March 2009 Monthly Statement Message

1. Airgas to conduct campus-wide inventory April 13-17
2. Procurement Updates
3. Travel News and Notes
4. Attend a VPF training session this spring
5. Download PowerPoint presentation from April 9 AO/FO Meeting
6. VPF Points of Interest
7. Links and Contact Information: When you need help

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1. Airgas to conduct campus-wide inventory April 13-17

Airgas will conduct a campus-wide inventory count of cylinders and dewars between April 13 and 17. MIT’s Environment, Health, & Safety Office, VPF Procurement, and Airgas encourage labs to return empty and unused cylinders and dewars before the inventory. This will reduce costs, improve safety, and make your lab greener. An accurate and efficiently run inventory could save MIT 5-10% a year in rental fees. If you have any questions, please email John.Jordan@Airgas.com.

2. Procurement Updates

P-card transition complete
VPF Procurement has successfully transitioned to the Bank of America Visa program for the MIT procurement credit card (P-card). The implementation of the program began during the week of March 16, with the delivery of new cards to cardholders. Please remember to provide your new credit card number to any vendors with which you have standing orders. Also, please provide the MIT card administrator with any changes in cardholder information to ensure your information is up to date.

If you have any questions about the new P-card, please e-mail procard@mit.edu. Please note that if your P-card is lost or stolen during non-MIT working hours, you should notify Bank of America at 888-449-2273 immediately.

Take advantage of MIT master agreement for hotel events
VPF Procurement has secured a master agreement for MIT with the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Cambridge, Le Meridien, the Cambridge Marriott, and the Royal Sonesta Hotel for day catering/small meetings and group/conference business. With this master agreement in place, MIT event planners only need to provide a requisition with a scope and statement of work for an event. The event will be covered by the agreed-upon master set of terms and conditions -- the hotels will provide a short summary of the relevant terms and conditions with each event contract.

Please take a moment to review the master agreements. If you have any questions, please contact Brion McAlarney ( brionm@mit.edu) or Derek Welcome ( welcomed@mit.edu).

Material groups great for categorizing, reporting on orders
Being selective in the use of material groups on a requisition is a great way to categorize and report on what you buy for your department, lab, or center (DLC). Material groups are commodity classifications required when you create SAPweb requisitions. When you choose the appropriate material group for all of your purchases, you will be able to generate reports from the data warehouse displaying the types of commodities your DLC buys.

This can be very helpful when you are looking for places to reduce spending. To see the whole list of material groups, please click on the binocular icon next to the material group field in SAPweb. Then, click on the “search" button, and the entire list of material groups will display.

3. Travel News and Notes

New security rule: Name on frequent flier account must match passport
VPF Travel advises MIT international travelers to make sure their frequent flier programs reflect their names exactly as they appear on their passports, in light of a shift in the responsibility for pre-departure watch list matching. The responsibility for pre-departure watch list matching will shift from individual airlines to the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) in August, under the Department of Homeland Security's new "Final Rule on Secure Flight."

That rule stipulates that all reservations contain the passenger's full name (including middle name) as it appears on the document that will be used to verify identity at the airport. The Secure Flight rule officially takes place in August, but given the phased-in approach the TSA is taking, travelers may want to take the necessary steps now to change names in frequent flyer accounts if they don't match their government identification.

LimoLiner expands Boston-NY service to include Hartford stop -- Begins April 16
LimoLiner's Boston-New York service now includes a stop in Hartford, Conn., on weekdays. LimoLiner vehicles now drop off and pick up eight times each weekday under the canopy between the Hartford Hilton Hotel and the Hartford Civic Center, at the #10 Free Star Shuttle stop, corner of Church Street and Trumbull Street. The Free Star Shuttle travels throughout the Hartford business and cultural district. LimoLiner offers competitive discounted rates for MIT employees, and first-time travelers are automatically enrolled in its Loyalty Program.

Reserve seats >> (Enter MIT’s Corporate Account Code (C1038) in the Promo Code box to obtain the MIT Corporate Rate.)

Discounts for Amtrak Acela Express and Emirates Airline extended
MIT employees will continue to receive favorable rates for the Amtrak Acela Express and Emirates Airline, under an extension of an agreement with both companies secured in early April. Under the Amtrak Acela agreement, MIT employees receive discounted fares for business and personal travel. The agreement with Emirates Airline secures discounted fares for employees traveling on MIT official business.

Terms of the agreements: Amtrak | Emirates.

4. Attend a VPF training session this spring

We encourage you to join the VPF for training sessions this spring. VPF training sessions provide a valuable introduction to VPF policies, procedures, and services for new administrative employees and a helpful refresher for other employees. Offered this spring will be our five introductory training sessions and Fundamentals of Budgeting at MIT, a three-hour course for those who are involved in budgeting. Learn more and reserve your slot >>

5. Download PowerPoint presentation from April 9 AO/FO Meeting

The slides from the April 9 Administrative and Fiscal Officers Meeting are now available for download. Speakers included Terry Stone, Executive Vice President and Treasurer, Rafael Reif, Provost, and Israel Ruiz, Vice President for Finance. Download the presentation >> (PowerPoint)

6. VPF Points of Interest

• VPF News – Delivered right to your computer: Subscribe to the VPF news feed, and we will alert you when new content is posted to the web site. You may receive VPF news by either RSS feed or email subscription. You may subscribe to the overall VPF feed, which includes all news posted to the web site, or to feeds with news specific to travel and procurement issues. More >>

• Status Report: The VPF is spearheading a number of process redesign projects. Here is a quick status report.

  Appointment Process Redesign: The pilot phase of the Appointment Process Redesign project will begin the first week of May, with initial training for pilot participants and the availability of the termination transactions tool to those participants. The project team is tackling the five transaction groups in sequence: terminations, supplements, leaves, changes, and new hires. As each transaction group is developed, new transactions will be made available to the pilot groups. The project timeline calls for supplements to be added in June or July, leaves to be added in August or September, changes to be added in October or November, and new hires (the final group) to be made available to the pilots in December or January 2010. When the project team is confident that the entire package of transactions is working well, we will roll out the system to the entire community.

  The pilot units are as follows:

  - Administrative Services Organization, School of Engineering
  - Department of Architecture, School of Architecture and Planning
  - Department of Chemistry, School of Science
  - Department of Facilities
  - Foreign Languages and Literatures, School of Humanities, Arts, & Social Sciences
  - Division of Health Sciences and Technology, Vice President for Research
  - Human Resources
  - Sloan School of Management

  Sponsored Research Vacation Tracker: A project team is continuing its area-by-area implementation of the online vacation tracker for sponsored research administrators. So far the team has completed the implementation for the Sloan School and the School of Architecture and Planning. Implementation for the School of Engineering is nearly complete, and the team is preparing to begin working with the School of Science. The team is offering monthly training sessions for administrators whose areas are already using the vacation tracker. The next training session will be held Wednesday, May 6, 12-1 pm, Little Cayman Room, NE49-3100. If you are interested in attending, please contact Janet Sparks at jstezzi@mit.edu.

7. Links and Contact Information – When you need help

Download PDF version of these charts >>

Web Links

Contact Information