From the category archives:

Reporting

Penalties for Late Consolidated Fiscal Reports

November 18, 2011

Do you receive payments from the New York State Office for People With Developmental Disabilities (OPWDD), Medicaid payments from the NYS Office of Mental Health (OMH), or the NYS Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services (OASAS)?

If so, you’ll want to investigate late filing penalties association with Consolidated Fiscal Reports (CFR).

In the November MP&S Nonprofit Alert from Marks Paneth & Shron, the following was reported:

The New York State Office for People With Developmental Disabilities (OPWDD) is planning to implement a 2% penalty for late submission of the Consolidated Fiscal Report (CFR).  A not-for-profit service provider’s reimbursement will be cut by 2% and the rate will be restored only upon submission of the CFR.  There will be no refund on the money lost during the overdue period.

According to the New York State Consolidated Fiscal Reporting and Claiming Manual, all service providers must submit their completed CFR to the applicable State funding agencies not later than 120 days after the end of the reporting period.  If an extension is submitted, the due date is not later than 150 days after the end of the reporting period.  An extension request must be electronically submitted.  For example, a June 30, 2011 CFR, with an extension is due on December 1, 2011.  Late submissions of a CFR, including all certifications and attachments, may result in a sanction or penalty being imposed against the service provider.

Providers who receive Medicaid payments from the NYS Office of Mental Health (OMH) relative to certified program services can have their payments temporarily withheld up to 20% for the first month under sanction.  Such reductions will be increased in each subsequent month by 10% until the CFR is submitted.  Providers who receive payments under contract with OMH can have their entire quarterly payments withheld until a satisfactory submission has been received.

Similarly, the NYS Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services (OASAS) can impose sanctions for late filing of the CFR as prescribed in OASAS Local Services Bulletin 2001-05.

The current regulations allow OPWDD to withhold up to 5% of the revenue in certain programs; however, it was not strictly enforced.  Now OPWDD is planning to impose a sanction of 2% on all programs.  Originally, OPWDD planned to implement a 10% cash hold-back policy on all programs but that proposal was rejected.

Sage Fund Accounting User Group Meeting – Boston 11-15-11

October 20, 2011

If you use Sage MIP Fund Accounting and you’re in the Boston area, mark your calendar and join us November 15 from 9:00 – 11:00 for a User Group Meeting.

Learn how the Advanced Financial Reporting Capabilities of Sage Fund Accounting can help you:

  • Master the tools within MIP to build reports and learn how to communicate effectively
  • Use the budget module to track the evolution of your budget and forecast future performance
  • Use formatting and report groups to summarize or aggregate data to meet the unique requirements of internal and external audiences

User Group Meeting Details

  • Boston User Group Meeting
  • Tuesday, November 15, 2011
  • 9:00 – 11:00 am
  • Location:  Year Up, 133 Federal Street, 11th Floor, Boston, MA 02110

Register here.

These informal meetings provide the opportunity for each software user to meet other software users in their area, and to share ideas about nonprofit practice and product functionality.

We promote an open forum – so bring your questions and share with others in an informal setting.

 

 

 

Jacqueline M. Tiso to Speak at South Carolina Conference for Community Action Programs and Head Start Organizations

April 2, 2011

Jacqueline M. Tiso, JMT Consulting Group’s CEO and founder is going to be speaking at the SC Community Action Partnership and SC State Head Start Association 2011 Annual Spring Training Conference, April 18 – 21, 2011.   The event takes place at the Myrtle Beach Marriott Resort and Spa located in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

The presentation “A CFO’s Guide to Reporting Technology” is designed to help the financial leaders of Community Action Programs and Head Start organizations learn how to leverage technology for better and more efficient reporting, which prevents delinquency and loss of funding as well as empowering the organization to make more effective decisions in program spending and management.  Additionally, when armed with better reporting, finance director are able to focus on the more strategic aspects of operations that are critical to meeting the organization’s mission.

Dozens of Community Action Programs and Head Start organizations have turned to JMT Consulting Group to serve as their technology partner.  We also host a monthly webcast dedicated to Head Start organizations.

Easing the Reporting Process for Head Start Organizations

February 28, 2011

These are uncertain times for Head Start organizations.  Whether funding becomes available or proposed budget cuts take place, you’ll want to make sure that you have the systems in place to best protect your funding and continue to support early childhood education and health.

Is your Head Start organization challenged with any of the problems listed below:

  • As you prepare for the next quarterly ARRA report, besides completing the report, are there long hours ahead of you to collect the needed information for the report?
  • Once you finish with the quarterly reports, are facing you GABI report?
  • Are you struggling for a way to track Federal share and Non-Federal share?
  • Once that’s complete, are you trying to unravel allocation of labor costs across departments, cost centers and other areas of the organization?

