I. Welcome (Cliff Lee) - Cliff covered the logistics for evacuation in the event of an emergency and relocation in the event of a "Shelter-in-Place" crisis.

II. PATS6B —> GESD Tracking (Marty Curole) - Jo discussed this item. If you had access for the PATS6B report, you must request access for the new report. If you want to find out the status of your projects with NFC, you must go thru your Security Officer to request security access at the required access level. Q: USDA has heard Security is backed up about 6 weeks, is this correct? A: Penny will have Jim respond to this. Regardless, access to this report needs to be put into the queue. If you don't want prior users to have access, fine; but you must request access for this new report. POST MEETING NOTE: Jim Julian will participate in the July CAPPS meeting and discuss the issue about security backlog, requests, etc.

III. .EARN —> Reporting Center Statement of Earnings & Leave (John Faciane) - scheduled for PP 25 to enter ELS and can search via an organization list. Q: Is the old EARN going to stay up/come down? A: Tony Priola indicated they'll take down EARN when CV 08 comes up - cut off at that point, in PP 25. EARN CoolJen product will disappear and will be replaced with the module on the Reporting Center. NFC South will send out emails to those with access to the client server version to alert them to this change. We're moving to the web area and away from the client server area and we cannot continue to support both versions. Q: Security - detail reports or separate category? A: it's a separate report or can access be granted to just that report. Jo feels only to 'that report' and it's sensitive data and there are garnishment issues. CAPPS agrees to a separate report with specific access to. Q: BPD - do we need to submit a request for security because it's in RC? A: YES. Details will be forthcoming - bulletin or email. Suggestion from DoraLee: Bulletin would hit a larger audience. C: Printing out of the Reporting Center is an issue. CA: NFC South is examining getting away from the .pdf modules and exploring style sheets; this should resolve the printing issues. Q: FDIC - if we have to get separate security for this, shouldn't the system overlap (Client vs Web)? A: Penny says they'll have to look into the impact and they understand the need for both versions and the decision/information will be in the bulletin and will cover any security issues. Q: Smithsonian - can you look into having those people who have access to EARN auto have access to the RC and this report. A: Penny indicated she isn't sure how this type of request can be handled but she'll check w/Jim on this and see what the audit request is.

