Functions
The Office of Financial Operations and Systems (OFOS) is an “oversight agency” that is staffed with individuals who are knowledgeable in interpreting and applying generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP). In its oversight capacity, OFOS manages the District’s overall accounting operations, fulfilling critical functions such as accounting for business events, general ledger maintenance, financial reporting, payroll processing and certain retirement-related services.
OFOS has two primary functions:
- Maintaining the District’s general ledger, culminating with the production of the District’s Annual Comprehensive Financial Report (ACFR) at the close of each fiscal year; and
- Administering the District’s payroll and retirement systems.
To fulfill these functions, OFOS’s operations are divided into two broad functional areas: Controller and Payroll activities. Accordingly, these functional responsibilities are distributed among five divisions within OFOS: District Integrated Financial System (DIFS) Support Center, Organizational Change Management/Financial Policies and Procedures, Central Accounting Operations, Financial Control and Reporting and Pay and Retirement Services. Daily OFOS operations are supported by an internal Financial Operations and Management Administration team.
OFOS Mission
To establish the guiding principles for financial and payroll operations, accounting systems, and policies and procedures in order to maintain the fiscal integrity of the District of Columbia Government. Our fundamental business objectives promote accuracy, transparency and accountability, while uniquely aligning us with our customers.
Key Responsibilities
DIFS Support Center (Business): Provides support and assistance to users of the District Integrated Financial System. The team’s core functions are in four key areas of responsibility: Organizational Change Management; Oracle System Applications – Analysis, Development, and Testing; System and Data Integrity; and Business Functional Analysis.
OCM/Financial Policies and Procedures: Creates and implements change management strategies designed to minimize resistance to change, and ensures financial policies and procedures are documented, timely updated, and made available to stakeholders.
Central Accounting Operations: Maintains the District’s general ledger, timely reconciles the District’s cash and investment accounts, maintains supplier information and responds to supplier inquiries, and handles the city’s federal and state tax reporting tasks to ensure compliance with IRS and state requirements.
Financial Control and Reporting: Prepares financial statements in compliance with generally accepted accounting principles; prepares and issues the city’s Annual Comprehensive Financial Report (ACFR) and its Popular Annual Financial Report (PAFR); and provides advisory services to agencies regarding accounting treatment for unusual transactions to ensure GAAP compliance.
Pay and Retirement functions are distributed among five teams within that office. The responsibilities of each Pay and Retirement team are as follows:
- Payroll Operations processes and monitors time administration which is the processing of the raw labor hours received from agencies via online transactions. Time and labor transactions are processed for three bi-weekly payrolls and one semi-monthly payroll. Payroll Operations is also responsible for editing and correcting rejected time transactions, confirmation review, notification and processing all updates to employee voluntary general deductions, employee direct deposit banking information and federal and state tax withholding information.
- The Retirement team administers the retirement processing for the federal police officers in the US Park Police, US Secret Service and White House who elected to participate in the District of Columbia Police and Firefighters Retirement System. In addition, the retirement team is responsible for the retirement reporting functions for employees who participate in the US Civil Service Retirement program.
- The Supplemental Payroll team processes off-cycle payments for District employees whose pay was not able to be processed through the regularly scheduled bi-weekly or semi-monthly payrolls.
- The Special Pay team approves and certifies each payroll to ensure that total appropriations, benefits, withholding taxes as well as gross-to-net deductions are accounted for and distributed to the appropriate accounts and parties. This team also verifies and ensures accuracy of calculations for special nonrecurring payments such as terminal leave, severance pay, death cases, back pay, salary and/or benefit adjustments, garnishments-wage attachments, and District and federal levies.
- The Applications and Security team processes the payroll of the District Programs. In addition, the team is responsible for the time and labor administration functions associated with ensuring that data is available for payroll operations to process. The team also assists employees with employee self-service (ESS) concerns related to payroll (i.e., passwords, ACH setup, withholding elections, etc.), and supports the OPRS Help Desk.