RE: Serials Accounting

["Williams, Norma" <nwilliam@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Title: RE: Serials Accounting

Shirley,
         Don't think we have the problem they talked about here.We eventually match when all of their mistakes and mine are reconciled.The problem with periodicals spent column is mine because I added all the invoices yesterday in the 558 file and they match their figure except for one invoice that they have not paid yet.We should only have a 20 dollar difference between us till that is paid. I have printed out another report and I will have to go back and see where I goofed. Think it was when I was transferring money for that extra invoice from Cox for Omega. I knew then I had made a mathematical mistake but thought I had corrected it.I will have to back track and correct now. I thought last month the difference was because they had not paid that invoice yet. It was on this printout so now I can make them match.I had two long invoices last evening that I didn't want to start before closing so I started looking at this. As they say two heads are better than one.

                                               Norma

-----Original Message-----
From:   Catherine Foreman [SMTP:cforeman@xxxxxxxxxx]
Sent:   Tuesday, December 21, 1999 3:52 PM
To:     INNOPAC@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject:        Re: Serials Accounting

We also used to reconcile the accounts from our system with the
University's Finance Department records, but stopped that once we moved to
Innopac. The reason was because the figures never matched, as you have
found. Our previous system was GEAC, and we would enter the invoices in
GEAC, but not authorize them until they were shown as paid by Finance. The
authorization in GEAC would move the money from Encumbered to Spent,
therefore the figures always matched.
We were very disappointed to find that Innopac did not offer this, and sent
it in as an enhancement request early on, but never saw anything come of
it. As soon as an invoice is entered in Innopac, and the posting is done
(we post each morning), the money is moved into Spent, but the invoice may
not be paid by Finance for one or two weeks, or sometimes longer.
It is important for our figures to be accurate for subscriptions, so
eventually we resorted to not entering the invoices in Innopac until they
were paid by Finance. Unfortunately this has it's drawbacks, as one can't
tell by looking at the record if an invoice has been received. We don't
enter a note in the record as it would be too time-consuming, but do keep a
copy of the invoice in our files.
We do enter invoices for monographs before they are sent to Finance, and
have just resigned ourselves to the fact that the accounts don't match.
When we do our year-end reports, we use Finance's Spent figures.
Sorry to not have a better solution for you. I'd love to hear if anyone
else does!
Happy Holidays all,
Cathy

At 03:07 PM 12/21/1999 -0500, you wrote:
>Each month I go over the ledger from our finance office and check off
>every invoice in the file. These match exactly. Then I check the amount
>accounted for in III, and find that III shows a considerably higher amount
>in the spent column, and I cannot account for the difference. With 800+
>titles being paid, it is nearly impossible to track where the discrepancy
>begins.
>
>Does anyone else have a problem reconciling accounts in III? In four
>months I am over $1881, and last fiscal year it was $3200. No single title
>stands out as the culprit. Any suggestions?
>
>Betsy Fishman
>Acquisitions Manager
>Muhlenberg College
>484-664-3570
>efishman@xxxxxxxxxx
>
>
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Catherine Foreman                  phone: (905)688-5550 ext.3265
Bibliographic Services             fax: (905)988-5490
Acquisitions Supervisor            email: cforeman@xxxxxxxxxx                
James A. Gibson Library            
Brock University                    
St. Catharines, ON, Canada  L2S 3A1
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