IV. Voluntary (Local) Taxes - 2 DOJ Requests (Brad Womack) - Brad indicated this is far more than just the 2 DOJ requests. We've had about 15 requests (over the past 6 months) to withhold tax in small tax areas (entities). First, let me recap what we currently do on tax entities. All of those we now support have over 500 Federal employees affected and they have an agreement with Treasury and it puts them on the same path, ie., makes them accept certain data in certain formats and we're currently withholding for about 160 tax entities around the country. In the past we have known that there are areas with <500 people and what we offer to them is a discretionary allotment to send their funds to whatever tax entity they choose. The problem is that in using the discretionary allotment, the deduction does NOT show up on the W-2 and causes confusion as to filing their tax returns. Apparently it's not a huge problem because we have not had it reported to us. However, in the past 6 months we've received these requests from agencies and from some of the tax entities as well. This could include only one employee or up to 499 employees. The 2 DOJ requests - both from Kentucky, one for 166 employees and the other for 24 employees. NFC can turn this info on for them; however, voluntary tax withholdings does not mean that the employee can elect to withhold this tax. What it means is that the Payroll Office withhold's for everyone, not just those included in the request from the agency. Some of these requests include employees working for DOJ but other employees who may work at USDA, Treasury, etc. Question from Brad: Who makes the decision for the USDA or Treasury employees? Is it appropriate for NFC to withhold for all the employees in those areas? Brad is not sure that the USDA agencies want us to withhold for their employees. This is a question we'll have for all small tax entities. If one agency requests this tax be withheld, do we automatically force this on the other employees in that area? We need the CAPPS group to decide this for NFC. Would it be appropriate for them to tax all employees in those areas? Who will pay for setting this up? For example - is it appropriate for DOJ to pay the full expense for setting up this tax for the employees in KY or should DOJ/USDA share this expense? Or should ALL of the clients pay for these small tax entities across the country? There are significant costs ($3-$5K) to set up a tax entity. This includes contacting the tax entity, establishing an account with them and setting up a reconciliation process. When we are withholding taxes we must submit monthly or quarterly reports to them as well as at the end of the year submit a Year End Report and W2 report as well as notifying ALLTAX of all taxes being deducted for each employee. Once we receive the info on how to set up the account, we then need to update TMGT and get w/programmers to have them set up the calculation for this area or have ALLTAX calculate the tax entity, then we have to change the W2 programs and edit and produce the W2 and send the reports out. A lot of things are needed to get the ball rolling, then every year (forever) we'll have to reconcile each of these tax entities, just because they are a small group of affected employees doesn't mean the reconciliation process is less - the number is not as big but the process is the same. So back to my earlier questions: 1) Who Pays? 2) Who decides as to whether we'll set up tax withholding for an area where multiple agencies are involved? Q: Treasury - do these local tax entities have an agreement w/Treasury? A: No. FC: Treasury declines for <500 so they don't really care about those areas w/<500 employees. Brad indicated that whether we have an employee in a tax area or not, we set it up because someone (or an agency) can move into the area but realize this is for the areas with 500+ employees. Q: NFC North - we understand that another payroll provider does establish this, has this been discussed in the e-Gov initiative and will this be a standard for all? A: Brad - DOI does this for many small entities, 300+ and they are not happy about handling this, however, they do it. Penny indicated it is part of the standardization effort and she'll check to see where this falls. She feels this is more of whether the community is willing to have these tax entities set up and who will pay for it? Q: Treasury - how does DOI handle the cost of set up, etc.? A: Unknown. Q: NFC North - can the initiator begin the process and pay for it, then update later as add'tl agencies come on? A: Penny indicated there is a billing algorithm and asked CAPPS to give them some ideas and she'll present this to billing dept. C: Cliff indicated that USDA is not willing to pay for this for only two employees. A: Penny agreed but the community needs to look at this as a global impact as we move forward into these tax entities. C: DOJ says other counties have inquired about this process; however, DOJ has not sent down another request until a decision is made on their current requests. C: George indicated there could be some union issues. R: DOJ indicated if this comes up with them, they put the burden on the tax entity to go to TREASURY to get a formal answer. C: BPD agreed w/this approach, ie., if no local tax agreement, they don't do it. C: Cliff is concerned that we should find out if e-Payroll group will standardize or what their desires will be and that's the position we should be taking. Q: What are the 4 payroll providers going to do? A: Brad will get w/Rick on this and the other providers to see what their thoughts are. Q: Treasury - can we at the same time find out how DOI bills for this service? A: Yes, per Brad. Q: USDA - if each time a new tax entity comes to be, do we have to pay each time? A: Yes. Brad indicated that these 2 DOJ requests are only the beginning, that other agencies could make a request as well. Q: NFC North - does this go in line w/ALLTAX? A: Yes it's in their programming, but it has to be activated. Brad indicated that small tax entities could have unique withholding requirements which would require front-end programming to allow our system to accept our data. That's why Treasury enters into the agreements to keep them all in line as opposed to allowing unique requirements. Standard criteria is to use the discretionary allotment process. Q: Treasury - should someone be checking w/the Dept (of Treasury) about their concerns? A: Penny indicated it's a return on investment, how much $$ and resources do you want to expend? If OPM is discussing this as an eGOv initiative, she is surprised that this would come up. Q: HUD asked if those agencies who have duty stations in the affected areas determine if they want to share the costs? And to share the costs irregardless of the number of people in those areas? A: The problem is that if only a few of the clients want this and pay for this but others come down later, who then pays? If you don't have employees in those duty stations, you should not have to pay. USDA indicated that EEX takes half of their development costs and splits it up among all the users. George agreed to this, even though EEX may now be looking at this differently as agencies are leaving EEX. Jo indicated there may be many options on the billing and everyone wants to know what eGOv decision is. Q: Is there a legal obligation? A: No. Jo mentioned that some agencies want this, while other agencies want something else, it may be political. Cliff reminded CAPPS that the discretionary allotment can be used currently. Brad says the CFR says with the small tax entities, you have to set up a process to withhold and the discretionary allotment currently covers this. Q: BPD - there are hundreds of these small entities and where does it stop and when do we reach the point where resources are expended...if we turn this on, where will it stop? A: Brad feels it doesn't make sense to set up a tax entity for a small group of people. The discretionary allotment process has been working well for 20 years; it's only in the past 6 months these add'tl requests have surfaced. Brad is not sure what prompted this. DOJ says some people are confused about voluntary allotment for local tax, thought this would be easy to do. Q: DOJ asked is the voluntary local tax where the employee is working or where they reside? A: That's one of the variables - do you tax residents or workers only? This raises the costs of setting these up. Penny indicated we needed to wrap this discussion up; we can discuss again at the July meeting. In the meantime, Brad will get the answers for the notes before the July meeting; otherwise, we'll discuss at the July meeting. C: Is there a threshold # of people that would have withholdings? CAPPS might want to set up this number.

