Columbia Finance Glossary of Key Terms & Acronyms, Study notes of Financial Management

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Columbia Finance

GLOSSARY OF KEY TERMS & ACRONYMS

To search for a term, click on the corresponding letter below:

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

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ADD-COMP

Additional compensation payments.

AP

Accounts Payable.

AP/CAR The University’s automated payment voucher processing system that has been replaced by ARC. It was used to electronically submit payment vouchers to Accounts Payable. It is only available in READ-ONLY status as of July 2012.

ARC

Accounting and Reporting at Columbia, our new finance system that will go-live in July, 2012.

As-Is The current state of a process; how something is currently performed.

A

Last Revision: June 2019

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Chart Fields The fields that store the Chart of Accounts (COA) and provide the system with the basic structure to segregate and categorize transactional and budget data. -See also: Chart of Accounts

Chart of Accounts A list of all General Ledger (GL) accounts used by one or several University codes. For each GL account, the chart of accounts contains the account number, account name, and the information that controls how an account functions and how a GL account is created in a University code.

Chart Strings The combination of ChartFields and the level at which accounting charges and credits are applied. -See also: Chart of Accounts

COA Chart of Accounts -See also: Chart of Accounts

COB Consolidated Operating Budget - found in the Data Warehouse section of My.Columbia portal - a useful budget report.

Commitment Control Functionality in PeopleSoft that enables us to manage expenditures actively against predefined, authorized budgets

Conversion The process of loading data from the existing system to the new system. The conversion process involves identifying the data that must be brought to the new system, mapping the data to PeopleSoft fields, translating old codes into PeopleSoft codes and loading the clean and compatible data into PeopleSoft.

C

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Cost Transfers Ability to change an employee’s account distribution retroactively in PAC. Also refers to the retroactive transfer of expenditures from one account to another.

Crosswalk The translation of a legacy value to a PeopleSoft value.

CUBHIS

Columbia University Biomedical and Health Information Services.

CUF

Columbia University Facilities.

CUHR

Columbia University Human Resources.

CUIT

Columbia University Information Technology.

CUMC

Columbia University Medical Center.

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EM

Exception Memorandum.

EmpID (employee ID): Unique identification code for an individual associated with the University.

Encumbrance A commitment to pay for goods and/or services reflected in a budget (i.e. purchase order commitment).

ERP

Enterprise Resource Planning Systems: A single, integrated business solution that works across an entire organization. The primary elements of the solution are multiple software applications, or modules, that provide specialized functionality within a single, integrated operating environment that makes use of data in a database that is shared among the modules. At Columbia University, the Finance business area is the focus of our ERP effort.

E

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F&A

Facilities and Administration: also referred to as Indirect Cost (IC), Indirect Cost Recovery (ICR), and overhead. F&A are actual costs incurred to conduct normal business activities, but are not readily identified with or directly changed to a specific project or program. -See also: IC ICR

FAS

Financial Accounting System (FAS) was the University’s Accounting system that has been replaced by ARC. Data available in READ-ONLY mode as of July 2012.

FDS

Financial Data Store, our new financial data warehouse. (Previously referred to as ODS --Operational Data Store).

FFE

See FINSYS.

Field An area on a page that displays or requires data.

FIN ERP Financials Enterprise Resource Planning project.

FINSYS

FINSYS tab in My.Columbia Portal

FR&O

Financial Reporting & Operations

Functional Requirements Comprehensive descriptions of what a specified software package will do, how it is expected to perform, and its intended purpose as it relates to the specified business needs (Finance) of the University.

FY Fiscal Year runs from July 1st through June 30th each year.

F F

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H

HRPC

Human Resources Processing Center.

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IC ICR

(This term has not been defined.)

IDI

Inter Departmental Invoice - used by CU departments who need to charge other CU departments for services rendered.

I

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K

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Labor Accounting Manages an employee’s account profile, additional compensation, and cost transfers.

Leading Practice A process or practice that is considered to be highly efficient or effective and has been adopted by a large number of organizations.

L

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N

NFY

New Fiscal Year.

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OFY

Old Fiscal Year.

OMB

Office of Management and Budget.

O

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Project Life Budget A budget that is created for the life of a project, e.g. Sponsored Projects, Capital Projects.

Purchasing Key Terms Please navigate to the following page.

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Q