Financial Systems
- Acquisitions Process Team - re-engineering the purchasing process
- Accounts Payable (AP) - part of the CMU core financial systems
- Budget Monitoring and Review System (BMARS) - midyear budget review
- Capital Projects Tracking System (CPTS) - requests for capital projects
- Center Information Master Fund Accounting System (CIMFAS) - part of the CMU core financial systems
- Core Financial Systems - the heart of CMU's financial applications
- Detail Budget System (DBS) - initial fiscal year budget building
- Energy Management System (EMS) - part of the CMU core financial systems
- FMS_INQ - inquiry on detail supporting maintenance charges
- Financial Resources Information System (FRIS) - financial information
- Inventory Control System (ICS) - centralized handling of purchases
- Journal Entry System (JES) - part of the CMU core financial systems
- MAXIMO - workorder tracking
- Property Accounting System (PAS) - used by property officers
- Purchasing Encumbrances & Payables (PEP) - part of the CMU core financial systems
- Tartan Trust Allocation System (TTAS) - procurement card charge reallocation
Financial Systems
CMU core financial systems include four modules, all COBOL and all written in-house in the early 1980s: CIMFAS (Center Information Master Fund Accounting System), PEP (Purchasing, Encumbering, and Paying), AP (Accounts Payable), and JES (Journal Entry System). In the last 5-7 years, these systems have been changed only where required to comply with regulation changes.
Budget Monitoring and Review System (BMARS)
BMARS is part of the Financial Resource Information System(FRIS) family of applications at Carnegie Mellon. This system is designed to collect electronically in a standardized format, year-end projection figures for use in the Financial Review process.
This system is used for monitoring, reporting, and projecting financial account and center information for budgeting purposes, as well as, the financial review process of Budget Services. The system provides for an approval process by division or college managers for updating projections on a month-to-month basis.
BMARS includes year-to-date figures from the Accounting System(FRIS) on a monthly basis after monthly closing and follows the Accounting System's hierarchical structure to navigate by center, department, or division. BMARS also uses the Detailed Budget figures loaded into the Detailed Budget System(DBS). As a reference, the user can look at the Detailed Budget for the current and prior fiscal year, the current Actuals put through the Accounting System, as well as the "Projected" amounts entered into BMARS for the current fiscal year.
Capital Projects Tracking System (CPTS)
CPTS, the Capital Projects Tracking System is part of FRIS. It handles capital projects requests. PMS, the Project Management System built here in 1987 in Ingres EQUEL/C, tracks designers' and construction co-ordinators' time on projects and other expenses. They are supplemented by several locally-built PC systems and spreadsheets. None of them are linked in a reliable and consistent way either to each other or to the core financial systems, although there is minimal data sharing with the FRIS chart of accounts. As of 7/95, a software evaluation team has decided to replace this collection of software with a combination of Expedition from Primavera and Microsoft Project, supplemented by Microsoft Access applications and ODBC links to FRIS. An implementation team is beginning work immediately.
Detailed Budget System (DBS)
Carnegie Mellon University requires that all departments on campus provide a detailed budget Each Spring, detailed budgets for the upcoming fiscal year are constructed. Budgets must account for all expenses and where the money will come from, including income earned by that unit and the nature and source of that income.
The Detailed Budgeting System provides the ability to: list departmental expenses and income, approve budgets, interface with the general ledger, and revise and model budgets for future years.
Energy Management System (EMS)
EMS, the Energy Management System, is a PC Informix application built in 1987. It has not had major changes since then.
FMS_INQ
This application allows inquiry on detail supporting maintenance charges.
FRIS
FRIS is an Ingres database with a growing number of financial applications, all in ABF at present. It was built in-house beginning in 1990 to serve as an inquiry database since CIMFAS and the other core systems will not support many (or, in some cases, any) interactive users, certainly not with an acceptable level of security. It initially displayed data refreshed only after the monthly accounting close, including detail on salary distribution not printed on the accounting statements. Since then, modules have been added to handle capital project requests (CPTS), mid-year budget review (BMARS), display of journal entries posted daily, initial fiscal year budget building (DBS), and inquiry on detail supporting maintenance charges (FMS_INQ). It is now refreshed with CIMFAS data daily. Modifications and major new functionality are currently underway.
Inventory Control System (ICS)
ICS, the Inventory Control System, was originally built in Ingres and Pascal/Quel in 1983 as a CMU student project and became one of the first major production Ingres applications at CMU. It was redesigned and rewritten in 1991 in Ingres ABF. Since one of the goals of the acquisitions re-engineering project is to significantly reduce inventory and centralized handling of purchases, this system may be decommissioned next year. Some of it's functions will probably be implemented in MAXIMO for Facilities Managements Services.
MAXIMO
MAXIMO, a product of Project Software Development, Inc., was implemented in February 1995. It is a Windows, client/server application, a Gupta SQLBase database, and runs on a Netware server. It was initially used just for tracking work orders. Preventive maintenance is being implemented as the base data is developed for each piece of equipment. Detailed labor records are being entered on a daily basis for rebilling purposes. Materials issues are being inloaded from ICS in batch on a daily basis. Purchasing and Inventory are not currently in use, but the work of the procurement re-engineering team will bring those modules into use by FMS as the pilot begins. We plan to use the Scheduling module, also, in time. The billing module was built in-house using SQR and Notes tables.
Property Accounting System (PAS)
PAS is an Ingres database and ABF application. It was developed in 1987-88 in-house and undergoes frequent enhancements. It has been modified to allow property officers all over campus to access and change some data. This year online disposals are being added and the space facilities database has been incorporated.
Tartan Trust Allocation System (TTAS)
This is the second Uniface application that ACIS has developed. It is used all across the CMU campus for reallocating procurement card charges. Users can review the charges that have been made on their cards and adjust the center and account information as needed. They can also "flag" charges that should be posted immediately to the general ledger.