2025-05-13 Acquisitions Meeting notes

 Date

May 13, 2025

 Participants

 Agenda

• No update from PC

• Implementers topics Acquisitions/Resource Management implementers

  • Topic 175: When you pay an invoice for a one-time order against a previous fiscal year, and update the POL status to fully paid, would you expect the previous FY encumbrance and the current fiscal year encumbrance (if applicable) to be released? Should ‘cancelled’ ever be an option for payment status to select to apply to a POL with a paid invoice?

    Open

    

    • Relates to Trillium enhancement: UINV-577: Updating order status when paying or cancelling an invoice against a previous fiscal yearClosed

    • Consensus in chat for first question: the encumbrance should be released in both the previous and current FYs.

    • For second question:

      • Cancelled may be used if paying a credit invoice for an order that has been cancelled. Encumbrance should still be released.

      • Possibly a prepaid item that the vendor could not fulfill.

      • Other scenarios raised with ongoing/standing orders

      • Leave ‘cancelled’ as an option or now

  • Topic 176: Automated tests (Testrails: C375283) uncovered a problem with paying an invoice based on budget encumbrance limits. Even if you are paying an invoice without a related POL/encumbrance, the encumbrance restriction below is also being factored in.

    • Expenditure restriction:
      [remaining amount] = (allocated + netTransfers) * allowableExpenditure - (awaitingPayment + expended]

    • Encumbrance restriction:
      [remaining amount] = (allocated + netTransfers) * allowableEncumbered - (encumbered + awaitingPayment + expended)

      • Only the encumbrance check is performed when orders are opened (provided the encumbrance limit is enforced).

      • Both checks are performed when attempting to pay an invoice (provided the limit is enforced).

        • Question from Julie: When the encumbrance check is performed, is it considering the encumbrance related to the invoice that should be released?

          • Dennis: The encumbrance is released at approval, so that is already ‘awaiting payment’ when the encumbrance restriction is checked at point of payment.

        • Ann advocated for making the formulas consistent for each restriction because excluding encumbrances from the expenditure restriction may cause problems toward the end of a fiscal year.

          • Dennis pointed out that the variation was because libraries may have different allowable percentages for encumbrances and payments, e.g. if a library allows 110% encumbrance but only 100% expenditure, over-encumbering would prevent legitimate expenditure.

        • Dung-Lan and Sara agreed with keeping the formulas as-is since they allow over-encumbrance and FOLIO needs to support different percentages and especially orders that you know will be rolled into the next year based on publication date.

          • Supported by Sabrina in chat.

      • Dennis proposes a workshop session in an upcoming meeting with real-life examples.

        • Re-labeling may be the key to resolving this question.