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Miscellaneous
Hints About Using SFSR
Laws/Regulations
Governing the USDA School Nutrition Program
System
Administration Forms
Input
Forms -- Overview
Starting
Claim Balances Form
Application
Form
School Detail
Form
Claim
Form
Approval
Form
Exception
Filing
Exception Claim (XC) Procedural Steps for Districts
Filing
Options
MFASIS
Reimbursement File
Reports
Click
the browser's BACK button once to return to this Content "speed list".
Miscellaneous Hints About Using
SFSR
- Your Internet browser MUST be set to accept "Cookies" in order
for SFSR to work on your PC.
If your browser is MS Internet
Explorer, click on View, then Internet Options, then Advanced tab and
scroll down about 2/3 of the way until you see the entry "Cookies". Click on
"Always Accept Cookies"(preferred choice) or "Prompt Before Accepting
Cookies",
then click on OK.
If your browser is Netscape, click on Edit, then
Preferences, then Advanced Category. Click on "Accept All Cookies", then
click
on OK.
- Discard all those old blank paper forms you used to fill out to
get your reimbursement! Print a blank copy of the new SFSR forms from the
Internet if you find it convenient to collect information during the month
on a paper form. Then transferring the numbers onto a SFSR electronic form
will be easy, since
all your numbers will be in the same place on both paper and electronic
forms.
- The BACK button of the browser is very useful but there are times
when you do not want to use it. The button is meant to act as a navigation
convenience. You can return to many of the Web pages that you have visited
earlier in your Internet session by simply hitting the BACK button and
sequentially "backing up" through the pages you recently viewed. Fast and
easy! However, when you fill out a data form, submit it, and then, say, you
decide to go BACK to the form and submit it again with corrected data, you
will get an error message. To make your correction, you must enter the form
"from the front", not BACK into it. Select the "revise" action from the
appropriate menu, make your changes, then click on "submit" and you will
have no problem.
- You can view data and run reports any time, any day. However, if
possible, avoid filing SFSR forms on the 3rd and 15th of each month
between the hours of 9 p.m. and 3 a.m the next morning. System batch
processing and maintenance jobs run then and it is best to avoid input of
new data at these times. If your schedule requires you to file forms during
these hours, you will be able to. However, the less SFSR input
activity during these hours the better.
- SFSR forms are stored on a year/month basis. This means that for any
month there is only one "copy" of the form saved. You can change the
information on that one copy as many times as you want to get the
information correct. You can file a July,1999 School Detail form, realize
later in the day that you left out several fields so you revise the July,
1999 form to add those fields, then realize you made a "typo" on a meal
count and revise July, 1999 again on the same day or at a later date.
- There are three important time limits for School Detail and Claim
forms.
- You cannot revise information or file new information related to a
Claim beyond 60 days after the end of the calendar month of the
Claim. Get your reimbursement figures filed correctly and approved within
the 60 days or the Claim will not be processed. That's the law.
- Claim filing AND approval deadline is the 8th of each month.
Missing this date will likely delay your reimbursement for a month.
- The creation of the file from which the State accounting system
creates reimbursement checks occurs at roughly mid-month. This event
triggers the establishment of a new copy ("Revision") of the School
Detail and Claim forms that are within the 60-day file/revise period.
For example, you file a Claim for August on September 7th. This is saved by the SFSR
system as Revision 0 of the August Claim. The file for accounting is
created on, say, September 10th, and a check for the amount of reimbursement you
claimed is mailed to you by the end of the September. All changes to the
cost and count figures for the August Claim that are entered after September 10th
and before the October processing date will be recorded on a second
electronic copy of the August Claim. This copy is known as August
Claim-Revision 1. A check based on this revised Claim information will be
mailed to you by the end of October. This process repeats itself a second
time, creating Revision 2, but only until the 60-day period runs out
around the end of October. Revison 2 reimbursement checks will be received
by the end of November. Revisions AND approval of those revisions must be
complete by the 60th day or the revised Claim is considered incomplete and
will never be processed.
Exception Filing Exception Claims (claims beyond revision three)
may be filed, but only under very stringent conditions. An Exception Claim
resulting in a positive reimbursement may be filed once in a three year
period. Negative Claims, meaning one resulting in no additional reimbursement
to the District, may be filed as often as necessary, and for multiple months.