V. Voluntary Separation Incentive Payments (VSIPs) (Cliff Lee) - discussed at last meeting and an email followed- Cliff provided a short recap. Section 1313 of DHS Act basically amended Chapter 35 of Title 5, U. S. Code adding a Subchapter covering Voluntary Separation Incentive Payments. This new authority applies to Executive agencies and requires the prior approval of the Office of Personnel Management. The new authority eliminated the agency 15% contribution to the retirement fund required under previous VSIP authorities. Unfortunately, OPM did not establish a new authority code to differentiate between VSIP's under Chapter 35 and VSIP's under other authorities. NFC's current process automatically deducts a 15% Agency contribution to the retirement fund unless an agency submitted a specific request to be excluded. We asked that replies be rec'd by 6/15 and we've heard from many of the agencies: DOC, FCC, FMC, MSPB, USDA, DOJ, HUD, SBA. If you're a congressional agency, you are not covered by Chapter 35 and will need legislative authority for future VSIP's. Other agencies who do not meet the definition of Executive agency (e.g., FDIC,) will also need their own legislative authority. We (NFC North) will alert NFC South about these agencies being excluded from this requirement of paying the 15%. FYI - FCA has a separate authority. Some of the small agencies also have their own authorities. Hopefully at the July mtg, we can give you an idea of when this will be implemented. Q: Treasury - NFC only deducts the 15% quarterly, if you have to have it stopped, can this be changed before they make the next deduction? A: Cliff indicated he will report out in the notes as soon as this change will be made. FQ: Does this mean we have to pay for it ourselves? A: Cliff indicated agencies should go thru SPPS. FC: NO, in our case, the payments have been made. FA: That's different. Again, the only thing you can do is access SPPS - we'll send requirements down on this. But we have no idea when the programming will go to production. FC: another part of NFC has to get the funds back and give it back to the agency and we hope that this requirement is implemented ASAP. There is some incentive for NFC to do this but we have to fit it in w/the other requirements on the table. Q: Who do we call for this request? A: Contact Mose (as indicated in the MAY notes) to coordinate the effort. And you should have a list of the employees who are affected.

UPDATE: Cliff sent an email to CAPPS on June 17th, listing the Executive agencies that would be excluded from the 15% Agency contribution to the retirement fund. If an agency is not included on the listing and would like to be added, they have been given until June 23, 2004 to notify PPSPS accordingly. Requirements for the program modification were submitted to GESD on June 24th. It has been assigned Project Number 40529.

VI. Status of 2004 Retroactive Pay Adjustment Processing (D'Juan Brady) - have completed the generation of all automatic retroactive actions. Removed controls where NFC was deleting the HCUP packages and agencies are handling this now. NFC generated report PER04RT which reflects the following actions still in suspense - CV 05: 80, CV 06: 109, CV 07: 44 - from the original population. Agencies must clear up these remaining suspense actions. C: Smithsonian - they've been trying to determine who has rec'd the retro payment and they have compared PP 10 employees and their salaries with what they should be earning according to the current pay schedules and they have identified those that are being paid incorrectly but those paid correctly they cannot tell if the retro payment has been processed accurately. Q: Is there a FOCUS report or some sort of report that agencies can use to determine if the retro was processed and paid out correctly, from PP 01 thru PP 07 for GS and for the wage grade employees as well? A: Jo indicated that last year someone (from NFC South) wrote a report, maybe it was run against PAYTA, does anyone have an idea if this report is available? GAO has been trying to get this report, however, they've been told no one understands how to regenerate this for this year. GAO can send us the report name but D'Juan says it sounds like something Steve wrote last year and it wasn't available this year. Q: George inquired as to whether the report could be updated to include information from this year (ie., PP's and YR)? Steve Cunningham will need to be consulted on this. D'Juan says this year's retro is different than last year's and the report may be different. Can you check into this? A: Yes, NFC South will check into this. Post Meeting Note: PPSPS spoke to Penny who will discuss with Steve the possibility of running this report and have it available at the July CAPPS meeting (if not before). C: Treasury - you may want to run the report for beyond PP 07 since some employees did not receive the retro timely and it was proc'd in PP 09. This could be due to the timing of when the HCUP package applied to the database; if in first cycle, would apply PP 07 but if delayed then it gets proc'd the next pay period...you need to look in PP 08, 09.

