The UCPath Center announced a new go-live date of March 18, 2023, for the redesigned salary cost transfer (SCT) process. As previously announced, the timeline is being extended due to delays in development and the need for significant defect remediation. The UCPath Center and UC campus Controllers selected the new timeline to ensure sufficient time for testing and preparing location users for this change.
This month, UCSF’s project team will begin user acceptance testing, which will include testing activities by campus department transactors nominated by our UCPath Customer Advisory Board. To prepare transactors for go-live, training will begin in January and will include a combination of self-paced and instructor-led offerings. Links to access and register for training will be announced next month.
What’s changing with the SCT redesign?
As part of the new salary cost transfer process, initiators and approvers will submit and approve new transactions using a series of new “Salary Cost Transfer” pages in UCPath. The new process will bring several new features designed to simplify data entry and improve accuracy. Highlights include:
| Future Salary Cost Transfer Process | Current Direct Retro Process |
|---|---|
| Initiators can select only the earnings distribution lines they need to transfer. | All earnings distributions lines in a paycheck are pulled into the “Old Data” and “New Data” sections of the Direct Retro page. |
| Initiators may transfer earnings distribution lines across multiple earnings periods in the same transaction. | When using the Direct Retro Salary Cap/MCOP Funding Worksheet, Initiators can only select one earnings period (paycheck) at a time to transfer. |
| Initiators will use one simplified interface to perform all transfer actions for all funding sources. | Initiators must scroll between separate “Old Data” and “New Data” sections and must use the separate Direct Retro Salary Cap/MCOP Funding Worksheet when transferring earnings onto capped funding sources when the employee’s earnings exceed a salary cap. |
| Combo/edit chartstring validation will be applied only on lines selected by the Initiator to be transferred. A validation check will identify all errors at once across all distribution lines. Warnings will alert initiators of potential postings to payroll suspense or the department default distribution. | Combo/edit chartstring validation is performed on all distribution lines in the “New Data” section, regardless of whether a distribution line is changing. Validation is performed one row at a time, and initiators must resolve a validation error on one line before the next validation error will be identified. |
| Initiators will have multiple options to save transactions in process, including transactions with validation errors. This will enable initiators to research and address errors without needing to start the transfer over. | Direct Retros containing validation errors cannot be saved. Initiators who need time to research errors or request activity period activation must cancel the transaction and start over later. |
| Batch processing is no longer tied to a pay confirm, which will result in more frequent postings to the General Ledger. | Batch processing and posting to the General Ledger is tied to the UCPath pay confirm process, limiting frequency of postings. |
What can Salary Cost Transfer Initiators and Approvers do now to prepare for the redesign?
The existing “Direct Retro” pages will remain available only for a limited time after March 2023 and can only be used to address changes to paychecks prior to October 2021 and to previously transferred earnings. We encourage departments to take action now to review and complete all transfers required on paychecks prior to October 2021. Once decommissioned, transactors will lose access to transfer paychecks prior to October 2021 and to redistribute earnings that were previously transferred using the current tool. We will share more information about the decommissioning of the current Direct Retro tool as it becomes available.