New coding structure will streamline Queen's accounting

Gazette Story by Rob Wood

26 October 2009

A new Chart of Accounts will be launched in late November to bring a consistent, organized coding structure to all types of accounts, department codes, funds, programs and projects at Queen’s.

The university will be launching the new structure as part of the Queen’s University Administrative Systems Replacement (QUASR) project implementation, a major step in fundamentally transforming how we do business at Queen’s. It will affect almost all activities that touch financial data – forms, requisitions, purchasing, journal entries, financial reports and many other accounting functions.

The new finance account structure will both simplify and standardize account coding across the university. For example, it will feature distinct codes to easily identify the fund (such as research or operating), department, and account ID associated with the financial data. Users will also have the ability to track specific expenditures for things like events, program activities, research projects and capital items.

Those who use financial systems or work with budget information will be familiar with the current structure of department and account codes, minor and subminor accounts. They will transition to the new structure that features:

• department codes that will be consistent across all administrative services at Queen’s.
• a new set of more than 400 standard Account ID codes that can be used consistently across departments to record revenues and expenses. For example, copier expenses in one department will have the same Account ID number as the coding used for the same type of expenditure in other departments. This will allow units to analyse their own expenses while departments and the University can produce overall summaries for similar types of expenditures. The new approach will provide easier access to information at the detail or summary level as well as support compliance with generally accepted accounting practices.
• coding to help departments and units monitor transactions and track unique program and project expenses – from conferences and service charge-backs to particular academic programs and research projects.

Over the next two weeks, additional details on the new Chart of Accounts will be distributed to account holders and posted on the QUASR website.