VII. 2004 Retroactive Pay Adjustments for FWS Employees (Cliff Lee) -

A. CPM 2004 -06 dated March 4, 2004 All the retroactive pay adjustment actions for wage employees have been completed. However, some POI's are not checking their Suspense files for their wage grade actions. Cliff pointed out that one POI had over 90 wage employees whose retroactive pay increases had been in Suspense for 3 pay periods and the POI had taken no action on these cases. Some POI's appear not to understand that if the employee has a personnel action subsequent to the effective date of the pay adjustment, that the pay adjustment must be deleted from EPIC and a HCUP package created on the employee. NFC has been getting calls from wage employees inquiring about their retroactive payments. We are advising them that the actions have been generated and that they should contact their personnel office for a status of their raise.

B. Cliff advised that NFC is now in the regular biweekly cycle for the wage increases and sending email notifications to CAPPS with the schedule changes and additions.

1. Treasury - if it applied but they didn't get any retro. There are some cases when agencies entered the document but the agency put the wrong values in there. No they are getting the money. FC: Ours took three or four pay periods for the retro to pay.

2. USDA - if we have an employee who crossed USDA agency lines, the retro does not pay if the old agency processes the HCUP case. The current agency did the HCUP case, but the payment did not follow through. A: Agencies should submit a request to manual pay for the retroactive payments.

VIII. Benefits Updates (Jody Nyers) -

A. TSP Open Season ends June 30th - the first effective pay period is PP 12 (June 13, 2004). If you find actions falling into suspense, please alert me so I can determine what the system is doing with those actions.

B. FEGLI Open Season - As you may be aware, OFEGLI (and OPM) decided to hold an open season for Federal Employees Group Life Insurance this September, in honor of OFEGLI's 50th anniversary. I attended a Benefits Workshop last week and here's some information they shared:

1. Total claims paid since 1954 = $33 billion

2. Total number of lives covered since 1954 = 12 million

3. Total claims paid in 2003 = $2 billion

4. This open season will allow employees to elect Basic FEGLI coverage, Additional Optional Coverage, Family Coverage without requiring a physical to be completed.

5. The open season will be for one month from September 1 - 30, 2004. However, the first effective date will not be until September of 2005. The reason for the delayed effective date is to prevent adverse actions and to ensure OFEGLI does not take a massive hit (ie., via multiple claims). In both 1985 and 1993 the open season actions were effective immediately and they took a huge hit. However, in 1999 the open season actions were delayed until 2000 and it worked very well although OPM said it was an administrative headache. This was due to tracking the actions for a year. At that time, agencies opted to either receive the forms and "hold them" in a file within the OPF or in a file within the HR office. OPM did indicate that some agencies lost the forms before they were processed (hence the headaches).

6. It is CRITICAL that the employee be in a pay AND duty status immediately prior to the effective date of the action. Pay status does not include annual leave, sick leave, LWOP, etc. It means actually being in a pay (TC 01) status for 32 hours during the pay period before the action is effective. This information is available via OPM's Benefits Administration Letter (BAL 04-203) on their website at this link: http://www.opm.gov/asd/htm/2004/04-203.asp

7. It's my understanding that NFC allowed the agencies to process the FEGLI changes from the 1999/2000 open season via PACT/PRES (at that time, now via EPIC) and placed the actions on "hold" or on "inactive" status. This means the actions will remain on the database for approximately a year; however, it also requires the agencies to take positive steps to make the action effective and to ensure the employee is in pay and duty status.

