Departments often work closely with subcontractors. Also, departments determine who in their department should receive the invoices from the subcontractors. For these reasons, the departments are best to work with their contacts to ask them to only send invoices to the designated campus department staff and no longer send the invoices to SCM Accounts Payable directly.

The campus department can determine who can best upload the invoice into DocuSign. SCM AP only requires that the PI or the delegated authorized approver (who has a U242 Signature Card on file with SCM designating they can approve subcontracts for the department) approves the invoice.

Generally, the Principal Investigator is the person who needs to sign the invoice to authorize the payment. However, if your department submitted a U242 Signature Authorization Card to SCM AP specifying that another person has authority for approving subcontracts for your department, they are authorized to approve subcontract invoices.

We recommend that you inquire with your department’s research administration team to determine how past invoices were previously approved. If you would like us to verify the approver or if someone has a Signature Authorization Card on file with SCM AP, please submit an inquiry to the SCM Response Team.

SCM AP only requires the PI or delegated approver that has a U242 Signature Authorization Card on file with SCM AP to approve the invoice.

Yes, please include the chartstring on the face of the approved invoice. In DocuSign, you can add a text box to type in the chartstring before routing the invoice for approval.

We ask that the departments specify the chartstring including the Account Code used for paying the invoice. The campus department can check balances in the Research Administration System (RAS) or review expenditures on the ledger to determine payments and balances.

However, SCM AP will review the chartstring that is specified on the invoice.

Yes, you can begin working with your subcontractors to have invoices sent to your department and start the approval process for upcoming invoices.

When coordinating with subcontractors, you will want to inform them that they should send the invoices to your department only and discontinue sending invoices to SCM AP directly. This will help prevent duplicate copies from being sent.

However, due to timing, we may have duplicate copies for a period of time. However, invoices with the same invoice number will not be paid multiple times. There are controls in place to prevent invoices with the same invoice number from being processed.

We highly recommend that the campus departments adopt this new process. This will bring benefits to departments and subcontractors by helping to reduce the time for invoice processing and payment. Pre-approved invoices will be prioritized for processing and payment.

Any invoices that are not pre-approved will continue to have longer processing and payment times that can average from 30-50 days and this time can vary depending on the volume of invoices received.

No, Supply Chain Management does not make payments on intercampus subawards. This change does not impact intercampus subaward processes. For more information, visit Processing Interlocation (ITF) and Intercampus (IOC) Transactions.

Yes, the same process applies to UFRA invoices.

Previously, when AP was a part of the Controller’s Office, they did implement a DocuSign process where invoices were sent to them and DocuSign was used to route approval. This process was created to replace a paper-based system. However, in reviewing existing practices, some departments continued to receive invoices directly from subcontractors and obtained approval before sending the invoices to SCM AP.

Also, based on customer feedback and to best help meet the campus needs on faster invoice payment process we are changing the invoicing process in the short term by asking the campus to receive the invoices from the subcontractors and obtaining invoice approval. 

Previous to the implementation of the DocuSign process, subcontractors sent paper invoices to campus departments for approval and then sent to AP for processing, so this is not a new process.

In the longer term, the campus has asked that we review additional solutions including revisiting the possibility of using BearBuy for the subcontracting process to bring further improvement and efficiency to the process.

If your department has a shared mailbox, you can provide that to the subcontractor so multiple individuals can see the invoice. Some departments today have the subcontractor send the invoice to multiple staff to increase visibility of the invoice. If there is turnover, in the offboarding and transition process, the department should work with subcontractor to send the invoice to another staff member.

No, Transcepta is not used for subcontract invoices at this time. Pre-approved subcontract invoices need to be emailed by the campus department to [email protected].

No. Invoices for BearBuy purchase orders must continue to be submitted through Transcepta.

SCM support contacts changed in 2020. Previous SCM support emails are no longer used. Suppliers should be directed to contact the SCM Response Team who supports our campus and external customers. They can be contacted using one of the following links below:

• UCSF Faculty, Staff & Students
• External Suppliers & Customers 

This information can also be found on the Supply Chain Management website in the “Need Help?” section of each page.