New Buy/Pay Process Created

New Buy/Pay Process Created

BY DANA DURBIN
Rice News Staff
Sept. 17, 1998

In an effort to streamline and make more efficient the process Rice uses to buy
and pay for items and services, Dean Currie, vice president of Finance and Administration,
has created the Buy/Pay Process department.

"Like many organizations, Rice had built up a system over time that was not
serving the real needs of either the departments or the center. With the participation
of every part of the campus, we believe that a radical restructuring of all this
is possible," Currie said.

Eugen Radulescu, who has been named Buy/Pay Process manager, stressed that the
transition to the new department will occur in phases and that the Buy/Pay Process
team will be strongly committed to customer service. Radulescu will also continue
in his current position as manager of the Transportation Department.

"We are not going to see these changes overnight. The transition will take
place over time," he said.

The transition will be backed up by training and documentation, and the new department
will be customer-friendly and will make "every bit of the buy/pay process
easier," Radulescu added.

The transition will focus first on the "pay" portion of the buy/pay
process, said Jana Callan, who will oversee the transition as the Buy/Pay Process
change manager.

Broader use of the Rice purchasing card will be encouraged as the first part of
the transition to the Buy/Pay Process Department, Callan said. While the card
is already in limited use on campus, changes such as an increased credit limit
are being made to make the card more user-friendly.

In addition, the department will move toward a Web-based reallocation form that
will allow staff to move money between funds much more efficiently and easily.

Training regarding the purchasing card and the Web-based reallocation form will
be conducted this fall, Callan said.

Other changes that will occur by the end of the year include the introduction
of an entirely Web-based buy/pay system, Currie said.

"This is an exciting thing because it came from a group on campus,"
Callan said. "Campus users are quite enthusiastic about these changes."

The changes were recommended by a campus group that, along with Arthur Anderson
consultants, studied the processes Rice uses to buy and pay for goods and services.
Executive sponsors of the buy/pay project were Provost David Auston; Scott Wise,
vice president for investments/treasurer; and Tony Gorry, vice president for information
technology and professor of computer science.

Serving on the group were Doris Anderson, Shannon Brown, Jana Callan, Randy Castiglioni,
Bob Dawson, Jackie Ehlers, Jane Healey, Becky Heye, Kathryn Husband, Tom Iezzi,
Cynthia Joubert, Mary Ruth Kubricht, Jerry Lewis, Sharon McDonough, Danny Powell,
Linda Rassinier, Wayne Robinson, David Scott, Joe Sowa, Evelyn Stewart, David
Tenney, Janet Thompson, Robert Truscott, Jean Vorhaben, Judy Van Wagoner, Terry
Whitt and Teia Wright.

In addition to the Buy/Pay Process Department, the Disbursement Department has
been created, which will handle the process of cutting checks as well as tax-related
issues.