Throughout this document when there is a reference to "Claims" this would
include "Exception Claims" if any exist.(See last section under Approval
Form) Throughout this document, the term "Claims" will include "Exception
Claims".
Federal (data elements, edits, reports) and Maine State
(financial information) laws and regulations affect the USDA school food
service programs and, thus, the SFSR system. A succinct extract of the
requirements follows:
FEDERAL REGULATIONS
Abbreviation Key:
ASP After School Program
NSLP National School Lunch Program
SA State Agency
SFA School Food Authority
SNP School Nutrition Programs
7CFR 210 Lunch
After School Program (ASP)
NSLP Eligible Student Enrollment
application
claim form
postmarked no later then 60 days from last day of the month
number of lunches served by category for month reporting
total number of children approved free and reduced lunches
State Agency (SA) shall withhold all program payments to a School Food Authority (SFA) for incomplete
information (more than 60 days) review problems
SA compare free and reduced lunches claimed to the number of children approved
SA ensure compliance to limit net cash resources to three month average expenditures>
SA verify number of meals claimed do not exceed the attendance factor
7CFR 210.8 Consolidation Claim
Any month that has 10 or less days may be combined on the Monthly Claim for reimbursement from with the
prior or following month.
7CFR 215 Special Milk
Application
Submit Claim
rate of reimbursement for free milk from cost of purchased milk
number of milks served during the month
claim stating true and correct
keep record three years
7CFR 220 Breakfast Regulations
application
breakfast cost for severe need
40 per cent of second proceeding year served free and reduced = severe need
monthly claim form
breakfasts served
must be in no later then 60 days from last day of month
meal count revision up to 60 days
records maintained for three years
SA Federal report monthly
STATE STATUTES
Chapter 051 authority 20 MRSA Section 6602
file a claim monthly on a form provided by School Nutrition Programs (SNP). Claims filed by 8th each month.
Records to provide other pertinent information required on the claim form.
The After School Program is also known as the "Snack" program. Fields have
been added to all system forms to either indicate whether schools are eligible
or participating in the program, or for entry of the costs and counts for the
program. The new information for this program is entered in the same manner as
the other programs on the existing forms. The Glossary has further detail for
each field added.
Rollover Annual School Data should be between July 1st and October 31st.
Each school must enter their current enrollment figure after October 1st of
each year, prior to filing any claim. This process will calculate the ASP At
Risk indicator based on the following formula:
ASP At Risk: Calculated at the school level. At Risk ASP schools are
reimbursed at a flat rate (vs. severe need breakfast using a sliding rate
based on cost.). A school is eligible for At Risk ASP reimbursement if 50% of
NSLP eligible students enrolled are free and reduced as of the October claims
form. The At Risk indicator will be recalculated each time the enrollment
figure is changed. Enrollment can be updated once per fiscal year, and
thereafter, only by DOE admin staff. The term "At Risk", rather than severe
need, is correctly applied to ASP reimbursement rate for snacks served.
Severe Need Breakfast is determined on if 40% or more of the breakfasts
served to students at the district in the second preceding school year were
served free or reduced price. The 40 percent level is determined based on the
average of the school year, not based on October 31st data.
Severe Need Lunch is determined on if 60% or more of the lunches served to
students at the district in the second preceding school year were served free
or reduced price. The 60 percent level is determined based on the average of
the school year, not based on October 31st data.
The "second preceding school year" means: for school year July 2000-June
2001 ("current year"), breakfast and lunch severe need eligibility
calculations would both be based on free and reduced price lunches served July
1998-June1999 divided by total lunches served from July 1998-June 1999.
The 40% and 60% need to be figured at the end of July using year averages
of participation, and have nothing to do with enrollment and number eligible.
"Year averages of participation" means total free and reduced meals served
(free plus reduced) July 1-June 30 divided by total student lunches
(free, reduced, and full price) served during that time period. If the result
is .4 or higher or .6 or higher, depending on the program being considered,
then the indicator should be set for severe need eligibility for breakfast or
lunch, respectively. This annual calculation and indicator setting should be
run prior to November. Rundate of November is to be sure all possible
revisions to June claims have been processed. These revisions would affect the
severe need/at risk eligibility calculations. Rundate of November is also to
be sure all schools have entered their enrollment for the current year.
To set up the system initially and to maintain its various data and look up
tables, a series of administrative forms are included under the heading of
System Administration.
