About this Briefing:
This briefing is designed to codify information that we believe will be most useful to our regional clients. This briefing will be provided to CAOs on a weekly basis as necessary. CAOs will share the information in this briefing more broadly within their school.
Additional information and periodic updates can also be found in the announcements section of the ProS website located at https://pros.berkeley.edu/home. The ProS website provides more detailed information on the services we provide, how to contact your RA, HR or purchasing staff for further assistance, service completion timelines and how to provide feedback on ProS services. Note that the ProS website is still under development and new features and information are added weekly.
Research Administration Update:
ProS Management of Non-Sponsored Funds: ProS research administrators are available to administer all research funds designated to a ProS faculty member including both sponsored and non‐sponsored funds. As part of fund administration, ProS RAs will monitor balances, communicate the balances and projections to the PI, escalate deficits and approve expenses pursuant to the terms of the grant award and accepted UC fund administration policy. Designated funds are defined as all funds which are at the sole discretion of a PI in the ProS Schools. RAs can also support financial administration for other titles with exceptional PI status or engaged in independent research within the region.
ProS RAs cannot manage the following funds:
- Housing allowances: these funds must be managed by each school directly
- Funds and programs that are currently administered by professional school staff who are paid from a grant will remain with the school
- Long term start‐up and retention commitments and endowed chairs are only managed by ProS RAs once they are allocated to faculty; annual allocations of these funds will be confirmed by the ProS RA so that funds can be appropriately managed within the PI’s portfolio
Please contact your RA Supervisor to discuss the appropriate scope of funds for your School and to better clarify roles as needed. Note also that Gifts and Business Contracts may require department support for invoicing and administration, but RAs can monitor balances and approve expenditures on existing funds, upon the request of a professional school.
New Payroll in Suspense: All UCPath lines in suspense now roll‐up to 69995 on a single deptID for the division. RAs will coordinate with unit finance on identifying which team (ProS RA or your school finance staff) need to resolve any positions that post to the suspense chartstring. We will also continue to monitor the BFS Payroll in Suspense Module through the retirement of PPS in September.
FY 18-19 Fund Deficits: The ProS region will be working closely with the VCA this week to clear all unresolved escalated overdrafts, including those overdrafts which involved shared liability as between CGA and SPO. Erika Luger will be coordinating this journal effort this week to ensure that all unresolved overdrafts are moved to the VCA deficit pool chartstring. If you have any questions about this process please contact RD Arno directly.
ProS RA Staffing: We are pleased to welcome the following RA staff to the ProS Region:
- Annette Morales joins us this month from the ERSO region. Annette has a background in human resources. She has completed training in research administration and will now continue to build her skills as an RA 2 located at Uhall. Welcome Annette!
- Norma Alacce joins us this month from the CHAMPS region. Norma is an RA 4 team lead and has been a long‐time UC employee. Welcome Norma!
- Longtime RA 4 team lead Tian Yu has accepted a Post‐award Supervisor position with the ProS Region. Tian will be the RA Supervisor for the team serving GSE, GSPP, Haas, Journalism, Law, Optometry, and Social Welfare. Over the month of June Tian will be transitioning his SPH portfolio to Norma and will begin to also work with RA Manager Katie Hudson to assume his supervisory responsibilities with the RA staff currently located at the Banway location. Congratulations to Tian and thank you to the Professional School staff who volunteered to participate in this recruitment process!
- Susan Gardner joined us in March from the CHaMPS region. Susan is a pre‐award RA 4 and has been a longtime UC employee. She is located at the Banway building. Welcome Susan!
Human Resources and Academic Personnel Update:
Readers/Tutors Timekeeping: A new application is being designed to allow Reader/Tutors to record their hours worked using an online app instead of completing a paper timesheet. This application increases the accuracy and availability of timekeeping and will significantly reduce the manual data entry now required of our Payroll/Timekeeping team. During summer surge this is a major gain.
It is anticipated that this application will be available in June for rollout in July. A very special thanks to GSPP and GSE for offering to be the first to use the application for the ProS region. We will be reaching out to other Professional Schools to schedule implementation over the next few months.
PLEASE NOTE: UCPath will only accept a Monthly/hourly or Bi‐weekly/hourly schedule for Reader/Tutors. A monthly/exempt schedule is no longer an option.
UCPath Updates/Changes:
- Benefit Change Requests – UPay 850 form “retired” . Faculty and staff have long been required to use UPay 850 forms to request changes in health care coverage and related benefits. With our transition to UCPath, this form is no longer used. Instead, faculty and staff should direct questions and requests to the UCPath Center. Employees should go to their personal UCPath dashboard and select the “Forms Library” in the far left side of the web site. In the Forms Library, employees should select "benefits," and will be given a choice of forms. If assistance is needed to complete a form or determine the appropriate form, please contact your HR Business Partner. Partner contact information is located on the ProS website under the Human Resources tab.
- Multi‐Location Agreements (MLAs):
- Academic Titles: Please continue to submit MLAs for academic appointments to APO. APO will ensure the form is properly directed.
- Staff Titles: MLA requests for staff appointments should go directly to your HR Partner. The HR Partner will work with Central Payroll, if needed, to process staff MLAs.
- Timelines for Hires – including rehires and concurrent hires – PLEASE give yourself 7 – 10 working days. The UCPath Center has a standard turn‐around time of three business days. However, during the “transition period,” which can go on for a number of months, turn‐around times have varied between 5 and 8 working days (and sometimes longer). The UCPath Center is working with UC Berkeley to address issues, but the alignment period for both parties continues to take a great deal of time. If you are hiring a new employee or rehiring an employee who has a break in service, PLEASE give yourself 7 – 10 working days before the intended start date
Purchasing and Reimbursements Update:
ProS Purchasing & Reimbursements provides support with procurement and Travel & Entertainment (T&E) Reimbursements that are not submitted via Direct Entry. Our team members also provide guidance and training on the procurement and reimbursement process, and have begun offering customized in‐service sessions. The GSE session was in May and SPH has a session scheduled this month. We will be reaching out to other groups to offer sessions as well. Please contact ProS Supervisor Latara Harris for more information regarding the content of these sessions.
General processing times: Requests are processed within 10 days from the time the requisition is submitted to when the PO is created. However, please note that during fiscal year‐end and before curtailment, the processing time may be longer.
Vouchers, including match exceptions, will be processed within 10 business days, pending departmental approval. Most vouchers are Net 30 and will pay out after 30 days. Checks for approved vouchers are run on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Staffing: Elaina Fernandez‐Hutchison has transitioned from interim Team Lead to our permanent Team Lead this month. She brings over twenty years of purchasing and reimbursements experience to the team and has served as our Interim Team Lead for about six months.