8. I'm not sure what the edits will be on the system for accepting late submissions; however, OPM did indicate that employees can submit their forms (new OPM Form FE-2004) for this open season as late as March 31, 2005. Again, this simply means the agency accepts the form and holds it until processing in September of 2005.

9. A question came up about whether EEX would be ready to accept actions but it's doubtful since they would have to be ready for the open season in a few months and this is not on their Fall release schedule. EEX will not be making changes to their system for this one month open season. Q: USDA - Will EPP be ready? A: Unsure, but Jody will check with NFC and get back to CAPPS. POST MEETING UPDATE: GESD is looking into what system changes will be needed to accommodate this FEGLI Open Season (this includes additional functionality to EPP/ESS).

10. Additional questions:

a. Can the agencies place the actions in EPIC on hold now and then release them in PP-18, 2005? A: Jody is working with NFC South to determine if this process will be allowed.

b. TR - What if someone has a life event and changes their FEGLI during the intervening period that may affect the election made during open season? A: That's very important and you need to keep this in mind when processing the actions.

c. How long can an employee be carried in non pay status? A: An employee who remains in a non pay status is ineligible to participate in this open season; however, how long can they remain in non pay status is unclear because OPM/FEGLI has not made a decision on this.

d. What if an employee wants to make an election but they didn't get it in time? A: Late submissions will be accepted up to March 31, 2005.

e. FM&CS - Did you find out any more on the address list? A: No not yet. At the meeting OFEGLI was hoping to receive agency approval to receive a report of all employee's addresses. There appear to be other issues (i.e., employees might not want their addresses made public). FQ: Can we go back as a community and recommend offices alert their employees of this open season? A: Jody indicated that this is a Benefits office issue to handle; if you are the CAPPS Rep and Benefits Officer than you need to make sure and educate your employees on this upcoming open season. BAL 04-203 is on OPM's webpage (see above) which has information necessary to understand what OFEGLI is doing. There will be another BAL forthcoming. One way to notify your employees (in lieu of sharing their residence addresses with OFEGLI) is to do is put a remark on the ELS and EPP. Jody will send an e-mail to agencies to see who wants to participate. USDA immediately indicated they did not want to have an automatic remark on the ELS/EPP. If an agency does not reply to Jody, the default will be that they will be covered by Jody's submission. There was quite a bit of discussion on this. Depending on the responses. Jody decided NOT to take the lead and place the remark on TM105 for the ELS/EPP but rather leave it up to each agency to decide how they want to notify their employees. Jody will send an e-mail with suggested text for the remark and agencies will be responsible for putting this in themselves; we will not do it for them. Post Meeting Note: Jody emailed CAPPS with a suggested remark; however, they can determine their context and whether or not they choose to notify employees via ELS/EPP.

C. Also at the workshop last week, they discussed Long Term Care Insurance and there are currently 200,000+ enrollees. Employees can elect this coverage at any time; however, it would require a physical.

D. And finally at the workshop last week, SHPS was there to discuss Flexible Spending Accounts. In 2003, there were 31,000 participants, as of today there are over 120,000 participants. Some of the concerns are ensuring the correct payroll office receives the allotments. It's amazing that there are employees out there who do not know what department/agency they work for (eg., an employee who works for Customs was previously employed by Treasury and now works under Homeland Security; however, when they accessed the FSAFEDS website to sign up they choose from the drop down menu as their department, the Department of Treasury. The action takes, or so it appears, then it fails the edits and SHPS contacts me to determine if the employee is pay rolled by NFC and if yes, what agency/POI they work for). SHPS has updated their website to make this more user-friendly in hopes that employee's will be able to select their correct department/agency. Paperless reimbursements are coming this July. This means those carriers who participate will automatically submit the claims to SHPS and the employee will not have to. The most interesting point was the amount of lapsed funds (ie., unclaimed monies). For dependent care it ran $427,000 and for health care, the amount exceeded $2 million dollars!!! That's a lot of cash in SHPS pockets due to employees not submitting their claims. SHPS indicated they send out notices twice a year and also in March for the prior year's balance. There is new legislation to carryover $500 from the previous year; however, it has not yet been passed. FYI - in the past, for any employee who missed an FSA deduction a double deduction would occur, which placed a financial hardship on the employee. This has been changed to deduct only 20% of the missed deduction until the entire deduction is collected. Cliff mentioned that not all of the BC/BS benefits are getting shipped - dental benefits were a problem for one individual. And BPD indicated that if you have supplemental coverage through your spouse, it must go there before SHPS. FMCS indicated they had an employee transfer and they missed 3-4 pay periods. Now all his deductions stopped, not just his extra to make up the mixed pay periods. Jody indicated there may be some unusual cases. Best suggestion is to work with SHPS; however, if you need Jody's help, contact her.

