE
ATD/DFS (machine shop)	Completed
ATD/RTF	Completed
CGD	Completed
JOSS	Completed
ACD	In process
UNAVCO	Completed
SCD	In process
RAP	In process
ASP	Completed
F&A (Valent)	Completed
MMM	In process
SCD NETS	Begins Oct 1 or in time to complete by Nov 30
HAO	Begins Dec 1 or in time to complete by Jan 31
ATD/RAF	Begins Dec 1 or in time to complete by Jan 31
Library/Archives	Begins Dec 1 or in time to complete by Jan 31
EO	Begins Dec 1 or in time to complete by Jan 31
IDC	Begins Dec 1 or in time to complete by Jan 31
Contracts & SA	Begins Dec 1 or in time to complete by Jan 31
ESIG	Begins Dec 1 or in time to complete by Jan 31

In the FY02/03 cycle the DPAs and Chris are teaming to conduct the inventory. So far, this is a significant improvement over past inventories; faster and more thorough.

To prepare for your inventory, review your Fixed Asset list in advance for proper descriptions and current location information. This will save you considerable time and frustration performing the inventory.

After your inventory has been completed, review your active asset records monthly to maintain the accuracy of your records. If you notice an unclear description, check with the Responsible Person for a better one. If you notice a Responsible Person who has changed offices, verify that the location information for their equipment is still accurate. Maintaining your records will make your next inventory easier.

OCTOBER MEETING AT FL - The October 2002 DPA meeting will be Thursday, October 31st at FL3-2072, 9:30-11:00 AM.

AUDIT UPDATE - The auditors have finished the interim phase of the audit and are gone until November 18th when they will return for the final phase. That allows time to closeout the fiscal year and prepare financial reports. As far as I know, everything Property went well in the interim phase.

GOVERNMENT FURNISHED EQUIPMENT (GFE) - GFE is equipment furnished by a government agency for use on a particular project. At the end of that project, the equipment is returned to the agency or one of their other contractors or otherwise disposed of according to their direction. This should not be confused with equipment acquired through government excess which remains with UCAR until we have no further use for it.

The government requires that GFE be tracked, regardless of its original cost. Therefore, if your division receives any GFE, be sure to notify the Property Office so we can help you track and report on such items.

ENGRAVING SERIAL NOS. - For assets that either have no serial no. (constructed assets) or for which the serial no. is not accessible, the Property Office will be engraving them on the asset after checking with the DPA (and Resp Person) to be sure that is acceptable. If a tag falls off and there is no serial no. we have no way of confirming, by unique identifier, that the asset is the one we're looking for.

When a serial no. has been engraved on the physical asset, the serial no. in the FADB will begin "ENG-" to indicate it is an engraved no. rather than one labeled by the manufacturer.

RESPONSIBLE PERSON ON NEW FADB RECORDS - FADB records for newly acquired assets are created by a download of the General Ledger Accts Payable data to the FADB. Programming for this process causes the Responsible Person field on the FASITE screen to be automatically populated with the name of the DPA. If the DPA should not be the Responsible Person that is changed either by the DPA or the Property Office using the Responsible Person on the tagging form. If you discover that you are the Responsible Person on some of your division's records but should not be, determine who the correct person is and 1) make that change on the FASITE screen by entering their Employee ID # or 2) notify the Property Office by e-mail of the PPE# and new Responsible Person name and we will change it.

FYE02 FADB CHANGES - Monthly uploads of new data to the FADB are usually done the first week of a new month for the month preceding. Because of the fiscal year end closeout, the upload for September 2002 will be done the week of October 21st. Depreciation will be run and posted immediately thereafter.

FYE02 DEPRECIATION - Final FY02 depreciation cannot be run until the end of October but some divisions need those numbers earlier in the month. Therefore, the first week of October we will run preliminary depreciation on the Bitech Test machine and notify impacted divisions what those numbers will be. This preliminary run cannot account for any changes made later in the month and posted for FY02 but should be very close to the final numbers.

FY03 FADB CHANGES - Once FYE02 transactions are completed in the FADB it will remain static until we have completed FYE02 financial reports and they have been audited. That means that FY03 changes (monthly uploads, miscellaneous changes, disposals, depreciation) will not enter the FADB until late December 2002 or January 2003. As usual, we will send e-mails when we do the next uploads, disposals, and depreciation but wanted you to know why you won't be seeing those e-mails for a few months.

Contact the Property Office at anytime with questions or for assistance.
We're here to help you manage your division's property.
Janet Campbell, ext 8858, janetc@ucar.edu; Chris Knoetgen, ext 8573, knoetgen@ucar.edu