Overview: Organization Suspense Accounts for Labor

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Organization Suspense Accounts Defined

Organization Suspense Accounts (OSA) are holding accounts, set up for every department to account for payroll transaction errors.

  • Each department is mapped to a single OSA
  • Every time a new Organization is created, the department must supply a PTA to be used for the OSA.
  • All payroll transactions posted to the OSA reflect the 51610 expenditure type and are burdened at the highest rate
  • An employee’s suspense transactions are charged to the OSA associated with the department (Org) on the employee assignment (job) in PeopleSoft.
  • Departments are required to clear Organization Suspense Accounts in a timely manner (optimal time would be every time payroll is run.)
  • Distribution Adjustments are entered in Oracle Financials to clear OSA balances.
  • All balances remaining in the OSA are cleared by the Financial Information & Reporting Systems team in the Controller’s Office at Year End Close.
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Reasons Why Payroll Earnings Post to Organization Suspense Accounts

  • A Labor Schedule does not exist for an employee that should have one. This excludes students in the GFS systems and employees submitting timesheets.
  • Labor Schedule lines total less than 100%. The remaining earnings are booked to the suspense account.
  • The PTA assigned in KRONOS was not on the employee’s Labor Schedule in Oracle.
  • The PTA listed on Labor Schedule was not valid when payroll was run.
  • The PTA assigned in KRONOS / Payroll / GFS was not valid.

To prevent and proactively manage Organization Suspense Accounts, review and follow recommended Labor Distribution Best Practices.

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Identifying, Clearing and Preventing Future Postings


Identify Transactions

Department Labor Schedulers receive proactive email notifications for the current pay period, informing them of any Labor Schedule lines that are invalid for employees within their Labor Org. Correcting these invalid Labor Schedule lines before the end of the pay period will prevent expenditures from posting to the department Org Suspense Account. Email notifications are sent twice a month, on the 12th and 27th of each month. The notification includes the employee name, assignment, project, task, award, labor schedule line %, start date, end date, and explanation of why the lines are invalid. When there are multiple Labor Schedulers per department, the email notifications will be sent to each individual in the department with Labor Scheduler responsibility.

To review all transactions that have posted to the department Organization Suspense Account:

  1. Run the FIN_EXP_279_ Transaction_Detail report in ReportMart3 and run the 279 OSA Macro. The report will reflect the actual balance in the account as recorded using expenditure type 51610. Running the macro will highlight dollar amounts in the organization suspense account. See Quick Steps: Clear Organization Suspense Accounts (Steps 2-5).
  2. For additional details, run the FIN_LABOR_173_Suspense_Account report. This report includes reason codes explaining why the transaction posted to the OSA. For an explanation of reason codes and steps to resolve future postings, see Resources & Job Aids: Reason Codes for Organization Suspense Accounts.

Clear Transactions

To clear a transaction, determine what PTA(s) the transaction should have posted to. If you have access to the Oracle Labor Distribution module, enter a distribution adjustment(s). See Quick Steps: Clear Organization Suspense Accounts (Steps 6-7). If not, notify the appropriate person to enter the distribution adjustment(s). To find a LD Adjuster in your school / department, see Who Can Create a Labor Distribution Adjustment.

Prevent Future Postings

To prevent future postings, review the reason codes included in the email notifications sent to Labor Schedulers for the current pay period or review the reason codes on the FIN_LABOR_173_Suspense_Account report to determine what action needs to be taken. Following are some of the most common actions a user may take to prevent future payroll transaction errors:

  • Modify the employee’s labor schedule. See Quick Steps: Create / Update Labor Schedule.
  • Modify GFS or the PeopleSoft record
  • Modify the KRONOS record to select the correct PTA information in future pay periods
    • If duplicate PTAs appear in an employee’s KRONOS timecard, be sure to select the PTA with the most recent date.
  • Ensure that the PTA(s) on paper timesheets are legible and that the timesheet contains the employee’s assignment number
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Frequently Asked Questions


Why do PTA’s become invalid?

Changes made to the PTA setup after the transaction was entered but prior to approval may cause the PTA to become invalid and the transaction to be rejected. This may include changes to:

  • Close Date - Last date Award will accept transactions (regardless of expenditure item date).
  • End Date - The last expenditure item date the system will allow an expense to be entered on the PTA.

    Example:

    An Award has an End Date of 31-DEC-05 and a Close Date of 31-MAR-06

    A distribution adjustment is entered and approved on 01-MAR-06 for payroll earnings reflecting the 15-DEC-05 (the expenditure item date) pay period. The adjustment will be processed and posted because the adjustment was entered before the close date (31-MAR-06) and the date the expense was incurred (15-DEC-05) was before the End Date.

  • Changes on the P, T and/or A status - If the status is At Risk, On Hold, or Closed, then charges cannot be posted.
  • Installment Not Activated - Central office has not enabled Award to receive expenses.

Why do some employees have a 31-AUG-07 End Date on their Labor Schedule line(s)?

  • End Dates on Labor Schedule lines for employees funded by non-sponsored projects – and where the end date is not populated with a prior date – are automatically populated with the end date of the current fiscal year.
  • End Dates on Labor Schedule lines will be used to create Salary Encumbrances (Commitments) and therefore must be populated (if the End Date field is not populated Salary Encumbrances processes will not complete in a timely manner).
  • Students in Labor Schedule classes are instructed to input the last day of the fiscal year (31-AUG-200X). Central Office staff is responsible for rolling dates forward (for non-sponsored PTAs).

Why are Organization Suspense Accounts available in KRONOS if they are not suppose to be used?

  • An interface is run daily from Oracle Financials to KRONOS to update PTA listings; OSA’s are included in the interface because they are active PTAs.
  • Organization Suspense Accounts should not be used for payroll charges because these are not (funded) accounts.
  • This prevents departments from having to submit paper timesheets and being charged a $15 charge per timesheet.

Do the Vacation Entries need to be moved out of Organization Suspense Accounts?

  • All transactions must be moved from the OSA, including offsetting Salary on Vacation (SOV) and Vacation Credit (VCR) entries.
    • SOV is the Salary an employee received while on Vacation.
    • VCR is the credit received from the central account for the employee's Vacation used.
  • Although VCR and SOV are offsetting entries:
    • Moving the entries ensures the total pay an employee received is accurately reflected on the appropriate PTA(s).
    • Allows the user to see the total effect of the vacation accrual policy on an account.

Why does my OSA have a negative balance?

Most likely this can be attributed to Vacation Credit (VCR) entries that were not transferred along with the corresponding Salary On Vacation entries (SOV.). Important Note: This means that the account the SOV was moved to was overcharged. To correct this, an adjustment must be entered for the VCR earnings.

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