Payment Receipting

The Bursar's Office conducts centralized receipting of all payments made to UMass Chan in the forms of cash, checks, or EFT. All these payments should be sent by the payers directly to the Bursar's Office (in person, via US mail, or electronically), unless being prior approved with privilege to be sent to the department first (for more details, see section "Payments Received by Department”). Centralized receipting assures that payments are processed by a standard set of control objectives in a timely manner.

• Remit-to-address to mail check payments
  UMass Chan Medical School
  Bursar's Office, S1-802
  55 Lake Avenue North
  Worcester, MA 01655
  
  
• Paying via EFT (ACH or wires)
  Departments should contact the Bursar's Office for UMass Chan banking information and further instructions on receiving payments via EFT (ACH or wires).

Payment Identification

The Bursar's Office is not a billing/invoicing party and relies on the billing/invoicing department to provide information about the payments to process payment accurately and timely into the accounting system. Department should initiate contact with the Bursar's Office before receiving payments.  It is the department's responsibility to notify the Bursar's Office about its incoming payments and provide speed type, account code, and required backup prior to the arrival of the payment.

Department should establish a unique payment identifier on their invoice (such as Invoice#) and require its payer(s) to always include such identifier on the payments to UMass Chan (e.g., on check stub/check memo, on EFT payment description). Good examples of unique payment identifier include:

• receipting speed type
• department name or program as invoice prefix
• unique identifier for the department/program

For EFT payments, if the payer sends out payment notifications, please ensure at least one of the Bursar's Office staff members is included as the notification recipient.

Bursar's Office - Processing payment receipts

Unless extra time is needed to research, all payments are receipted by the Bursar's Office within 24 hours after the payments are received. Payment receipts are fed to UMASS PeopleSoft Finance system (the General Ledger) daily, under journal source code CR and with journal numbers starting with CR.

General guidelines on GL chartstrings used for payment receipting:

• All grant payments are receipted to Grant Accounting clearing account by the Bursar's Office and then re-classed by Grant Accounting to their respective grant destination in the GL. To locate grant payment, departments should first contact their designated grant accountant before reaching out to the Bursar's Office.
• All donations are receipted to the Advancement Office's clearing account by the Bursar's Office and then re-classed by Advancement to their respective destination in the GL. To locate donation payment, departments should first contact the Advancement Office before reaching out to the Bursar's Office.
• In general, payments should NOT be deposited to these funds: AIF, RTF, or State allocation. Any payment questions in relation to these funds, please contact the Bursar's Office first.
• In general, expense account codes CANNOT be used to receipt payments, unless the payment is a refund or reimbursement.  In order for the Bursar’s Office to receipt a refund/reimbursement payment, the department is responsible for providing the Bursar's Office with the Finance report showing the original expense, as well as backup proving the nature of the refund/reimbursement payment.

To learn more about centralized payment receipting by the Bursar’s Office:

• UMass Chan Cash & Cash Equivalents Receipting Policy

UMass Chan requires all non-credit card payments to be directly mailed or submitted via EFT to the Bursar's Office by the payers. With legitimate business needs (such as on-site conference/workshop fees, fund raising events, retail transactions), a department that wishes to accept payments from its customers first and then transmit to the Bursar's Office for processing should obtain approval for such privilege and establish detailed procedures to ensure compliance to UMass Chan internal controls at all times.

To be considered for such payment receiving privilege, the department should:

• Contact the Bursar's Office about its business needs before completing the required forms.
• Review UMass Chan Cash & Cash Equivalents Receipting Policy–specifically the sections of “Request an exception to receive payments directly at the department” and “Payments directly received in the department:”
• Complete the “Request for Receipting Privileges Form” and submit to the Bursar's Office for review and approval
• If approved, the department will be subject to the annual Cash Receipting procedures review conducted by the Bursar's Office.
• If procedural/personnel change occurs during the year, submit an updated “Request for Receipting Privileges Form” to the Bursar's Office.

