Financial Accounting and Reporting (FAR) monitors all Education and General Funds, Designated Funds, Auxiliary Funds, Restricted Funds, and Agency Funds. FAR is responsible for maintaining a high level of understanding of the rules and regulations and providing technical assistance to the departments.
FAR ensures the financial integrity of The University of Texas at Austin by managing funds in accordance with sound accounting principles and appropriate policies, laws, and regulations, providing accurate and timely reports on these funds, and ensuring costs charged to the university’s various missions are properly allocated. This is accomplished by
- Maintaining a high level of understanding of the rules and regulations.
- Providing technical assistance to departments
- Reviewing new laws and policies to determine their impact on reporting procedures
- Preparing various financial reports and analyses for both internal and external users
- Preparing the Monthly Financial Report.
- Preparing the Annual Financial Report.
- Processing year-end accounting transactions (year-end accrual entries)
Find answers to common questions about transfers, pooling and balances, account setup and management, year-end, and more in askUS.
Responsibilities
- Telephone information/occasional office visits.
- Answer questions concerning balances, transactions, procedures, policies, etc.
- Help resolve voucher processing problems.
- Train departmental contacts in procedures and techniques for information retrieval and voucher processing.
- Direct unanswered questions to the appropriate source for answers or assistance.
- Answer questions.
- Prepare vouchers on request.
- Research problems.
- Do special projects, reports, worksheets, presentations, etc.
- Provide any other support as necessary.
- Monitor revenues, expenditures, transfers, and fund balance forward to make sure they are appropriate according to applicable accounting principles and university policies and procedures.
- Maintain object audit groups (CO2).
- Review and final approve transfer documents (VT2).
- Review and process balance forward documents.
- Prepare and process documents to re-appropriate funds.
- Prepare and process documents to lapse funds.
- Prepare and process journal vouchers.
- Research problems.
- Review and process original budget document.
- Review and process budget adjustments. Final approve VT2 documents.
- Periodically compare actual to budget.
- Review that budgeted transfers are made on a timely basis.
- Alert management/department to potential shortfalls which could create year-end overdrafts.
- Maintain and monitor approved overdraft file.
- Monitor and assist in clearing problem overdraft accounts.
Continuing Education and Documentation
- Attend ACE classes.
- Self-study of The University's Handbook of Operating Procedures, The University's Policy Memorandums, the University's Handbook of Fiscal Procedures, the Comptroller's Notices to State Agencies and Accounting Policy Statements (APS), the Comptroller's Annual Financial Reporting Requirements for Colleges and Universities, NACUBO Guidelines in the Financial Accounting and Reporting Manual for higher education.
- Maintain a list of desk duties.
- Maintain specific documentation related to each fund group.
- Prepare Annual Financial Report.
- Make necessary adjusting and closing entries.
- Verify and process automated adjusting entries.
- Prepare schedules related to fund group.
- Work with departments in reconciling departmental reports with the annual financial report.
- Provide auditors information concerning the report.
- Review Monthly Financial Report.
- Review general ledger accounts.
- Ensure that the subsidiary ledger ties to the general ledger.
- Provide information for input into the Monthly Financial Report for Revenues and Expenditures as required by UT System.
- Prepare Periodic Management Reports.
- Prepare special reports related to the fund groups. This includes O'Donnell Reports, IPEDS report, Coordinating Board Report of Research Expenditures, CFAE Gift Reconciliation, ARP/ATP reports, and various surveys.
- Ensure accuracy of all reports
- Ensure that accounting records are accurate
- Verify that the appropriate policies and coding schemes were followed.
- Ensure that reports are appropriately tied to the accounting records.
- Reports to the State