E. Health Savings Accounts (HSAs)- Jody asked about this at the workshop last week; however, at this time there is no new information. OPM does anticipate it being available for this open season. Last month, I mentioned that money that individuals put into HSAs is not taxable and they can put away the amount of the deductibles on their health plans up to $2600 for individuals or up to $5150 for families. OPM is looking forward to an open season in which employees can choose not only their preferred plan, but also the vehicles thru which they will be able to pay health costs for themselves and their families (i.e.., FSAs and HSAs). FEHB carriers are submitting their proposals on how to meet the IRS requirements and OPM is sure this will occur during THIS UPCOMING OPEN SEASON (i.e., Fall 2004) for atleast a couple of the carriers. They hope to have additional information at their September conference. Q: TR - they just discussed this in the federal register. Is this in addition to FEHB and FSA accounts? DOJ - I am confused on these? A: Jody explained that the HSA is for High Deductible Health Plans and only a handful of the carriers are prepared to handle this. There are several more decisions that need to be made first. Information on HSAs is available at OPM's webpage.

IX. Employee Express Update (George Morris) - EEX monthly meeting yesterday (6/15). Checkbook and PlanSmart asked for time to present to reps, but only one showed up. Both want sponsorship off EEX web page; final decision to be made later. Your EEX Reps should be able to provide details. Fall Release information was announced. TSP catch-up contributions (the year field will be on the screen so employees can elect this year vs. next year-December/January issue last year) will be part of release. FEGLI Option & Cost/Billing structure discussed (USDA is pulling out and others are discussing it). EEX is reviewing cost structure and if another major client is lost, they may have to do a major overhaul, but in the meantime, a simplified cost assessment will be put in place. EEX is considering proposing their system for possible electronic OPF application.

X. Child Support Garnishments (George Morris/Steve Loeffelholz) -

A. NFC Sweep from submission addresses to EFT scheduled for PP-14. Received feedback/info back on 46 states and territories (Guam VA, Puerto Rico) shooting for PP-14 in lieu of PP-12 due to needed payroll reconciliation reports. NFC does not have enough reports yet to do this-it is an internal delay. NOTE: Clients are asked to tell their servicing personnel offices NOT to enter EFT data prior to PP-14 sweep because the data will go the recipient ACC+ Addendum record (USDA/FS did this and it has rejected). NFC has not forwarded the global report of new EFT accounts for this very reason, but will do so after PP-13 has run. Agencies must have the individual mailing/address(s) until after PP-13 pays.

1. A: (George) Did OCSE bring you (NFC-Steve L.) In on the Medical Support Orders issue? They wish to talk to payroll offices and agency reps. A: These are separate issues from EFT. Q: Has NOLA had any involvement on this? A: No, this is a Treasury issue. After CAPPS meeting, OCSE contacted NFC-North to indicate that this secondary issue (Medical Support Orders) has been tabled at this time.

