I. Welcome (Gary Gaspard) Guidelines for Building Evacuation and Shelter-In-Place Conditions

Gary announced to the CAPPS attendees the procedures for an evacuation in the event of an emergency and/or a “Shelter-in-Place” crisis situation.

II. Update on NFC Status (Gary Gaspard)

1. Leave donation T&A issue – T&A’s with a leave donation in excess of 8 hours (or where the combination of leave donation and leave exceeded 8 hours) produced Error 261. This issue has been resolved. If there are further issues, contact Gary Gaspard or Jo Bonner.
   
2. Jury Duty Fees – Through recent analysis, OPM has found that it is not feasible or cost effective to collect jury duty fees from the employees. The template was sent by email to CAPPS representatives and Customer Contacts on 7/27/06 in order to request responses. The deadline is set for 8/31/06.
   
3. Survey for Customer Forum – A survey sent on 7/25/06 asked customers for Customer Forum topics and requested agencies to reserve the date of 11/14/06 for the Customer Forum to be held in Washington, DC. The survey deadline is 11/06/06.
   
4. OPM FEHB Changes – Per OPM employees will not have to re-enroll when FEHB code is expanded. Employees who remain in the same health plan will not need to take any action for their coverage code to change; however, carriers will be sending all members a new ID card with the new expanded enrollment code.
   
5. NFC to show the new FEHB code until the database change is made and will perform a sweep. OPM will prepare a table that will house the new codes that will populate our TMGT system to cover all FEHB carriers.

III. STAR Web 5.0 (Randy Speed)

1. Notifications will be sent out to agencies early next week for requests to Security on what is needed for STAR 5.0 QA testing. Randy stated if there are any problems with testing to send him an email with copy Alisa Wells. There were 15 agencies that have responded to the notification.
   
2. STAR 5.0 is currently being migrated to production. The STAR 5.0 software program should be available on the desktop and ready for use on August 17th by 10:00 a.m. Randy thanked everyone who had participated in the testing.
   
3. Gary stated that customers should contact the Call Center at (504) 255-5230 for STAR Web 5.0 assistance.
   
4. There is a 1-½ hour Time Manager demonstration scheduled for 5 viewing times. A Customer Notification listing the viewing times will be distributed. Time Manager was migrated on 8/16/06 and will be available on EPP on 8/21/06.
   
5. There will be a draft list of courses prepared that will indicate what will be covered in each FOCUS course. Gary replied that he would send out the list.
   
6. There will be demos out on the NFC Homepage but they are not instructional material.
   
7. There will be a new Time Manager option available on EPP to all employees. Please check the News and Announcements available on EPP for updates.
   
8. An option for daily entry will be available on Time Manager but system will default to daily entry. There will be 2 selections – timekeeper entry and timekeeper and employee entry. Gary asked that the agencies control the rollout within their own agencies. Notifications will be sent out to indicate when Time Manager will be available on EPP.

IV. Order of Precedence and Effects on TSP Deductions (Ron Andrus)
Representatives from GESD Tax & Benefits Processing Branch/Payroll Tax Reporting Section stated that employees who elect 100% of their gross towards TSP will need to be aware of the order of precedence for deductions that is mandated by IRS. There are certain deductions that precede TSP deductions and other deductions that will come after TSP deductions. This regulation is in accordance with the NFC’s Payroll/Personnel System Order of Precedence, Title 1, Chapter 1, Appendix A. Employees will be billed for other benefits if they elect to put 100% of salary into TSP. For example, if an employee elects 100% of salary to TSP and they pay social security, then social security will not get paid. It is the employee’s responsibility to monitor their elections.

V. 113A & 113G Spreadsheets on the Reporting Center (Randy Speed)
NFC has made format changes to the 113 reports on the Reporting Center to meet OPM requirements. A notice will be sent out to the customers asking for testers.
Testers will have to request access to the testing area. All instructions will be in the notice.

VI. FY 2007 FOCUS Training (Gary Gaspard)
A schedule is being developed for FOCUS training for the upcoming fiscal year. A notification was sent to the agencies to indicate their needs based on the quarter in order to schedule training accordingly. NFC is planning to add the DB2 database in the FOCUS training based on the new rates/colas. The training would then cover IDMS and DB2. Agencies in the meeting requested NFC to look into adding more on History and PAYTA. Most of rates/colas do not change from year to year.
Last year there was a plan to present an intermediate course for the gap between Basic FOCUS and Advanced FOCUS training for those employees who did not use Basic FOCUS often and that the Advanced FOCUS was more than what was needed, would need additional training. However, due to Hurricane Katrina this intermediate course was postponed.

VII. Undeliverable E & L’s (Gary Gaspard)
Agencies were contacted requesting point-of-contact, POI number, name and address of the agency. This information is to assist the mail center in forwarding the undeliverable E & L statements. A large volume of the undeliverable E & L statements was used through the postal software mailing system. One of the software mailing systems (Vera-Move) edits and verifies forwarding addresses.
Another mailing software system called Mail Stream Plus verifies the address. A report is to be prepared to identify E & L statements that are undeliverable. There have been 1,000 to 2,000 statements that were determined to be undeliverable. NFC recommends agency mandate paperless E & L statements.

