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March Month End

Issued by Mike Sinclair - Central and Research Accounting

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Key Year End Dates

Key Year End Dates are detailed below. Further detailed guidance will be issued in the next few months.

Issued by Mike Sinclair - Central and Research Accounting

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Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) Credit

The Finance Division has processed the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) credit into Department Accounts in the March 2021 period.  The credit has been posted against Source of Fund “JUMA” and associated salary costs were moved to match off against the credit.  The credit covers the period February 2021

Any questions or queries relating to the credit, please contact Graham Gustard (Graham.Gustard@admin.cam.ac.uk) or Mike Sinclair (Mike.Sinclair@admin.cam.ac.uk).

Issued by Mike Sinclair - Central and Research Accounting

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Accounts Receivable – AstraZeneca/Coupa Supplier Portal Reminder

AstraZeneca are moving to mandatory use of the Coupa Supplier Portal (CSP) from 31st March 2021. From that date all invoices issued to AstraZeneca from the University will need to be submitted on this portal, they will no longer accept invoices sent by post or email. 

The University already has a central Coupa registration (managed by Bernadette Parsons in Credit Control) to which we can add users from all our departments and the Research Office if they need to transact with AstraZeneca, we want to use this registration rather than have separate registrations set up for individual departments.

Please contact Bernadette Parsons (Bernadette.parsons@admin.cam.ac.uk, Tel: x765872) if

• you wish to be registered as a user on Coupa

• you have already completed a Coupa registration (we can merge the accounts)

• you have any queries on the new process with AstraZeneca

• any of your other customers mention a Coupa connection going forward.

Issued by Bernadett Parsons - Shared Services Manager

Medical Exempt orders from Marketplace suppliers

When using the Marketplace to raise purchase orders that include items that qualify for the VAT medical exemption relief (ME0% tax code) buyers will need to ensure that a copy of the associated Medical Exemption Certificate is also manually completed and forwarded to the supplier. Unfortunately, the certificate is not automatically transmitted to the supplier alongside the order.  To assist Key Contacts were sent last week a spreadsheet with the contact details for all of the Marketplace suppliers.  

Therefore, please could you follow these temporary guidelines whilst we consider alternatives.

Once the order is approved (and automatically submitted to the supplier) the buyer will need to either print the purchase order to access the medical exemption certificate which will be generated as the last page of the PDF file, or manually complete a medical exemption certificate

• This certificate needs to be completed (appropriate boxes ticked), signed and emailed to the Marketplace supplier.

• This requirement to provide a completed and signed ME certificate applies to all suppliers. Further to the guidance we issued in Bulletin 852 please also ask the supplier in the covering email if the goods will be shipped from overseas? We have received numerous examples of orders to UK suppliers, thought to be UK transactions, but where they have actually been shipped directly from overseas and Import VAT charged.

Where the goods are to be imported please confirm the following with the supplier:

• Which freight agent / fast freight parcel operator will be used (e.g. FedEx, UPS, DHL).

• The tracking number for the shipment

• What the delivery terms are – this determines who is responsible for the import declarations and payment of duty.

• The supplier should be instructed to pass a copy of the ME certificate to the freight agent to ensure that no VAT is paid on import.

To minimise the risk of the goods being held at the border or VAT being charged incorrectly (which becomes an additional cost to departments),  it may also be prudent to contact the parcel operators and provide them with a copy of the ME certificate (and any other duty relief certificates / required licences). Some agents may ask for clearance details and the ME certificate should be provided to them directly.

We appreciate that this creates an extra administrative burden.  Unfortunately, this is a result of the customs border now in place, post-Brexit.  Where goods are imported, it is typically the University that needs to evidence the claim for ME VAT relief and, in order for this to happen,  the agent needs to have the ME certificate when making the import entry.

If you have any further queries please contact Procurement Services procurement.services.enquiries@admin.cam.ac.uk

Issued by Karen Sheldon - Finance Training

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Financial Users Group (FUG) - Recording available

The recording of Friday's FUG is now availabe from here and from the FUG Papers page along with the full presentaion.

Issued by Michelle Bond - Head of Financial Systems 

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Accountants’ annual update

We are delighted to announce that we have arranged a date for the annual update. Our auditors PwC have kindly agreed to run a session on the latest updates to FRS 102.

 

The event will be held on 28 April at 3pm and is expected to last 60 – 90 minutes. This event will be held on Teams which hopefully will make it accessible to the majority. Attendees will be emailed a link to join the meeting nearer the time.

 

As with past events qualified staff can use this towards their annual CPD. The event is designed for qualified and part-qualified accountants across the University. Anybody already on our list should have received an email but feel free to pass the details to any colleagues who we may not have contacted directly.

 

Click here to book a place.

 

Issued by Helen Parker - Finance Training

 

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