Look up tables are provided for Annual School Data, District, MFASIS
reimbursement payment information, annual USDA breakfast, lunch, milk, and
after school, Rates, Site, Town, Menu, and School data elements. DOE staff
with system administration permissions can add, change, or delete values from
these tables. A look up table is a list of acceptable values for a given data
element in the database. System edits check against this list and will not
allow users to update the database with values that are not in the list. These
tables are also used to reduce data entry and errors. Users can display
the list of values, click on the one they want, and it is entered for them.
This process eliminates all typing and invalid value errors.
Using the Education Accounts form, DOE can define DOE users and give them
exclusive access to the Administration Pages. School officials and the general
public are excluded from this area of the SFSR system. DOE users can file
forms and run reports.
The User Account table defines for Oracle which SFSR users who are
permitted to take actions that update the Oracle database. This is where DOE
defines Legal Agent, District, and local school users' access limits -- who
can file specific forms, approve Applications and Claims, and run reports. DOE
can add, change, and delete users, user IDs, and passwords through this
administrative form.
School name and address, County name, and public school Enrollment data are
maintained by other DOE programs, not SFSR. DOE MIS periodically updates SFSR
tables with this information to keep it current. These updates are done by a
process (typically SQL*Loader) that is not part of the SFSR System
Administration functionality.
All submitted SFSR forms are public information and will be viewable by the
public over the Internet. There are four SFSR input (data collection) forms:
Application, Claim, School Detail, and Approval. All forms are interactive,
electronic Internet forms available on the World Wide Web. In general, this
means that:
- some information is filled in on the form for you to save data entry
time,
- often you may choose entries from a list to eliminate manual typing,
- calculations are done for you as you enter the raw data to save time and
eliminate errors,
- informational warnings may be displayed before a form is accepted for
submittal, advising the user of an unusual situation (such as a meal count
exceeding the attendance factor limit) and providing a chance to either
correct inaccurate data or obtain user approval to submit the form as is
[see ## below], and
- errors (typo's, invalid entries, omission of required fields) are
checked before the form is accepted for submittal to DOE. Messages will be
displayed to tell you what needs to be done to make the form acceptable for
submittal.
- Once submitted, your information is immediately saved in the SFSR
database and held for the monthly processing run. Submitted Application and
Claim forms are held for authorization before being released to monthly
processing, while School Detail forms automatically process each month
without the external authorization step.
There are Exception School Detail and Exception Claim forms, but these are
filed by DOE staff on behalf of a school or district and are not viewable to
the public, schools or districts.
## Note: Per federal requirements, all warnings that are overridden by the
user will generate a federal exception record in addition to updating
the SFSR database. These exception records are for USDA program administration
use only and will be provided to the USDA on request.
This form is filed by DOE once before a District initially begins using the
SFSR system. No modification of the starting balances is permitted by SFSR.
All accounting adjustments needed must be made on the regular monthly Claim
Form. This provides a solid audit trail of corrections made to the ongoing
balances addressed by this form.
Once a District has its starting balances in the SFSR system, it may no
longer file any paper forms. All filing must be done electronically from that
time on. Revisions to forms initially filed on paper must be made on paper.
Revisions to forms initially filed electronically must be made electronically.
This form is to be filed by the District annually by August 15, for most
institutions. For public schools, it must be approved by the Superintendent to
constitute a valid application to participate in the school food program. For
nonpublic LEAs, the comparable official -- Headmaster, Camp Director, etc. --
must approve the Application.
- The Application must be modified any time information on it changes and
the form with the updated information must be authorized, just as with the
original Application. Changes to the Application are processed during the
monthly SFSR run. Only the latest information is kept on file for a given
fiscal year; no history of changes made during the year is kept.
- Information from the previous year's Application (if any) will pre-fill
the form for the upcoming year to minimize the amount of data entry required
when reapplying.
- Each public school participating in the USDA school food program must
file this form each month as its formal request to its District to receive
reimbursement for the meals served during the preceding month. By Maine law,
Claim forms must be filed and authorized by the 8th of the month. In order
to meet this deadline, schools may be asked by their Districts to submit
School Detail forms before the 8th.
- Local Educational Agencies (LEA) are their own District in that there is
only one institution in each nonpublic school District enumerated by DOE.
Therefore, the officials of each LEA must file all SFSR documents by the
appropriate deadlines, since there are no Superintendents or District
Directors involved.
