VII. State Revenues and Appropriated Loan Receivables

Guide to Financial Operations

VII.9 Fringe Benefits and Indirect Costs

VII. State Revenues and Appropriated Loan Receivables
Guide to Financial Operations

Fringe Benefits and Indirect Costs will be paid from Federal and other dedicated revenue funds of the State.

Fringe Benefits costs refer to those disbursements incurred by the State for the benefit of its employees and includes the costs to the State, as an employer, for Retirement plans, Social Security, Health Insurance, Dental Insurance, Worker's Compensation, Survivor's Benefits, Unemployment Insurance and the State's contribution to the Employee Benefit Funds pursuant to agreements with the various bargaining units.

Indirect costs are agency or central service agency costs that cannot be directly associated with the administration of a particular program and therefore cannot be charged as a direct program expense. Indirect costs include, but are not limited to, physical overhead, space occupancy, utilities, information technology and central service agency (e.g. OSC, OGS, Civil Service, Budget, General Services, etc.) costs.

Statutory Authority

Statutory authority for assessing, collecting and making payments from funds of the State are included in various statutes of the State. Generally these provide that whenever the compensation of an employee is paid from Federal and other dedicated revenue funds of the State, fringe benefits and a proportionate share of administrative costs associated with the administration of benefits which would otherwise be chargeable to the State's General Fund, shall, with approval of the Budget Director, be paid from such Federal and other dedicated revenue funds. Employee fringe benefit and indirect costs of the General Fund are paid from general state charge appropriations provided annually and are not subject to the special assessment procedures described herein.

Comptroller’s Authority to Assess and Collect Section 8-b State Finance Law
Retirement Section 16(c) Retirement and Social Security Law
Social Security Section 138-a Retirement and Social Security Law
Health Insurance Section 168-1 and 2 Civil Service Law
Worker’s Compensation Section 88-a Workmen’s Compensation Law
Survivor’s Benefits Section 154-8 Civil Service Law
Unemployment Insurance Section 580 Labor Law
Employee Benefit Funds Section 6(f) State Finance Law

Assessment Rates

At the beginning of each fiscal year, the Division of Budget will enter the new fringe benefit and indirect cost standard rates into the State Financial System. Any questions regarding standard or waiver rates should be directed to an agency’s DOB examiner.

In some cases, the federal government may request the negotiation of a separate rate for distinctive programs instead of using the standard rate determined by the Division of Budget. For example, a special rate can be developed for a state-administered program of an organizational unit supported with federal funds. For programs or funds that require a rate other than the standard rate, or require a waiver, agencies should enter a new waiver request in SFS which, once approved at the agency level, will be routed to DOB for further review and final approval. Current and prior fiscal year rates can be found within the State Financial System (SFS) in the following path:

General Ledger/FBIC WorkCenter Dashboard/Reports/Query tab

Bi-Weekly Allocations

Fringe Benefit and Indirect Cost allocations are based upon personal service (PS) disbursements paid from appropriated funds, except the General Fund and any other fund specifically exempted by the Division of the Budget. The allocation is derived by multiplying the percentage rates by the total personal service disbursements made between each bi-weekly allocation. The allocation looks at the accounting string used on the PS charge and uses the same string for FBIC charges.

Redirects

If an agency would like their FBIC allocation to charge a different SFS chartstring in the event the allocation journal fails for insufficient cash or for budgetary issues, redirect functionality is available to agencies to use an alternate chartfield combination.

Prior to the beginning of each fiscal year, agencies create a Redirect Set which is unique to a specific GLBU. Multiple Redirects can be created within the Redirect Set. Redirects may be updated or inactivated throughout the fiscal year using Effective Dated rows. When the FBIC process is run it will apply the most recent Effective Dated Redirect row to the charges.

Required Reports

With the implementation of the FBIC Automation Process, agencies have also been given an FBIC WorkCenter Dashboard as a central location for FBIC related information.

To access the FBIC WorkCenter Dashboard, navigate to General Ledger > FBIC WorkCenter Dashboard.

Under the Reports/Query tab, under different links, agencies are able to view their journals in error through Error Reports, and can obtain Transaction Reports, Redirect Reports, Analysis Reports, and Waiver & Standard Reports.

For detail data prior to the FBIC Automation, Agency AP users have been granted access to the Accounts Receivable and General Ledger modules under the SFS Financials menu to allow them to run the NYAR0260 (FBIC Invoice) and the NYGL0442 (FBIC Ledger) reports for their agency. These reports can only be run for data through March 31, 2019 before the new FBIC Allocation was implemented

The NYAR0260 displays all of the FBIC invoice detail by fund of a specific GLBU (customer) during a specific time period.

To run the NYAR0260, navigate to Accounts Receivable > Report > FBIC Invoice. If a run control already exists, navigate to Find an Existing Value. If no run control exists, navigate to Add a New Value, create a Run Control and Save. With the implementation of obligation date on June 1, 2014, a separate invoice date was made available in SFS. Prior to June 1, 2014 the quarter end date was used for invoice date.

When running the report enter the following in the run control,

  • ‘From Date’ –the invoice date of the bill for bills created after June 1, 2014 OR the last day of the quarter for bills created prior to June 1, 2014.
  • ‘To Date’ – should always be 3/30/19 to include all Invoices as of the State’s conversion and cleanup transactions from the FBIC Billing Process to the FBIC Allocation Process.
  • ‘Business Unit’ – Agency GLBU

The NYAR0260 can be viewed in Report Manager once the report run status is “Success”.

The NYGL0442 displays the invoice IDs, billed amounts, paid amounts, any credit/re-bill adjustments and the outstanding amount due by fund for each GLBU (customer) through a specified time period. Each report is located within the Report sub menu of the respective module.

To run the NYGL0442, navigate to General Ledger > General Reports > FBIC Analysis Report. If a run control already exists, navigate to Find an Existing Value. If no run control exists, navigate to Add a New Value, create a Run Control and Save.

When running the report,

  • ‘From Date’ – should always be 3/30/12 to include outstanding balances as of the State’s conversion from the Central Accounting System to SFS.
  • ‘To Date’ – the current date is recommended so that all activity (bills, payments, credit/re-bills) through that date is included
  • ‘Fund’ – leave this field blank to include ALL funds
  • ‘Customer’ – Agency GLBU
  • ‘Project’ – leave this field blank to include ALL projects

The NYGL0442 can be viewed in Report Manager once the report run status is “Success”.


Guide to Financial Operations

REV. 10/09/2019