If your accounting system is not providing you with the data you need to complete the reporting, it may be time to look for a new system.  If you are overwhelmed with spread sheets (manual, time-consuming and prone to error), there are better tools that can assist you with your accounting.

Join us on April 21 at 11:00e for a free, online webcast “Easing the Reporting Process for Head Start Organizations.”  Register here.

A repeat session will be held May 19 at 11:00e.  Register here.

For information on the sessions or if you have difficulty registering contact nhasser@jmtconsulting.com .

 

 

Community Healthcare Centers: A Specific Look at How Sage MIP Fund Accounting Can Work for CHCs

December 2, 2010

Sage MIP Fund Accounting is a powerful option for Community Healthcare Centers that need to report to multiple funders: Federal, State, Private Foundation and other sources.  Join us on December 7 for a brief on how Sage MIP Fund Accounting could serve your Community Healthcare organization address the complex reporting required for all stakeholders.

We’ll discuss how:

Sage MIP Fund Accounting & JMT Consulting Group helps Health Centers by:

  • Offering compliant cross-fiscal-year, multi-dimensional reports for various funding sources, including complex federal grants;
  • Integrating seamlessly with your existing Clinic, EMR and personnel information systems to streamline information management;
  • Simple creation of cost reports for Medicaid & Medicare and other funding sources;
  • Green up the audit process with its paperless capabilities;
  • Reducing or eliminating manual spreadsheet reporting and reducing human errors;
  • Creating customized budgets for your grants, programs and cost centers.

Selecting Right Fund Accounting Crucial for Community Healthcare Organizations

November 30, 2010

In reviewing a profile of Crider Health Center it really hit home what an important decision selecting the right fund accounting software is.  The complexities of holding FQHC status, where strict compliance with multi-level regulations is a must, could cripple an organization that didn’t have the right accounting system.

But in addition to meeting the reporting demands of state, federal and agency funding, Crider was able to add further efficiencies and cost savings just by being able to have greater control over reporting.  Prior to implementing Sage MIP Fund Accounting, they were paying an outside auditor thousands of dollars per report.  Now they’re doing it themselves – with speedier turnaround.

We love seeing these kinds of positive results with our clients.  And we love hearing feedback like this:

“In a very short period of time, we started providing dental, primary care and pediatric services, acquired a new medical practice, and began building another facility.  I don’t see how we could have done this without JMT Consulting Group and Sage MIP Fund Accounting.”  Beth Smith, Vice President of Finance and Facilities, Crider Health Center.

Sage MIP Fund Accounting Boston User Group

November 5, 2010

If you use Sage MIP Fund Accounting in your Boston nonprofit organization, we invite you to a User Group meeting on November 16 from 9:30 – 11:30.  The location for the meeting has generously been provided by Year Up.

At this meeting we’ll be looking at Management Reporting using User Defined Groups (UDFs) within Sage MIP Fund Accounting:

  • Learning how to track units of performance (using custom, user-defined field
  • Determining how many clients are served per program manager
  • Determining the administrative FTE per program

Please join us!  We’d love to see you.  It’s a chance to learn as well as network with other nonprofits from Boston.

Click here for location and registration information.

 

Considering new fund accounting software? Some things to think about as you explore.

November 4, 2010

It’s sort of a mantra of ours that the decision you make regarding your accounting software is one of the most critical choices you can make for your nonprofit organization.  Look no further than the amount of time your accounting and finance team spend on creating monthly, quarterly, and program-specific reports, just to name a few.  Reporting is the key to effective use of the funds you’ve been awarded as well as additional funds you hope to gain.

The solution that works wonderfully for one nonprofit may not be a good fit for another nonprofit.   It’s part of the reason that we represent a number of different fund accounting solutions.  When counseling a nonprofit on software selection, we don’t walk in with a preconceived notion of selling a particular solution.  We want to learn about your organization first and understand the challenges that you face.

There is so much more than just software to consider.  While features and functions are important, there may be other factors that need to be weighed in your decision.  Are you staffed to support a system internally?  Do you have the necessary systems and infrastructure (or the means to invest in them) to host your systems?

Most of the time, there are human and technical resources available to support an in-house system.  But more and more, due to limited budgets and internal resources, we’re being asked about Software As A Service (SAAS) and Cloud Computing.  We believe that this is more than a fad and that it will continue to be a consideration on the list of choices available to nonprofits.  As a result, we’ve recently added Intacct to our product portfolio in order to better respond to the different requirements of nonprofits seeking our help.

If you have questions regarding the various fund accounting solutions on the market, we’d be happy to answer them.  Use the comments section here on the blog or give us a call.  Also, we routinely host free webinars on the various solutions in order for you to learn more about them.  You can see the webinar topics here.

With so many good solutions available to relieve you of tedious, time-consuming, cumbersome manual processes – you should look to a solution that can automate those routines and give you more time to analyze the data – and we’d be happy to help you explore the options in order to find the perfect fit for you.