The New Revenue in Workday Financials

Contributed by Danielle Hancock, Josh Breeden, and Lisa Shuler 

In today’s world, when we think of revenue, we often think of the GL (Ledger/Book of Record) and disassociate it from the GA (Expenditure Side/Sub-Ledger) because Oracle is a Ledger/Subledger system. In Workday Financials, revenue and expenditures will be more easily linked because it is a single ledger system. Having said that, it is important to point out what we know about the different types of revenue and how they may function in Workday. The Finance Strategic Transformation (FST) functional team is still working on this, so we don’t know everything yet. As always, things may change as we progress through the project.

Remote Deposit/Bank Deposit/Credit Card Payments à Ad Hoc Bank Transaction (Banking & Settlement)

Currently, most of these types of revenue would be entered into the system through a GL journal entry. In Workday, an Ad Hoc Bank Transaction (AHBT) will automatically be initiated when a deposit hits the bank account. The AHBT routes to the Cost Center’s Deposit Specialist (in their Workday inbox) for them to enter the Foundation Data Model (FDM) values for the revenue prior to submitting the transaction.

Note: Central AR and OSP deposits will be handled differently.

These types of transaction are a cross-functional activity being discussed between the Banking & Settlement, Customer Accounts, and Financial Accounting teams.

Accounts Receivable (AR) à Customer Accounts

Currently, Accounts Receivable (AR) is used to invoice customers outside of the University when a department provides a good or service externally. In Workday, the same will be true. This process is part of the Customer Accounts functional area, which encompasses customer creation, invoicing, and managing customer contracts.

Gifts/Endowment Income à Gifts

Currently, these types of revenue are booked by central accounting/gift processing in either a DR, DI, or DU award type for gifts and ER, EI, or EU award type for endowments. In future state, gifts will still be booked by central accounting/gift processing. The team is still determining exactly how that will work, but all gifts and endowments will be booked to a gift worktag (GF) where you will be able to tell the difference between a gift and endowment in the gift worktag description. This is part of the Gift functional area.

GL Journals à Manual Journals (Financial Accounting)

Currently, all other revenue besides those listed above are entered via a GL journal. Some examples include tuition revenue and transfers. Similar to current state, Student Information System (SIS) tuition revenue will be recorded via integrated accounting journals from SIS. Revenue Transfers (89XX object codes) will be processed as accounting journals, which is part of the Financial Accounting functional area.

ACH Payments/Wires à ?

Currently, these types of payments can come in for many different reasons and don’t have a corresponding customer invoice. The team is still working on what this process will look like in future state, exploring potential use of the Cash Sale business process, which will allow for Central AR to specify the Revenue Category and any associated FDM values as provided by the receiving Cost Center.

Expenditure Credits

Expenditure credits are not considered revenue (it is actually reducing an expense) and examples include vendor refunds, travel reimbursements, sundry reimbursements, or joint funding (see Policy FIN-050). In current state, you scan the check via a remote deposit scanner and complete an expenditure credit form for the Cashier’s Office to make the entry in Oracle. In Workday, we are envisioning this working very similarly to the aforementioned remote deposit entries, where an Ad Hoc Bank Transaction (created based on a remote deposited batch) will route to the Cost Center’s Deposit Specialist to choose the appropriate FDM worktags, including the Spend Category for the expense being reduced.