Q: Can a report be run on how many statements were rejected?
A. A report will be sent to the points of contact. Agencies need to take action within their own agencies to monitor the undeliverable E & L statements that are being rejected. Two groups (one of them was VERAMOVE) rejected the statements. George stated on Table 16 – GLC – there is an unresolvable issue where OPM says it is not populated. There are 500 people who have been affected for a very long time. Gary spoke about agencies needing to look into mandating
paperless option for E & L statements only is available on EPP. Only a low percentage of the agencies have chosen the paperless option. About 4% to 5% of the 500 to 600 employees have selected that option. He also stated that agencies who do not mandate the paperless option will not receive a discount. Jody mentioned DOL has mandated the paperless option within the agency.

Q: Will the agencies be able to monitor the usage of employees having access to the EPP?
A: It is not a process agencies can use. There is a method or tool made to look at the time the user has signed on to the EPP. Gary stated he would research on ways this action can be monitored. This item will be put on the action item list for next month’s CAPPS meeting.

VIII. Treasury Direct Inserts for Savings Bonds 2006-2007 (Ginny Towe)
Ginny presented a number of changes for the savings bonds for
fiscal year 2006-2007.

1. To adhere to the privacy act statement the social security number will no longer appear on the savings bond.
2. Savings bonds will be mailed in new white bond envelopes to include advertisements regarding paperless savings bonds option by going through Treasury Direct.
3. The Smartex option to change paper savings bonds from paper direct through Treasury Direct email address, http://treasurydirect.gov, then click on News Release option, then click Treasury Protects.
   Q: Explain more about the social security and the white envelopes.
   A: SSN will no longer appear on the savings bonds and they will be mailed in white envelopes. Ginny stated notifications will be send out to the agencies of information about the links and various changes for savings bonds. She also stated that agencies may want to notify their employees, since when the W2s were mailed in different envelopes, many were thrown out.

IX. Non-Foreign Area COLA Rate Changes (Debby Tatum)
The Non-Foreign Area COLA Rate Changes are scheduled for Pay Period 18 or 19. According to the OPM regulations under General Counsel for FLSA, COLA should adhere to the two-year statute of limitations on how far to go back to implement the changes for back pay. The two-year statute of limitations for regular back pay cases should start from 4/4/04 where it was published in the Federal Register in Year 2002 and was again published on OPM’s Notice in Year 2004. Debby also stated that they are awaiting the requirements to determine how far to go back in implementing the changes for back pay. She further stated that Cheryl Cotton, DOJ, has knowledge of the timeframes for the back pay. Jo stated she would check into the ruling from the General Council. NFC Policy Staff will monitor the ruling of this issue. This item will be added to the Action Item List.

X. Benefits Update (Jody Nyers)

1. FEHB Expansion of Character Length – character length will change to 10 characters effective for open season beginning January 2008.
2. TSP Quarterly Meeting – next meeting will be held at the Department of Commerce on 9/13/06. Maximum contribution of $15,000 is the TSP contributions deferral limit for Year 2006 that the employees can elect. If a contribution exceeds that amount before the end of year, the employee will not be allowed that deduction. It was advised that an email should be sent to the employees to remind them to check on their TSP account balances.
3. Dental/Vision Benefit Update – OPM had a good process of selecting the carrier. Everything should be ready for this open season of 11/13/06 – 12/11/06.
4. OPM Benefits Officer Meeting – The meeting is scheduled for 10/17/06.
5. Benefits User Group Update – Meeting is scheduled for Fall 2006.

XI. Lagniappe
George discussed union dues issues. On Table 16 some agencies are using the invalid city codes of 999, 998 and 997 with some accounts having accounting codes and some without accounting codes. Under the EmPOWHR title codes – Agencies converting to EmPOWHR and are using 999 for title codes will need to work with NFC to get titles in TMGT. EmPOWHR does not allow 999. Jo – The Spot Awards option in excess of $500. A proposal was made to increase the threshold for spot awards from $500 to $750, and up to $6,500 for the Secret Service Agency employees. An email will be sent to the customers for responses.
Tom – SSN, W-2 Testing – putting in a password protector.

Q: Will the spreadsheet include a password protector?
A: Agencies should call their point-of-contact or send the password on a separate email, to be sent in Excel or Word software applications and not to include dashes in the social security numbers. Social security numbers should not be sent by email.

Q: On health benefits, is the enrollment process directly with the carrier?
A: Yes

Q: On the benefit portal, the portal will send information to the office about the NFC document to be interfaced back to NFC for payroll processing?
A: No
Increasing union dues not deliverable and was returned back to NFC. The contact point is no longer functional under Table 10. On Table 14, the Title Position screen needs to be updated. The position number is 9999. Health Benefits enrollment can have access to Control B. This internal report is produced locally and it goes to the benefits area. This report has information about all agencies and the report is not sorted by agencies, it may be sorted by social security numbers. Portions of the report cannot be sent. Employees should maintain a copy of the benefits cards from their insurance carriers to prove they have coverage.

Q: Could the database for Leave Error Report be changed to reflect the field for Comp Time? Could a bucket be created for the field?
A: Actually, buckets were made in the database change. However, the programming behind the package is pretty thick.