Cash Management interview questions and answers

1. Can a bank statement line be matched against multiple subledger transactions? Automatically? How? Is the reverse true: Can multiple bank statement lines be matched against a subledger transaction?

Answer
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Bank Statement Line may be manually matched against multiple subledger transactions. At this time, this may not be accomplished automatically. The reverse is not possible. Multiple bank statement lines may not be matched against a subledger transaction (manually or automatically).

 

2. What is the functionality of the 'Charges' field on the Bank Statement Form? When must it be populated?

Answer
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Functionality of the Bank Statement's Charge Field:
The Amount Reconciled is derived from adding the Bank Statement's Charge and Amount Columns.
The Amount Column must be within tolerance for Auto Reconciliation to occur (even if the netted value of Amount and Charge column equals the subledger transaction amount). Charge is not a required field.

 

3. What is the difference between Clearing a (subledger) transaction and Reconciling it? What is the purpose of these two distinctions?

Answer
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Clearing a transactions creates accounting entries that recognize the movement of cash. Reconciling matches bank account activity to subledger (payment, receipt) activity. Transactions may be cleared prior to reconciliation if the user wishes to obtain a more accurate picture of cash (in the GL) but is not yet ready or willing to reconcile. 

4. Cash Management only allows automatic matching to Remittance batches. Is there a plan to automatically reconcile normal receipt batches (non-remittance) to bank statement lines?

Answer
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'Normal' Receipt Batches are used for grouping, managing, viewing and controlling receipts (see Receivables
User's Guide, p4-59, R11). There is no plan to provide functionality to reconcile (non remittance) receipt batches.

5. Why are NSF and Rejected bank statement lines included in the control total DR value, and Stop bank statement lines included in the control total CR value? ("negative" value transactions)

Answer
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The following example should provide an explanation for the question above:
a. A check is received by the bank for $100.
b. The bank will create a (statement) entry of $100 to the recipients account. The amount is recognized but will not be available until the check clears.
c. During the clearing process it is discovered that there are insufficient funds in the account that distributed the check.
d. The receiving bank will make a reversing (statement) entry to back out the funds it had previously 'recognized'. This is why NSF bank statement lines are included in the control total values. Similar logic could be applied to other transaction types.

6. What are the implications of running Cash Management standalone, running Cash Management only with Oracle Payables, or running Cash Management only with Oracle Receivables?

Answer
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Cash Management allows you to clear and reconcile payments created in Oracle Payables and receipts created in Oracle Receivables against your bank statement. It also provides extensive Cash Forecasting functionality.
When Cash Management is installed without Payables and Receivables, bank account reconciliation functionality is significantly limited. A user may only import or manually enter bank statements.
Reconciliation may not be performed and miscellaneous transactions may not be created. Without Payables or Receivables,
Cash Forecasting is still possible although additional setup will be required and the functionality may not be as complete.

7. What process do I need to run to import transactions from external systems for the Reconciliation Open Interface

Answer
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In most of our applications, an open interface requires users to load transactions into open interface tables, and then import them from the open interface tables to the transaction tables. For the Reconciliation Open Interface, the users simply load transactions into the open interface table or define a view for Cash Management to access the transactions. There is no additional process to import from the open interface table.

Q: Setup: Is there any security to prevent changes to an existing "Forecast"?

A: No. The "Forecast" report was intended for internal use, not as an secure audit report.
The "Forecast" is a spreadsheet that collects data for you from your Oracle database. You can then do 'what if' scenarios by changing the data. Or, you can correct cells to reflect data that has not been entered into the Oracle applications. You can also add new rows with additional data. Of course, you can choose not to change any of the cells.

Q: Template: Can you create a 'Forecast' without creating a template?

A: No. There is no generic template available.
You must specify at least one row and column in a template to be able to generate a forecast.

Q: Template: How can I see my cash starting point on my forecast?

A: Use the 'GL Cash Position' source when you set up your template.

When your forecast is generated, you will see the 'GL Cash Position' at the bottom, grouped with the totals, not with the other rows.

Also note that your initial cash position is calculated differently depending on how your ‘Enable Average Balances’ option is set in Oracle General Ledger.

The navigation path in General Ledger is:
Setup -> Financials -> Books -> Define.

The ‘Enable Average Balance’ option is a checkbox in the ‘Standard Options’ alternate region.

When the ‘Enable Average Balances’ option is on (checkbox is marked), the forecast calculates the initial cash position from the End-of-Day balance, which is the actual balance of a general ledger account at the end of the day. The information comes from the GL_DAILY_BALANCES table.

When the ‘Enable Average Balances’ options is off (checkbox is not marked), the forecast calculates the initial cash position from General Ledger journal lines. The forecast starts with the beginning balance of the GL period for the forecast start date. Then the journal entry amounts are accumulated for each journal entry line whose effective date is between the period’s begin date and the forecast start date. The initial cash position is the sum of the beginning balance of the GL period and the journal entry amounts.

Q: Forecast: Why is there no output when the "Forecast" (CEFCAMTS) is run?

A: Generating the "Forecast" does NOT produce a report.

