Reviewing a Questioned PCard Purchase

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Reviewing a Questioned P-Card Purchase

• Office of Research Training and Compliance
• September 2008

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What is a P-Card?

• The Procurement Card is the institutional credit
  card that is designed to give controlled buying
  power directly to the Departments/Divisions
  eliminating the need for many purchase and check
  enclosed orders.
• To ensure compliance with all Federal and State
  procurement regulations, the Procurement Office
  must review all purchases made with contract and
  grant funds to ensure that they comply with the
  Federal Acquisition Regulation and the Office of
  Management and Budget Circular A-110, which
  details procurement standards ensuring that
  goods and services are obtained in a fair and
  effective manner.

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What is the P-Card Review?

• Each month, the Office of Research Training
  Compliance
• receives a list of questionable charges from the
  P-Card
• Office. These are charges
• that have been made to
• federal awards. The
• charges are then reviewed
• by ORTC to determine
• whether they are allowable,
• allocable, reasonable and
• applied consistently.

(Sample Spreadsheet of Questioned Charges)
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• During the ORTC review of charges, a series of
  questions will be entered into a Questions
  field on the spreadsheet of charges.
• A Responses field will also be added for the
  RSC to answer those questions.

(Extracted Charge w/Question)
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• Once the ORTC initial review is complete, the
  spreadsheet is posted to the G// drive for RSC
  review.
• The RSCs with questioned charges will be notified
  via an e-mail from the Managing Director of
  Research Service Operations of the deadline for
  reviewing those charges.
• It is the responsibility of the RSC to ensure
  that all questioned charges are reviewed and
  appropriate to the award.

G\OCRO\P-CARD REVIEWS
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You have received the notification e-mail, what
is the next step?

• Once you have received an e-mail notifying you of
  questionable p-card charges, your next step is to
  review those charges and the back-up
  documentation to ascertain whether or not the
  charge is allowable as-is, or if it will need to
  be moved to a different account.
• In order to review the back-up materials, you
  will need to access WebXtender, a secure software
  that stores p-card documentation.

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WebXtender

• Before you can access the WebXtender application,
  you will need to ensure that you have login
  information.
• Each RSC team in OCRO should have their own
  unique set of login information that will give
  them access to their school or department-specific
  charges.
• This login information can be obtained through
  your team leader.

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• To log into WebXtender, you will need to first be
  sure that you are logged into a secure network
  (VPN). To do this, launch GBUSSNet Dialer from
  your Programs tab and choose either the
  erp_core or erp_wex connection. Once you are
  logged into the VPN, you will be able to access
  the WebXtender web site.

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• To log into WebXtender, use this web site
  http//webx.sco.gwu.edu/wx/
• This site will not
• load correctly if
• you are not logged
• into the VPN first.
• Click the Login
• button.

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• A new window will open and prompt you for your
  user information.

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• Once you have
• logged into WebXtender,
• you will need to
• double-click on
• the Procurement
• Card option.

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• Then enter the cardholder last name between
  asterisks and click Submit

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• Double-click on the cardholder name you need to
  review and then choose the p-card statement with
  questioned charges. The statements are organized
  in cycle order with the most recently scanned at
  the top.

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Notes re Navigating WebXtender

• You will need to be aware of the following
  navigation buttons while using WebXtender.
• Not using the appropriate navigation buttons to
  close documents or log out of the WebXtender site
  can lock up your login information, blocking your
  access until the web site is reset at midnight.

Log Out
New Search
Close Document
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• Additionally, the previous page and next page
  buttons are used to navigate through the scanned
  p-card documentation. You can also use the Go
  To button to navigate to a specific page within
  the document.
• FYI backup documentation is not keyword
  searchable.

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• Once the documentation opens, you will need to
  scroll through the cardholder statement until you
  see the charge that is in question.

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(No Transcript)
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• The handwritten number next to the charge in
  question corresponds to the receipt order in the
  scanned backup documentation.
• Ex. if there is a 3 next to the charge, the
  receipt for that charge will be the third receipt
  in the scanned backup documentation.
• Receipts follow any additional paperwork (ie.
  Travel Entertainment forms, etc.) that may also
  need to be included with the statement
  documentation.

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• Once you have identified the receipt within the
  backup documentation, you will need to review it,
  using the award budget, to determine whether or
  not the charge is
• Included in the budget
• Allowable under A-21, section J
• Reasonable and
• Charged to the correct account.

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A Note on Allowability of Charges

• A check of the award budget is imperative when
  you are reviewing questionable charges. You need
  to ensure that the charges you deem allowable are
  also appropriately justified in the award.
• For example, Miscellaneous Supplies need to be
  spelled out in the proposal in detail simply
  because a sponsor has included this line item in
  the award, does not mean that all of the charges
  to that account are automatically allowable.
• Also general Office Supplies are almost always
  unallowable. The only allowable office supplies
  purchase is that supply that is justified as an
  exceptional circumstance.

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Also Keep in Mind

• The single purchase threshold for p-card
  purchases is 2,500. Splitting charges is not
  allowable!
• Unless prior approval is granted through the
  P-Card Office (you should request written
  documentation of the approval from your PI), a
  single P-Card charge should not exceed 2,500.
• A single charge greater than 2,500 should not be
  split in order to come in under the 2,500
  threshold. If a charge is split, it will be
  reported to the P-Card Office and could result in
  the PI having their p-card privileges revoked.

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• Once you have reviewed the charge, you will need
  to enter your response into the spreadsheet.
• Responses can be as concise as allowable or as
  lengthy as necessary.
• It is acceptable to enter pending PI discussion
  (or something similar) and then re-visit the
  spreadsheet once you have a more definitive
  response.

(Sample Response to Questioned Charge)
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Please note

• The spreadsheet is removed from the G\\ drive
  the day after the deadline for the review of
  questioned charges. If you have not reviewed
  your charges by that date, you may contact ORTC
  to request an extension. If the charge is not
  reviewed and an extension has not been requested,
  the charge will be marked as no response
  received and will be included in the report to
  the Chief Research Officer.

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P-Card Policy and Handbook Access

• The P-Card Office maintains the P-Card handbook
  and P-Card In-A-Page reference documents for
  your information at
• http//www.gwu.edu/supchn/pcard.htm
• The P-Card Policy is available online
• http//my.gwu.edu/files/policies/ProcurementCardFI
  NAL.pdf

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Additional Resources

• P-Card Review Desk Procedure
• G\OCRO\P-CARD REVIEWS\P-card Monitoring Desk
  Procedure
• or
• G\OCRO\Desk Procedures
• Office of Research Training and Compliance
• Jackie Bendall, Director, ext. 4-7991
• jbendall_at_gwu.edu