ASAP Customer Board Conference Call
Meeting Minutes
January 27, 2005

• Previous CAB Meeting Minutes

Customer Board Participants:
Art LeBlanc, Chair and Federal Program Agency Representative;Dee Ann Haworth, Vice Chair and Indian Tribal Organization Representative; Steve Allison and Jerry Scribner, State Representatives; Jennifer Criss, Federal Program Agency Representative; Linda Holiman, Non-Profit Representative, Maria Vargas-Capriles, University Representative

Federal Reserve Bank Participants:
Celeste Johnson, Adele Allen; Teresa Warren; Customer Business Application Function (CBAF) Staff;

Financial Management Service Participants:
Elizabeth Oldenburg, Director, Intergovernmental Programs Division; Christine Ricci, Manager, ASAP Customer Liaison Staff;Carol Cole, Regional Operations;Margie Springer, ASAP Customer Liaison.

Introductions:

Art LeBlanc was introduced as the new ASAP Customer Board (ACB) Chair and Dee Ann Haworth was introduced as the new Vice Chair.

Appoval of November Minutes:

The minutes of the November ACB Meeting were approved with minor changes for posting to the FMS ASAP website.

Implementation Update:

Redesigned Enrollment:
Releases are now scheduled to be implemented in 6-month increments. Redesigned Enrollment, Release 2.0, has been limited to Requestor Organization Internet Enrollment and has a target implementation date of June 2005. Release 2.0 will also have a new look and feel to the ASAP.gov screens. They will have a much more professional look.

The next release, targeted for implementation in December 2005, will include Redesigned Enrollment for Federal Program Agencies, 1031s, Individuals, and Batch Recipients.

The staff at the Richmond Federal Reserve is scheduled to develop the new screens in February or early March. We plan to share the screens with the ACB when the new screens are in the test environment.

An effort known as 'Single Sign On' will allow users to have the same ID and password to gain access to multiple systems on the Treasury Web Application Infrastructure (TWAI). ASAP.gov does not follow the self-enrollment model relying instead on the designated enrollment process. To enroll in ASAP.gov, the user provides banking information which is then verified by an Enrollment Reviewer at the Federal Program Agency. Once verified, an email is sent to the Certifying Officer (CO) to activate the user. We are looking to have a file upgrade for 'Single Sign On' purposes for users who self enroll and need access to the ASAP.gov system.

Q: At our last meeting, FMS said a letter concerning ASAP.gov was to be sent to Federal Program Agency Chief Financial Officers (CFOs). Will it still be sent?
A: Yes, FMS still plans to send the letter to agency CFOs. We will ensure that the ACB members are copied on the letters.

Digital Signatures:
The use of Digital Signatures by Federal Program Agency COs are now targeted to be in place by May 2005 on an agency-by-agency basis. (Digital Signatures are not tied to the Redesigned Enrollment and Release 2.0 effort.) FMS will be traveling this summer to in-person-proof agency COs. Due to concern by FMS's Chief Counsel's office about the role and timing of the use of digital certificates, FMS is reexamining whether COs will be required to sign certifications. We may have the Enrollment Reviewer acknowledge that they have seen the banking data.

Status and Listing of ASAP.gov Fixes:
The CBAF staff is updating, in plain English, the status and listing of ASAP.gov fixes as of the end of January 2005. FMS will post the file to the ASAP website www.fms.treas.gov/asap.

Q: Two ACB members commented that they are still experiencing 'Page Not Found' errors.
A: If users are experiencing 'Page Not Found' errors, they should download the patch posted on FMS's ASAP website. Updated information will be posted to the FMS ASAP website instructing users who, after downloading the patch, are still experiencing these errors to contact the CBAF staff at 804/694-8384. Screen shots and/or a description of the tasks performed before receiving the error, as well as the time the error occurred, are very helpful information in resolving these problems.

