An IFR should be used when ever the activity is state activity. All activity should
go through an IFR unless there is an approved exception as stated below.
SBF accounts should only be used when the revenue is from gifts or contributions.
FSA accounts should be used for the benefit of individual students, faculty or staff
members or appropriately recognized organizations
RF S&F accounts should be used when there is an employee paid with Research funds
The following are the steps you should use when requesting an IFR account:
Determine what the account is to be used for. How much revenue will this account generate?
What will your expenses (budget) be? This information should be shown on the
IFR Allocation Worksheet.
Once you have determined this information you should then receive approval from your
Dean or Chairperson.
Along with the Dean's or Chair's approval, submit your request to your VP area for
approval.
Upon VP approval, the VP coordinator will submit the request to Accounting for processing.
Accounting will inform you and all interested parties once the account has been created.
If the IFR account will be for a service that you will be charging a user fee, there
are additional steps:
Determine what the account/service is for.
Obtain approval from your Dean or Chairperson
Submit request to VP area for approval.
Visit "Service Center Guidelines" for information on how to determine the user fee.
This will be achieved by determining the projected annual expenses and the annual
unit of service (i.e. annual hours, annual analyses). This information will be input
on the rate schedule (see attached) to determine the rate.
Once the rate has been calculated, it is then submitted to the VP area for their review
and approval. The VP coordinator will request Accounting to create the account.
Accounting will submit to the University Controller for final approval.
While awaiting the University Controller's approval, Accounting will submit the request
to the SUNY System Administration to create the account.
Upon final approval, Accounting will inform you and all interested parties of the
account.
A simple way to answer this question is to think of your own checking account. The
ending cash balance would be equivalent to what the bank says you have after certain
checks and deposits have cleared. The uncommitted cash balance is what you say your
real balance is after you adjusted the bank balance by any outstanding deposits and
checks. The ending cash reflects your account balance after payroll, purchase orders,
journal transfers and any IFR assessments have been processed and paid, while the
uncommitted cash includes not only the processed and paid expenditures but the encumbered
payroll, purchase orders and accrued IFR assessments. Note the Uncommitted Cash does
not reflect future revenue.
The Office of the State Comptroller (OSC) and the Division of Budget analyzes the
actual fringe benefit costs on an annual basis. After the rate is computed, OSC notifies
all state agencies of the rate specific to a fiscal year and agency.
The 2021/22 rate for Federal is 61.85% and the State (Non Federal) is 62.70%. The
components for the 2021/22 rate are as follows:
Revenue is the basis for charging IFR assessments not expenditures.
Fringe benefits will continue to be assessed on expenditures. The IFR overhead assessement
will be charged on the revenue prior to any fringe benefit charges. As the revenue
is deposited to your account, the assessment will be charged. This charge is a direct
reduction to your account's cash balance. It
DOES NOT affect your account's allocation.
When, Purchasing processes a purchase order, they make an encumbrance against your
account's allocation,
not your cash. When you request your account's initial allocation, your request should
be based on your anticipated annual revenue and expenditures. If your cash is greater
than anticipated, you may request, through your VP coordinators and ultimately the
Accounting Department, additional allocation. Basically, you need your allocation
to spend your cash, and you need your cash to get your allocation!
All deposits are made at the campus Bursar's Office. Every 15th and 30th (or 31st)
of the month a revenue summary report is generated identifying the total of all deposits
made to each account. The Accounting Office reviews this report and subsequently enters
the revenue information into the SUNY system. When you look at your AES report's cash
page or the SUNY system, the cash amounts reflected for each month are for the last
15 days of the prior month and the first 15 days of the current month. For example,
if you look at the month of January, the cash would be for the periods of December
16-31, and January 1-15.
Along with your AES reports, each IFR account includes a copy of the IFR Collections
Analysis report. This gives the detail information.
Just
contact or e-mail Kathie Diehl/Accounting Department explaining the error and indicate the
correct account. Accounting will process a transfer of cash between the accounts.
A transfer of cash may generate assessments.
When IFR allocation is in short supply and projections indicate that you will not
require all of your requested allocation, some may be transferred to other accounts
that are short at the VP coordinator's discretion. This does not mean that your money
has been taken, your cash balance is unaffected.
Unlike state purpose funds, IFR accounts do not "lapse". Although the allocation is
unspent, the cash balance rolls forward, and is one of the factors used to determine
the account allocation for the following year.
An account director is responsible for keeping logs of all information supplied on
the rate schedule for the service center. This includes the expenses as well as the
annual units. The information maintained in the logs will be required during the campus
rate review process. This is an audit requirement.
Excess external revenue is anything that is charged above the approved external rate.
The excess external revenue may be kept by the department and used at the department's
discretion. The account director is responsible for maintaining logs, which identify
the amount of external revenue collected. During the rate review process the logs
are used to identify the amount of excess external revenue, which may be contained
in the account balance. This is also an audit requirement.