Standard Operating Procedure

The Disbursement Voucher (DV) e-doc is used to process payments that cannot be paid on a procurement card (pcard) and do not require a purchase order (PO). Payment options for a DV are Automated Clearing House (ACH), check, wire transfer, or foreign drafts.

In addition to the standard financial transaction tabs, the DV e-doc has unique tabs: Payment Information, Contact Information, Special Handling, Nonresident Alien Tax, Wire Transfer, Foreign Draft, Non-Employee Travel Expense, Pre-Paid Travel Expenses, and Pre-Disbursement Processor Status.

A DV requires more information than most financial e-docs. Each DV must include the following information:

• Payee Type: Who is to be paid?
• Payment Reason: Why the payee is being paid? (see Payment Reason Codes)
• Amount: How much the payee is to be paid?
• Payment Method: How is the payment is to be made?
• Documentation Location Code: Where supporting documentation is stored? (see Business Rules)
• Other Considerations: What forms or documents that must be physically sent with the payment, e.g., processing a credit card registration?

Best practice recommendation: Avoid check enclosures; utilize the available space on check stubs. The check stub enables you to communicate with the vendor.

• Contact Information tab: Are there changes to the contact information? The Contact Information tab defaults to preparer's name and phone number, but this information can be edited.

Roles and Access Rights

The following roles are available for the DV e-doc:

• Requestor: A proposed, optional, additional step whereby a request for a DV is sent to a KFS-user who has the authority/ability to initiate the e-doc ("initiator"). The requestor is not a KFS-user role, it is locally delegated authority. The requestor is an individual within local units who has been identified by the organization as having the authority to request a DV.
• Initiator: Responsible for preparing a DV and must understand the institutional need for a DV financial transaction. This individual may or may not be the same as the requestor. Before initiating a DV transaction on behalf of the university, the initiator is responsible to assess whether the proposed transaction supports the university's mission.

Note: In cases where the initiator and requestor are not the same person, the initiator ensures that the requestor has the authority to request a DV transaction.

• Other roles:
  • Fiscal officers within a financial transaction or business service center for the accounts used
  • DFA employees (for routing only)

The following areas and roles at Cornell have access to the DV e-doc:

• Financial transaction and business service centers
• Fiscal officers
• DFA employees
• For inquiries (viewing) only (requestor role):
  • Department/unit finance managers
  • Department administrators
  • Finance specialists

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Business Rules

• Original documentation will be scanned and attached to all DVs and held for one year.
• The DV payee cannot be the same as the initiator.
• The DV payee must remain active through the entire workflow process.
• Check amount cannot be negative or zero.
• There must be at least one accounting line.
• Negative amounts are not allowed, and the account lines must equal greater than zero.
• Total of accounting lines must match the Check Total field.
• The object codes associated with the following object types or object levels are prohibited: (this information will be updated when object types and levels have been finalized; still under analysis).

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Workflow

Based on rules set up, the DV e-doc will route through a series of approvals before the disbursement is actually made. Due to its unique nature, the DV e-doc has some special routing issues:

• The DV e-doc first routes to the fiscal officer for each account in the Accounting Lines tab.
• After the e-doc has been approved by the fiscal officers, the DV goes through any special routing as required by business rules surrounding the attributes of the transaction and the payee.

The e-doc status becomes FINAL when the required approvals are obtained. Then the transaction is processed by the Pre-Disbursement Processor.

Download the Workflow (PDF, 212 KB)

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