- Accurate and timely information on this School Detail form is essential
to the District's monthly Claim for reimbursement. Filing deadlines take on
extra importance in an automated system like SFSR. Late filing is likely to
delay your reimbursement funds for a month.
- Forms must be filed in monthly sequence. For instance, you may not file
October's form if you have not filed September's form yet. To catch up, you
may, of course, submit forms for two months at once.
- DOE strongly discourages the sharing of computer user IDs and passwords.
With both the USDA and the State DOE, the combination of a user ID and
password with a filed electronic form constitute a legally binding
electronic signature. If the filer of School Detail information wants to
delegate the task to another person (either for temporary backup as during a
vacation or as in a permanent job-sharing situation), that other person
should contact DOE SFSR program staff and request their own user ID and
password. As with the paper system, the filer of record (the person to whom
the user ID and password were issued) remains legally responsible for the
content of the electronic forms approved by others on his/her behalf.
- By the end of October each year, LEAs must fill in the enrollment item
on the School Detail form with their maximum expected enrollment for the
current fiscal year (begins on July 1). Once an enrollment figure is
processed by the SFSR system, no changes to this figure will be accepted
electronically.
Public Schools Note: Electronically filing this form may replace
your reporting requirements to your District in part or in total. Your
District may require additional information from you that is not required by
the DOE. These reporting requirements will vary by District. However, in all
cases, local school detail information MUST be filed electronically each
month. Until your local school gets Internet access, your District may enter
the information for you from a paper form you submit to the District. This is
extra work for both you and the District and is a temporary procedure.
By Maine law, each District and each LEA that is participating in the USDA
school food program must file a Claim form by the 8th of each month as its
request to DOE to receive reimbursement for the meals served during the
preceding month.
- Accurate and timely information on this form is essential to the
District's monthly Claim for reimbursement. Filing deadlines take on extra
importance in an automated system like SFSR. Late filing is likely to delay
your reimbursement funds for a month.
- No Claims may be filed until a valid Application is on file in the SFSR
system.
.
- When a user successfully submits a Claim (i.e., it passes all edits),
and before the form is sent to the database, it will calculate and display
the reimbursement figure for the Claim. Unless changes are made to the Claim
before the monthly SFSR processing run, these figures will be the exact
dollar amount of the reimbursement to the District or LEA for that Claim.
- Successfully submitting a Claim will also generate a message to the
filer that the Claim has been accepted. Processing will take place next
month if the Claim was filed or approved after the deadline for the
current month.
- DOE can withhold reimbursement from a District for noncompliance. This
will be done via keeping submitted Claim form(s) from being processed
(manually deleting the electronic approval) and requiring that those
Claims be re-approved once all noncompliance issues have been resolved.
- When there are fewer than 10 operating days in a month, the Claim for that month may be combined
with the Claim for the preceding month. For exammple, if the District operates for 8 days in June, the District
may skip filing a June Claim form and add June costs and counts to the May Claim. The resulting two-month
Claim form is known as the May Claim.
Superintendents of schools, Headmasters, Camp Directors, etc. are the legal
agents for school districts. As such, they are responsible for certifying,
among other things, the truth and accuracy of information on all Applications
and all Claims that are submitted for reimbursement.
In many Districts, District Directors traditionally prepare and submit the
Claim form to the Superintendent for approval. Some Superintendents actually
sign the forms, some delegate this task to a subordinate using a rubber
signature stamp of the Superintendent's signature. Either way, the
Superintendent is legally responsible for what is filed with DOE. That
responsibility is spelled out on this electronic form in text that is
identical to what appears on the paper form.
In the new SFSR system, Superintendents, Headmasters, etc. will have a
separate sign-off or Legal Agent Approval Form. Applications and Claims not
approved via the Approval Form will be considered incomplete forms.
- disapproved Claims, including updates and revisions, will not be
processed by DOE. School Detail forms related to disapproved Claims will not
be processed either.
- disapproved Applications,including updates, will be considered
incomplete forms containing data of questionable accuracy.
DOE strongly discourages the sharing of computer user IDs and passwords.
For both the USDA and the State DOE, the combination of a SFSR user ID and
password with a Legal Agent Authorization Form constitute a legally binding
electronic signature. If a Superintendent or other Legal Agent wants to
delegate to a subordinate the approval of Applications and Claims in the SFSR
system, that person should contact DOE SFSR program staff and request their
own user ID and password. As with the paper system, the original Legal Agent
remains legally responsible for the content of the electronic forms approved
by others on his or her behalf.
