Best Practice for Approving Multi-Activity Benefits

When approving a Benefit with multiple activities, always start with the lowest Activity ID.

This is the initial Activity and it contains critical information for all activities in this Benefit. None of the associated activities can be approved if the initial Activity is not. Even if the initial Activity is approved it's important to review its totals, notes and attachments. This will provide the historical details leading up to the most recent Activity or Activities.

Remember the activities layer together to form one Benefit so it's important to consider all previous activities when approving new ones.

Complete the full approval process for each Activity, even if you see the same information repeated. It's critical that you open each associated Activity by clicking on its Benefit / Activity ID then clicking View Activity in the compressed view to see the full details of each associated Activity.

• Verify that the category and supplier are correct as this information will stay the same across all activities in this Benefit.
• Review the Benefit type to ensure it's accurate based on the baseline type used. Due to the complexity of some transactions, the appropriate combination of baseline and Benefit type may need to be determined on a case-by-case basis.
• Each Activity's calculations will be unique as will terms and durations. Check them all, including aggregate totals of all activities in the Benefit.
• Multi-year Benefits can be complicated to enter and some users will enter a total for the Benefit to date instead of a total for the Benefit in this fiscal year. This can lead to double counting if it is not corrected in the review process.
  
  Pay particular attention to any Benefit value that is greater than or equal to the baseline value. This is a warning sign and you as the approver should proceed with a cautious eye.
• Check the notes for each Activity to have a full understanding of all the elements in this Benefit.
• Verify that the Benefit has been applied correctly across the campuses and that the correct departments have been listed for each Activity.
• Verify that the appropriate documentation has been attached to every Activity in the Benefit. Even if the document names look the same in multiple activities, download and review all files.