Import/linkage processes
E&G / JV Departments & GLAs (based on Banner data imported through Cognos)
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Terminology
What Banner FIS calls Index Codes are called GLAs (General Ledger Accounts) by PCR-360
What Banner FIS calls Organizations are called Departments by PCR-360
Billing Groups are an OIT/Telecom invention in PCR-360 that classifies aspects of University operations based on how they’re funded (so we can charge different rates for some services):
E&G means Education & General Funded, more precisely activities that are related to budgeted operations of the University (the specific Fund-based logic is described below)
JV means Service & Grant Funded, more precisely everything that’s not E&G
CASH means cash customers, entities that are not part of the University
Telephone service is billed differently for E&G vs. JV vs. CASH customers, so it’s important to classify the usage of each service by billing group, which we do based on the fund classification of the index code that’s paying for it. However, non-telephone services generally bill everyone at the same price no matter which billing group they’re in.
How do these things get into PCR-360?
Index Code GLAs: automated
The Schedule_Index_List Cognos report is generated every morning and its export file is uploaded to the PCR-360 server (/wiki/spaces/TKB/pages/1724645544 managed by BI team + server operations by LAP)
PCR-360 detects and imports the file, as described in /wiki/spaces/ICAT/pages/2205647320
But exactly how does the import work? What model of orgs and index codes is PCR translating into what model of Departments & GLAs? How are funds involved? How does PCR decide whether to tag a Department with the E&G or JV billing groups? Brent is exploring.
CASH Departments & GLAs (for external “cash” customers)
The result is that the GLA Catalog is always an accurate representation of Banner index codes (including the codes themselves, their descriptions, active/inactive statuses, and even further FOAPAL associations in User Defined Fields).
E&G + JV Departments: manual
The E&G and JV branches of the Department Hierarchy were initially populated from a bulk import in 2017, and have been manually maintained since then. Departments only appear here if they are manually added.
Departments whose index codes are all associated with E&G funds (below) only have an “E&G” version; departments who have only JV fund-associated index codes have only a “JV” version; departments with index codes which are associated with both types of funds have two Department entries, one of each type. The Department list allows us to associate each IT service with a Department Owner, and the connection to a default index code and the billing group classification helps set GLAs and billing groups more automatically, though not perfectly.
CASH Departments & GLAs: manual
These are manually created and linked by the SMO team on as part of cash customer onboarding.
ESIGN Departments
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What are/were these for? Are they used for anything other than hijacking the Department → default GLA mapping and confusing agents? Can they be removed? Brent is exploring.
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: a mistake
These seem to have been invented by Layton Webber as a pilot of how Adobe Sign charges might be linked to their customer GLAs. They are no longer in use for this purpose and are in the process of being inactivated and removed by the directory by Brent Emerson (SMO-308). Until this is complete, they should not be used in service orders.
Connections between Departments and GLAs
Each Department has one Default GLA assigned; when that Department is selected on a Service Order, that GLA is autofilled as the Default GLA for that order. Conversely, if you search for one of the default GLAs in the Department Owner field, it will turn up the associated Department. If you search for a GLA that is not linked to a Department in this way, no Department will be returned. The mapping is from each Department to one index code; there is no guarantee that each index code is in the mapping.
Intended function
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The GLA Permissions tab on each Department allows us to associate
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multiple GLAs with each Department, ostensibly for the purpose of restricting Coordinators to using certain GLAs based on their Department affiliation. We don’t use this feature, and the GLAs listed on this tab don’t help autofill the Department Owner field on Service Orders as the Default GLA does.
Using GLAs, Departments, and Billing Groups in Service Orders
When creating a service order, enter the index code that should receive charges in the Department Owner field. If this autofills a single department, you’re all set! The Department should be right and the index code should become the Default GLA for the order.
If the Department doesn’t autofill, look up the index code in the Cognos report (Cognos > Departments > OIT > Index Code Funds, Orgs, Billing Groups) to find the org code and Billing Group associated with that index. Enter the org code in Department Owner, using the version of that Department with the right Billing Group. Save the order, then replace the GLAs on the next tab with the proper index code.
If the right Department isn’t available (or a version with the right Billing Group isn’t available), add an entry to the Department Hierarchy in the right billing group branch: just E&G if all indexes for that org are E&G, just JV if all indexes for that org are JV, and one of each if the org has both kinds of index codes.
Rule for determining if billing group for a charge should be E&G or JV
Each service/charge is expensed to a particular index code; the fund associated with that index code tells you which billing group the charges should be in:
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