If DOE ever needs to withhold reimbursement for District noncompliance, it
will do so by deleting both the approval indicator for the District's
unprocessed Claim(s) and the District official's authority to approve forms
until the District complies with the program regulations.
Revisions of School Detail and Claim Forms. Up to two revisions to
an original School Detail and up to two revisions to an original Claim form
are permitted by the SFSR system within the federally mandated 60-day revision
period. Sixty days after the end of a calendar month, what is on file is the
final information for the month in question. No further information or
reimbursement adjustments can be made other than on the rare occasion when the
Exception Claim procedure needs to be used. (See Exception Claim (XC)
Procedural Steps for Districts).
- Revisions cannot be filed before the original of the form for a given
month-year.
- Revisions are defined as resubmissions of forms for a given
month-year, the originals of which have been previously filed and
processed by DOE during a SFSR monthly run. Up until that processing
occurs or the 60 day limit runs out, users can alter information on a
revisable form (School Detail or Claim) and submit those altered forms as
often as they need to. Until monthly processing takes place, submitted
revised forms are not counted as one of the two allowable form revisions
that will be saved by the SFSR system and used to calculate reimbursement
amounts.
- SFSR will process and save up to two revisions of each revisable form.
To file a revision in the SFSR system, bring up the form for the
month-year you want to alter. Your original information will be displayed
so you only need to enter the changes and submit the revised form.
- To comply with federal regulations, once the 60-day revision period
has expired, the Web revision capability will not be available for the
form of that month-year, even though there will typically be about another
week before the regular monthly SFSR run is made.
Exception Claims (XC) are Claims for reimbursement that are filed through a
special regulatory dispensation after the normal 60 day filing period has
passed, per the FNS consolidated 60/90 Day Guidance issued December 30, 1984,
and all later revisions, that interpret regulations in the Agriculture
Appropriations Act of 1983, Public Law 97-370. They are filed by DOE staff on
behalf of a school or district.
The District wanting to file a Claim after the 60 day timely filing
period may call the SFSR program staff for details on how to proceed.
the District must provide a written request (by e-mail or on a DOE paper
form) to the SFSR program staff for the filing of an Exception Claim that
corrects a late Claim, including:
- the reason a late Claim is requested;
- a Corrective Action Plan explaining how future late Claims will be
avoided;
- the correct numbers to be put into the Exception Claim.
The District must provide a written request (by e-mail or on a DOE paper
form) to the SFSR program staff for the filing of an Exception Claim that
corrects a timely Claim, which will include the correct numbers to be
put into the Exception Claim.
SFSR program staff and the Policy Director/Team Leader of Support Systems
will determine whether an Exception Claim is allowed in the current situation.
In the event of an Exception Claim for additional reimbursement (a.k.a. a
positive XC), SFSR program staff will verify with FNSRO that money is
available for the fiscal year of the Exception Claim.
SFSR program staff will notify the District if the request is not
allowable.
SFSR program staff will file allowed Exception Claims.
SFSR program staff will contact the District's Legal Agent and advise
him/her that the Claim needs approval.
The Legal Agent has seven calendar days to approve an Exception Claim,
negative or positive. If the Legal Agent sees an error in an XC, (s)he must
contact program staff to have it fixed before approving the XC. There is no
online provision to Disapprove an Approved XC as there is with a timely Claim.
The Legal Agent will approve the Exception Claim in a timely manner, enabling
processing during the next monthly processing cycle. If he/she does not meet
this deadline, DOE staff will file and approve it as an emergency measure, and
will set the indicator that stops further updates to the claim, so it will be
processed timely.
Payment will be accomplished using the current SFSR payment process,
regardless of the fiscal year of the Exception Claim. Claims and Exception
Claims with a status "A" are selected each month for payment. Negative
Exception Claims with an effective year and month from a prior fiscal year
will be set immediately to status "F".
DOE will seek payment outside of SFSR procedures. Unless and until being
offset by positive reimbursement Claims and Exception Claims, negative
Exception Claims from the current fiscal year will retain the status "A" and
the balance will be carried forward until October 4th, just as negative
balances are from timely Claims. On October 4th, the status of all prior
fiscal year Claims contributing to a negative year-end balance for a given
District are set to "F". Separate checks will be issued for payments of Claims
in separate fiscal years.
