In this issue:
- Irregular Invoices | REMINDER: Upcoming Resolution Deadlines
- FlexWork Furniture | Changes to UCLA's Program
- BruinBuy Plus System Issue | Update on Change Request Error
- Next Week's Forecast | Events & Deadlines
- In Case You Missed It... | A Glance at Previous News
We’re halfway through the month of February, and irregular invoice activities are in full swing! Don’t forget these important deadlines:
| Invoice Hold Date | Department Action Line |
|---|---|
| January 1, 2025 – January 31, 2025 | End of day today, February 14 |
| February 1, 2025 – February 16, 2025 | End of day Friday, February 28 |
If the necessary department action(s) is not taken by each deadline, impacted invoices may be rejected or pushed to payment. Additional information on how unactioned invoices are centrally addressed can be found on the Irregular Invoice Resolution Calendar web page.
Need help? Review our irregular invoice resources, receive live support in office hours, or join each deadline’s corresponding irregular invoice working session.
NOTE: Unactioned invoices are reviewed on a case-by-case basis. Invoices with a 2024 hold date that were not actioned by the previous January 31 deadline have been processed per the final disposition paths table.
On Tuesday, Vice Chancellor and CFO Stephen Agostini and Chief Procurement Officer O.T. Wells II announced that UCLA's FlexWork (work from home) furniture program is no longer centrally funded.
Effective February 11, 2025, departments are responsible for the approval and funding of home office equipment purchases for employees who work remotely on a full- or part-time basis. Central resources from the Office of the Chancellor will no longer fund furniture allowances for these purchases.
Eligibility requirements and approval* are now at the discretion of the funding department; however, all purchases must be in accordance with UCLA Policy 740 & 741 – Attachment A.
Orders that have already been made through the program and are currently being processed by UCLA’s vendor, Steelcase, will remain centrally funded. The Campus Purchasing & Payables’ FlexWork Furniture web page provides guidance on:
- Purchasing home office workstation equipment (e.g., stand-up desks and office chairs) with department funds
- Using University discounts if an employee wishes to purchase their own furniture
- Returning UCLA-owned furniture upon an employee’s separation or transfer
*excludes reimbursements – review the FlexWork Furniture and Non-Travel & Non-Entertainment Reimbursements web pages for additional information.
Read the February 11 communication for complete details.
As communicated in January 24 Recap, we’ve identified a technical issue that is causing Change Requests to duplicate purchase order (PO) lines.
What’s Happening?
If a Change Request is issued against a PO with one or more fully invoiced lines, the fully invoiced lines duplicate on the revised PO. This occurs even if the lines weren’t edited in the Change Request submission.
NOTE: This issue only impacts POs with fully invoiced lines. Review the How to Determine the Invoicing Status of PO Lines guide for additional information.
What’s Should I Do?
| PO Type | Guidance |
|---|---|
| Subawards / Subcontracts | Continue to submit Change Requests as needed. The Subaward / Subcontract team will review requests on a case-by-case basis and contact you with next steps if your PO has one or more fully invoiced line items. |
| Non-Subawards / Non-Subcontracts | Refrain from submitting Change Requests for POs with one or more fully invoiced line items. If you need to make changes, create a new PO. |
NOTE: Pending Change Requests with fully invoiced lines won’t be approved by Campus Purchasing until this issue is resolved. Change Requests unaffected by this issue will continue to be processed.
UPDATED: When Will This Be Fixed?
The BruinBuy Plus team is actively testing a solution for this issue, and we expect to share next steps in the near future.
| Date | Details |
| Monday, February 17 | Office Closed | Presidents' Day Holiday |
| Tuesday, February 18 | 11 a.m. – 12 p.m. PT | Accounts Payable Office Hours 3 p.m. – 4 p.m. PT | Vendor Management Office Hours |
| Wednesday, February 19 | 9 a.m. – 10 a.m. PT | Travel Accounting Office Hours 11 a.m. – 11:45 a.m. PT | Purchasing Office Hours |
| Thursday, February 20 | 11 a.m. – 12 p.m. PT | Subaward / Subcontract Office Hours 11 a.m. – 12 p.m. PT | Non-T&E Reimbursement Office Hours 1 p.m. – 2:30 p.m. PT | Accounts Payable Office Hours |
| Friday, February 21 | N/A |
Rejection Protocol for Unmigrated Legacy PO Invoices
BruinBuy Plus just celebrated its one-year anniversary! With this milestone, Accounts Payable is updating the rejection protocol for invoices that list an unmigrated legacy PO.
Background
Once an invoice is submitted to UCLA, it’s scanned by Digital Capture, an optical character recognition (OCR) tool that maps invoice information to the associated PO.
As of June 2024, invoices that list an invalid PO (i.e., closed PO, missing PO, listed PO does not exist) are rejected rather than placed on indefinite hold. Depending on the PO issue, the invoice follows one of two rejection paths:
- Initial Submission Rejection: The invoice is rejected during the Digital Capture review. Initial submission rejections are not visible in BruinBuy Plus.
- BruinBuy Plus Rejection: The invoice is rejected after it has populated in BruinBuy Plus and entered approval workflow. The invoice remains visible in BruinBuy Plus.
REMINDER: Unmigrated legacy POs are closed and considered invalid.
What’s Changing?
Previously, invoices that listed an unmigrated legacy PO followed the BruinBuy Plus rejection path. Moving forward, these invoices will follow the initial submission rejection path and no longer be visible in BruinBuy Plus.
What Do I Need to Do?
Please continue to work with your vendors to ensure they’re listing valid PO numbers on their invoices. You can learn more about invoice rejection on the Rejected Invoices web page.
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Need Help? | We're Here to Support!
The BruinBuy Plus hub continues to be updated with new resources! For Service Desk support, create a ticket:
- Email: help@it.ucla.edu
- Phone: (310) 267-HELP (4357)
- ServiceNow Portal: tinyurl.com/bruinbuy-plus-support