It creates a forecast, which is an interactive spreadsheet. To get a printed report of your forecast, you must run the Cash Forecast Report after generating the forecast. As parameters, you give it the Template Name and the Forecast Name.

Version 11.5 (11i) will produce a report along with generating the forecast.

Q: Forecast: Why does the output for the "Forecast" (CEFCERR) say, 'No data found'?

A: Generating the 'forecast' does NOT produce a report.

It creates a forecast, which is an interactive spreadsheet. When you generate the forecast, there are two concurrent requests submitted.

1. The first request generates the forecast, and no report is produced.
2. The second request is the "Cash Forecast Execution" Report, which is an exception report. If the "Cash Forecast Execution" Report says “No data found” then the forecast worked. If the "Cash Forecast Execution" Report has data on it, then the forecast did not work and the report lists the reasons why.

To get a printed report of your forecast, you must run the “Cash Forecast” Report after generating your forecast.

Q: Forecast: Why does the "Forecast" (CEFCAMTS) show all amounts as zeros?

A: This could occur for several different reasons.

1. You can create an empty forecast on purpose, just to get the spreadsheet.

This is called generating a 'manually entered cash forecast.' You can then enter the information in the cells yourself, just like 3 rd party spreadsheets. The advantage is that your forecast will be in the same format as other forecasts you generate.

2. Your template may not be set up correctly.

If someone has made changes to your template, it may no longer be retrieving the data you were expecting.

3. The Cash Forecasting views may not have data for the dates or periods you have requested.

If there are no records in these views for those dates or periods, then there is no data for your forecast. Cash forecasting retrieves data using the following views:

CE_AP_FC_DISC_INVOICES_V
CE_AP_FC_DUE_INVOICES_V
CE_AP_FC_PAYMENTS_V
CE_AR_FC_INVOICES_V
CE_AR_FC_RECEIPTS_V
CE_PAY_FC_PAYROLL_V
CE_PO_FC_ORDERS_V
CE_PO_FC_REQUISITIONS_V
CE_SO_FC_ORDERS_V

Please review Oracle Cash Management Technical Reference Manual, version 11, for detailed information on these views.

4. The Euro currency was not seeded correctly when Oracle added it to Cash Management's currencies.

The Cash Forecast will not generate correctly, until you fix the Euro currency. The problem has been fixed for version 11.5 (11i). However, if you have an earlier version of Cash Management, it is easy to fix this yourself.

A. Go into Cash Management, and navigate to: Setup -> Currency -> Codes
B. Query up the code "EUR".
C. Scroll to the right, and under Currency Derivation Type, make sure it says "Euro Currency". If it's null, set it to "Euro Currency" and save.
D. Regenerate your Cash Forecast, and it should generate legitimate numbers in the cells.

Q: Forecast: Why are some of the amounts zero when the "Forecast" (CEFCAMTS) is run?

A: Someone has changed the template on which this forecast is based.

When columns are added to a template, they are also added to all forecasts based on that template. However, the new cells in existing forecasts will have zero amounts in them. You must regenerate your forecast to populate the new cells.

Q: Forecast: What ways are there to generate a Forecast?

A: You can generate a forecast using three different methods. The first two produce identical results, so it should not matter which method you choose. The third method, however, produces a 'manually entered cash forecast.' It is a forecast with zeros in all the cells. You can then enter information in the cells yourself.

1. This method produces a forecast with amounts in the cells. Submit from the Concurrent Program form:

Other -> Programs -> Run

Select one of the following for the Request Name:
Cash Forecasting by Days
Cash Forecasting by GL Period

2. This method also produces a forecast with amounts in the cells. Navigate to one of the following:

Cash Forecasting -> Forecast Template
Cash Forecasting -> Forecasts
You can generate a forecast by using the Special Menu.
Special -> Submit Forecast

3. To create an empty forecast, navigate to:

Cash Forecast -> Forecast Template
Choose New, select a Template Name and a Forecast Name, and any other required fields. Choose the Review button, and you get a forecast with all the rows and columns from the template you used, but with zeros in all the cells. This is called a 'manually entered forecast.' You are expected to enter all amounts into the forecast yourself.

Q: Forecast: What is 'inflow' and 'outflow'?

A: 'Inflow' is any data that brings cash into your company, such as Oracle Receivables, Oracle Order Entry, and Oracle General Ledger.
'Outflow' is any data that takes cash out of your company, such as Oracle Payables, Oracle Purchasing, Oracle Payroll and Oracle General Ledger.

Q: Forecast: What does 'inflow' and 'outflow' mean for the General Ledger source types?

A: GL Encumbrances are 'outflow', because the forecast shows unused encumbered amounts for expenses and assets. To use this source you must set up the Forecast By to 'GL Period'.

GL Budgets can be 'inflow' or 'outflow'. The 'inflow' comes from revenue account budget amounts, and the 'outflow' comes from expense account budget amounts. To use this source you must set up the Forecast By to 'GL Period'.

GL Cash Position is inflow. The forecast shows a separate row along the bottom of the forecast along with inflow, outflow, and net amount totals.