Main responsibilities of department when receiving payments:

• Checks should be endorsed when they are received (contact Bursar’s Office to obtain an endorsement stamp). Do not keep copies of checks per the University policies.
• All cash and checks must be securely maintained and safeguarded before being transported to the Bursar's Office.
  • Segregation of duties should be established within the department, no one person should perform all functions (e.g., the person receiving cash should be different from the person transporting cash to the Bursar's Office).
• Standardized transmittal form with receipting speed type and account code and proper signature(s) should be remitted with each deposit to the Bursar's Office. 
• All payments received should be transported to the Bursar’s office in a locked bag within 24 hours. Department should contact Campus Security to escort transporting cash deposits of $500 or more.
• For more control measures, please review UMass Chan Cash & Cash Equivalents Receipting Policy – “Payments directly received in the department” section.

Identifying payments posted to the GL:

When trying to locate a payment, the department should first view available reports (SUMMIT or PeopleSoft Finance) for the GL chartstrings where the payment in question should be posted to. If unable to find the payment, the department should ask the payer for a copy of the cashed check or bank remittance details on the EFT payment and provide to the Bursar's Office for further research.

Processing correction journal:

When a correction journal is needed after the payment is receipted, the department should provide the Bursars Office with the original deposit information (the Journal # starting with CR), the correct accounting information (new Speed Type and account code) and any supporting documentation as needed.

• The University of Massachusetts (“UMass”) Treasurer’s Office, Merchant Services is responsible for the oversight of credit card account maintenance and reporting. To become a merchant accepting credit card payments, departments must follow established setup procedures and adhere to UMASS policies and Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (” PCI DSS”).
• Campus eCommerce representatives represent their respective campus on the UMass e-Commerce Group, are the primary point of contact for their campus, and are responsible for disseminating all relevant policies, standards, and guidelines to ensure merchants are knowledgeable and compliant with PCI DSS requirements and Incident Management.
• UMass Chan departments requesting to receive credit card payments must first log a ticket to UMass Merchant Services (log in to UMass Treasurer's Office-Cash Management > click “Merchant Services” > click “New Merchant ID”.)  The requesting department may also reach out to the UMass Chan campus e-Commerce representatives (Bursar/Assistant Bursar) for additional support.

Setting up credit card payment is a joint effort between the requesting department, campus IT, UMass Merchant Services, third-party service provider used by the department, and outside qualified security assessor (QSA).

• After becoming a merchant, the department is mandated to always adhere to PCI DSS and UMass Merchant Services policies and procedures and to participate in the Annual PCI Audit (tasks include completing PCI training, submitting Self Assessment Questionnaire (QSA), and obtaining Attestation of Compliance (AOC) from third party service provider).
  
  
• All relevant information about accepting credit card payments can be found by logging in to UMass Treasurer's Office-Cash Management and then clicking “Merchant Services”.

• Credit card transactions (processed via POS terminals or online) are posted to the general ledger in two business days via an automatic interface process.

• The department must reconcile credit card transactions between data from the originating device/web application and the General Ledger on a regular basis.

• • Run queries beginning with CM_ACCTG, EC_ACCTG, UM_JPM_ACCTG, or UM_PP_ACCTG (depending on the credit card payment processor the department uses) in PeopleSoft Finance or run Transaction Detail Analysis dashboard in SUMMIT.

• • Transactions posted by the automatic interface process appear under journal numbers beginning with CM, EC, JPM, or PP (depending on the credit card payment processor the department uses)

• • Verify transactions posted to the general ledger equal the POS terminal or online transaction settlement reports.

• •   If the business process for the originating department requires that the revenue be reallocated to a different chartstring, a transfer should be requested on a weekly basis by Friday at noon. Provide a journal entry with appropriate chartstrings to the Recharge Mailbox at rechargeentries@umassmed.edu

• Segregation of duties should be adopted (i.e., staff processing credit card payment via POS terminal or maintaining online payment site is different from staff performing reconciliation).