The report ED293 will sort the Claims by fiscal years.
An Exception Claim will allow corrections to cost and count figures for
participating schools/districts, but participation status cannot be
changed retroactively
No exception may be filed if an application has not been filed for the year
effected. Also, if a Claim was originally filed on paper, the Exception Claim
must also be submitted on paper.
As a result of processing, an Exception Claim may generate either a
reimbursement payment to the District or a "Reclaim Amount". To address a
Reclaim Amount, the District must pay back reimbursement funds to DOE via a
payment made outside of SFSR system functionality and enter the payment in
SFSR as a Disbursement at the School Detail level.
Exception (XC) Filing
Except for those dealing with the 60 day filing limitation, most timely
Claim edits will also apply to XCs.
The three plus the current FY rule always applies to all Exception
Claims. XCs may revise Claims reporting data from an Effective YYYYMM from as
far back as three fiscal years prior to the current fiscal year. Neither
positive nor negative Claims older than this can be changed, even by an
Exception Claim.
The 36 month period for an Exception Claim is 36 months from the
month during which the XC is filed. For example, if during July 2000 a
District has a positive XC filed for February 1999, the District must wait 36
months from July, 2000 to be eligible for another positive XC.
Only one XC that generates positive reimbursement for a given YYYYMM
is allowed for a given District in a 36 month period. If more than one month's
Claim is eligible for a positive XC, only one may be filed, so the one with
the largest reimbursement should be selected for filing. A given YYYYMM Claim
for a District can have additional positive XCs filed as long as the 36 month
rule allows it. The three plus the current FY rule always applies.
XCs affecting only months after the YYYYMM of the District's Startup Claim
are allowed.
Only administrative users can access the XC and XSD links on the SFSR
administration menu pages.
An allowable XC meets the following criteria:
- Timely Claim filing period has passed.
- A District must wait for 36 months after the filing YYYYMM of a positive
XC, i.e., one resulting in additional reimbursement for the District, before
it may file another positive XC for any YYYYMM. The three plus the current
FY rule always applies.
- The three plus the current FY rule always applies.
A District may file a negative XC resulting in its reimbursing the
government at any time, without limit to the number of such filings or to the
amount of time between such filings. There can be multiple XCs that generate
negative reimbursement for a given YYYYMM for a given District. The 36
month limit does not apply as it does for positive XCs. Multiple months'
negative XCs can be filed, and a given YYYYMM Claim can be changed via
negative XCs as often as negative adjustments are indicated by audit or
discovery of errors. Identifying Characteristics of XCs and XSDs
- Exception Claims will show a status of "X", rather than the normal "C"
or "R" status, prior to approval by the District's Legal Agent.
- Exception Claims and Exception School Detail forms will always be given
a Revision number greater than "2". No timely forms will ever have a
Revision number of "3" or greater.
Upon attempted filing, SFSR will always check for an allowable filing date
of an Exception Claim, comparing the current date YYYYMM with the filing date
YYYYMM of the most recent positive XC, if any, for the District currently
requesting an XC.
All Exception claim and Exception School Detail forms successfully filed
will be retained by SFSR. The Revision number of each type of form will begin
at a value of "3" and increase by one for each successive XC or XSD filed.
There is no maximum value of the Revision field, although SFSR Exception forms
will display a maximum of two digits.
XC Filing Link:
- Filing an XC involves first filing the SCD forms for the District and
then filing the XC itself. These forms will display the most recent data on
file for the Effective YYYYMM Claim or School Detail in question, so only
corrections need to be entered.
- Clicking on the link for filing XCs will initially run two edits.
- First, the age of the Effective YYYYMM will be checked against the
three plus current FY rule. If the Claim is too old to be adjusted, a
message will advise SFSR admin staff and no entry into SFSR is allowed.
The staff will explain this to the District requesting the XC.
- Second, the 36 month edit that applies to positive XCs, verifying
whether a positive XC for a given District can be filed currently will
run. A warning message to SFSR admin staff will be generated if one
cannot.
- If no warning message displays, the XC may be filed.
- If the 36 month warning displays, staff can click on a "Continue" button
to file a negative XC. A positive XC must not be entered.
- If the 36 month warning is disregarded or if a data entry error is made
that turns a negative XC into a disallowed positive XC, an error message
will display after staff clicks the Submit button to enter the Claim. At
this point, XC data corrections will be erased and correct reentry of all XC
and XSD data is required. The browser Back button cannot be used to access
and fix the erroneous field(s). The filer must return to the XC filing link
on the Administration Menu page and begin the process anew.