2. Agencies will be seeing changes based upon the case number changes Steve Ls' staff is making.

XI. User & Work Group Updates

A. Awards - (Jo Bonner) Next meeting will be July 14th from 9:30-11:30 in Lincoln 3.

B. EPIC - (Mark Liegey) - EPIC Users Group (UG) has not scheduled a mtg yet, however, Mark is dealing with the day-to-day operations of EPIC; if you need his assistance, it's easier to reach Mark via email to Mark.Liegey@usda.gov. He'll do whatever he can to help you out. Mark mentioned a proposal for the UG to work it a bit differently - we'll have the EPIC UG (which will meet here at USDA for support, share info, operational issues, help with problems, pros/cons, etc.) and this group would meet monthly. In addition, we'll have a Requirements Group (RG) to discuss system problems, requirement changes that are needed, requests to NFC South, enhancements/upgrades to the system, QA testing, EPIC on the web, and work hand-in-hand on how EPIC should work. One of the first things he'd like to tackle is looking at the Software Problem Report (SPR's) and he'd like the RG to get this resolved. Sending an email to a programmer in GESD doesn't fully solve the problem, it just pushes thru an action but doesn't fix/repair the system. We are looking at how to resolve these issues. Agencies can determine if they want someone different on the UG Vs the RG or it can be the same person. (Similar to Jo's T&A RG - policy folks Vs UG - timekeepers). This is a proposal and Mark needs your feedback on these groups. Q: Is this two separate groups or the same? C: Treasury agrees it should be two groups. They agree that they are getting operational actions proc'd but not a system correction. Mark asked when the groups want to meet? (Morning/afternoon, same day - different day)? C: Everyone agreed it should be a standing meeting so it meets the same day of the month, each month and preferably in the morning. With this in mind, the first meeting of the RG will be Tuesday, July 13th, in Room 1623 South, Lincoln 1,2 at 10:00am. Mark will send an email to the CAPPS Reps & EPIC UG email list to assure he reaches all interested parties and will hopefully receive positive replies in order to make the July 13th meeting a success. FYI - Mark's phone number is 202-720-2237.

C. FESI (Jody for Glenda Dorsey) - the interface layout for Commercial Garnishments will be available for customer testing in the August-September time frame.

D. ICAMS - (Jody for Glenda Dorsey) - No report.

E. Leave Share - (Jo Bonner)

F. PINE Edit - (Cliff Lee) - put out a call for volunteers and have heard from DOC, USDA, and PSA. Cliff would like to have a meeting in July so if you are interested in participating, let him know ASAP.

1. Q: Treasury indicated they sent an email with a contact name for this workgroup, did you get it? A: Cliff didn't get it, please re-send it.

G. PMSO - (George Morris) - We have received a number of volunteers. He will be sending a message out next week to the volunteers, and will cc CAPPS reps on the initial message. He has received several hard copy packages of recommendations. Expect feedback with a few days and will schedule first meeting.

H. T&A - (Jo Bonner) Next User Group meeting July 8th from 9:30-11:30 in the Resource Room and the next Requirements meeting is July 8th from 1-3 in the Resource Room

1. STAR 4.0 testing began June 7th. Pilot starts PP-13, July 12th. Implementation is scheduled for PP-15, August 9th. QA User Team will meet on June 24th to review the manual.

2. Leave Error Report now available on the Reporting Center (Project 40045) - Jo asked John Facione and it's been completed and should be out there as a separate, administrative report. CULP152 (AL/SL, etc. discrepancy) - what does CAPPS want? Separate request, TK's request - YES, make it a separate report. What is the security needs? John will have to advise Jo as to what the users need to ask for to their Security Officers. Does this include AL, SL, Comp? YES, it does not have any add'tl fields but if they are desired, this will go thru the T&A WG. Penny said we need to determine when to STOP the hard copy mailing of this report...we'll cut off the hard copy reports...when? What about the CULP report? NO that is okay and will be available. Jo will discuss at the mtg in July and let them decide. Get that info to Donna Speed as soon as you can. Q: Doralee - can we have a bulletin on this? A: YES per Penny.

XII. Potpourri

A. DOC - what is the status of the White House waiving the SES overpayment? A: The White House refused to weigh in on this, up to the Agency Heads.

B. CFTC - We still have an outstanding FERCCA case which I have some information on, can I leave this with Jody for followup? A: Absolutely, Jody will look into this issue.

POST MEETING UPDATE: Joyce Parent is working on this case; hopefully it will be resolved soon.

C. CFTC - submitted a request to GESD Request to have a table updated for their pay. To date it has not been updated, what should we do? A: Send the request Nick Sicomo at Nicholas.Sicomo@usda.gov asking that the table be updated.

D. TR - one of their clients wants to know if the tax withholding for certain documents can be done via a dollar amount Vs percentage A:. The two options are to use the employee's withholding rate or the maximum IRS rate (28.5%). No dollar amount will be accepted.

Agencies in attendance: USDA, ARC, CFTC, CSOSA, DOC, DOJ, FDIC, FMCS, GAO, HUD, NCPC, OSC, PSA, SBA, SMITHSONIAN, TREASURY, and NFC.