Password Update:
Key to the 'Single Sign On' effort is the unique e-mail address of every user. The CBAF staff has been successful in contacting users who previously shared office e-mail addresses to obtain new individual e-mail addresses. While there's been a change in the password configuration for the TWAI, the ASAP.gov format for passwords will remain the same. The timeframe to reset passwords will be increased from 45 days to 90 days. Users will be notified before the change is effective.

Q: There are some other applications with a 90-day timeframe to reset passwords that allow users a few extra days (e.g., five days) to reset passwords themselves. Will ASAP.gov implement the same timeframes to reset passwords?
A: We will look into this.

New Release Schedule:
An overview of the new release schedule was provided.

Release 2.0: Targeted Implementation Date: June 2005
Contents:

• Internet Enrollment for Recipient Organizations
• Allows Recipient Organizations the ability to enroll in ASAP.gov via the Internet
• Provides changes to the "look and feel" of the application

Release 3.0:Targeted Implementation Date: December 2005
Contents:

• Internet Enrollment for:
  - Federal Program Agencies
  - Individuals
  - 1031s
  - Organization Batch
• Allows organizations other than Recipient Organizations to enroll in ASAP.gov via the Internet
• Notification Enhancement
• Updates the Notification function to identify the user name and provide a description of the notification
• Eliminates duplicate or repetitive notifications

Release 4.0: Target Implementation Date: June 2006
Contents:

• ACH Debit for Returns
• Allows recipients to return payments or partial payments if a grant recipient draws down too much money and wants to return some of it.
• Recipients will initiate and ACH debit to their bank account for the amount they want to return.
• Your bank must allow the account to be debited.
• Debt Offset
• Allows a Federal Agency to withhold a percentage or whole dollar amount from each payment drawn by an organization that owes money to that Agency
• This applies only to outstanding current debt with that Agency
• Current debt is defined as debt that is less than 18 months old
• Reports
• Implements previously approved user requested changes to Reports.

Q: Will batch payments be included in a future release?
A: They will likely be included after batch enrollment, but batch payments have not been scheduled because there are a lot of issues surrounding them.

Status of Change Requests:
FMS will be taking a closer look at the Change Request Database to ensure all items have been captured and submissions acknowledged. FMS will also see where the approved change request items can logically fit into the new release schedule.

FMS will be meeting with the CBAF staff to review the status of open enhancements. The meeting will be scheduled before the next ACB meeting.

Status of Legacy ASAP Cutoff Criteria:

Contingency/Failover:
There was a successful Contingency/Failover test in the beginning of January. However, other applications were a part of the test and the process took longer than we expected. We have scheduled another test for February to get a more accurate assessment of the recovery time for ASAP.gov

Replication of User Provisioning Data:
ASAP.gov is able to replicate user provisioning data.

Reports and Inquiries:
FMS needs user feedback on whether Reports and Inquiries are working. Art noted that testing of Reports and Inquiries functionality can be done once notification of a fix is received. Once the status and listing of ASAP.gov fixes is posted, the ACB can verify a fix and assist FMS in determining what still needs to be done.

Another related issue for Reports and Inquiries was the tendency for ASAP.gov to drop the leading '0' if a recipient ID begins with a '0'. The CBAF staff will look into resolving that issue.

We will not cut off legacy ASAP until Reports and Inquiries are fixed.

Conversion of Remaining Users:
There are users who have ASAP.gov access but still use the legacy system. We also have users that are still solely relying on the legacy ASAP system. We continue to work with CBAF to convert these users to ASAP.gov. FMS will notify all users at least 30 days in advance of the legacy cutoff.

Other:

In early January, FMS sent a letter to 100 university users to solicit membership for the ACB. We are awaiting responses from the mailing. FMS asked the ACB for suggestions to increase membership for the Indian Tribal Organization and Non- or For-Profit representatives.

Next Meetings:

The schedule of upcoming meetings is listed below:

ASAP State User Group Meeting
Charleston, West Virginia
Tuesday, March 8, 2005

ASAP Federal Program Agency User Group Meeting
San Antonio, Texas
Wednesday, April 13, 2005

ACB Meeting
San Antonio, Texas
Thursday, April 14, 2005