- [DOE responsibility.] Severe Need Lunch eligibility indicator is not
kept by year. But, DOE has chosen not to change this, even though XC
reimbursement amounts may be incorrect (high or low) since they will be
based on the status of the District on the date the XC is filed.
If a Local Educational Agencies (LEA) is technologically incapable of
filing SFSR forms electronically over the Internet, it may continue to file
paper forms with the required information to its District. In this situation,
each month the District will be responsible for electronically filing, first,
the School Detail form(s) it received on paper and, then, the Claim form.
At a minimum, one personal computer (PC) at the Superintendent's office is
to be capable of using the SFSR system to file and approve electronic
documents. DOE grant awards to establish this connectivity and/or help with
related training, were dispersed to all Superintendents beginning in 1997.
Ref: Informational Letter No. 57, Policy Code: DD, dated 6/25/97, " Grant
Awards to Superintendents' Offices".
ONLY the LEAs that do not belong to a District, such as summer camps,
residential group homes, and private schools, and that are also incapable of
filing SFSR forms via the Internet may, for the time being, continue to file
paper School Detail, Claim, and Application forms directly with the DOE as
they have in the past. New versions of the paper School Detail, Claim, and
Application forms are available from SFSR program staff at DOE.
Districts may be reimbursed each month for actual use of their USDA
breakfast, lunch, milk and after school programs. A payment file of
reimbursement amounts is created by a SFSR computer program from the original
and revised Claim forms submitted since the last monthly run of the program.
The file is sent to the State's MFASIS accounting system for overnight
processing with other accounts payable files. Paper checks are printed and
mailed by the MFASIS system to each District or Local Educational Agency (LEA)
that has filed a valid and properly approved Claim Form.
The SFSR reimbursement computer program automatically runs at a scheduled
time each month, started by scheduling software on the IBM mainframe computer
at BIS. SFSR program staff may put that process on hold by calling the BIS
Operations staff at any time before the scheduled creation of the file.
For historical reference by DOE, local schools, auditors, and
others, all SFSR reports created by DOE on a regular basis can be viewed on
the SFSR Internet Web site. Additional reports may be added to the system as
needed.
- ED283 - School Lunch Enrollment Report
This report subtotals enrollments in the school lunch program by
District/Local Educational Agency with totals for the State. It replaces old
report ED283.
Enrollment figures for all public schools as of October 31 of each year
are compiled by a division of DOE outside the SFSR program. This information
is loaded into the SFSR database without any manual reentry of the data.
Enrollment is fairly stable in these schools and the data remains unchanged
until the following year's new figures are available to SFSR.
Enrollment figures for residential group homes, private schools, and
summer camps are collected by the SFSR system on the School Detail Form. If
these institutions have no access to the Internet, they may continue to send
paper Application forms to DOE and include their maximum expected enrollment
for the current fiscal year on a revision to that form by the end of
October. These institutions often have large swings in enrollment during the
year, but to keep all enrollment data "comparable" they are asked to provide
estimated peak enrollment figures if they are not in operation on October 31
each year. This information will be updated annually, as is public school
enrollment.
Once LEA enrollments for residential group homes, private schools, and
summer camps are in the SFSR system, no corrections can be made without
contacting SFSR program staff. Public school enrollment figures are not
correctable by SFSR staff.
- ED288 - School Breakfast, Lunch, and Milk Data Report
This report subtotals cost and count information by county and
District/Local Educational Agency with totals for the State. It replaces old
report ED288.
- ED293 - Monthly Reimbursement Report
This "check file" report is run automatically and only in batch mode for
any month for which a reimbursement file has been created by the SFSR system
and sent to the State's accounting system for payment. A printed copy is
automatically sent to SFSR staff. The report is sorted by District/Local
Educational Agency for each meal program, with Statewide totals for each of
the meal programs. It subtotals reimbursement payments across meal programs
by District. It replaces old report ED293.
In addition, an unformatted "file dump" of the actual payment file from
the State's accounts payable system is available to DOE staff for three
prior State fiscal years plus the current year of monthly payments. It
replaces old report AK15.
Contact Walter Beesley at DOE\School Nutrition Program
for more information about this system.
E-Mail
walter.beesley@state.me.us
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