Program Release systems outage begins February 8

Several campus administrative systems will be off-line beginning at noon February 8, 2008, while the campus brings three of five new computing systems online. The exact amount of down time is not yet known, but our best estimate is within 10 business days. This is an early notice--particularly for anyone whose work involves financial transactions. 

You may recall our earlier email about the five projects collectively known as the Program Release: Grants, Madison Accounts Payable Purchase Order, Legacy Accounting to SFS Transition, Automated Travel System, and Effort. Effort was brought on-line in November. ATS will only be used by a small group of pilot testers until it is more widely introduced in the fall of 2008.  It is the other three that will affect your work in February. Here's how. 

Payment transaction processing including invoice payments against purchase orders, direct payments, TERs, PIRs and Travel Advances and salary and non-salary cost transfer processes will not occur during the outage period. Emergency procedures will be available to make payments on a limited basis. However, all procurement transactions including Purchasing Cards, online ordering through MDS and Purchase Order processing will continue to be available for campus users during the blackout. Financial information accessed through WISDM will be available without updates until SFS comes back up. To minimize the impact of the down time please complete as much transaction processing as possible using the dates supplied by your Dean’s office and the information on the SFS status during Program Release available at http://www.bussvc.wisc.edu/sfs/ProgRel/sfsStatus.html.

The overall goal of this effort is to improve our capability to submit and access financial and grant-related data online. Many working groups have already been informed or received training on one or more of the projects noted above. For an overview of the 2008 Program Release and each project, see http://www.vc.wisc.edu/ProgramRelease.

Watch for training invitations in coming months. In the meantime, you may direct any questions about 2008 Program Release to pr@vc.wisc.edu.