WHAT IS CAMS?

The Commerce Administrative Management System (CAMS) is the financial and administrative system that will be implemented at nearly all Department of Commerce bureaus. The goal of the CAMS implementation is to modernize and integrate financial and administrative management systems, streamline related business processes, and provide managers with standardized, accurate, and timely information to manage their resources while reducing administrative costs.

WHAT IS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CAMS AND CFS?

CAMS serves as the umbrella for the financial and administrative functions, consisting of the Core Financial System (CFS) as well as feeder systems and interfaces.  CFS provides financial management and accounting services and consists of the following modules: Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, General Ledger, Budget Execution, Cost Allocation, Reimbursable (Cost Management), Reporting and Workflow Management.

** See the graphic on the following page for a complete list of planned CAMS interfaces.

The figure below graphically depicts the tentative Financial Management System at NIST following the Core CAMS Implementation currently scheduled for deployment in October 2003.  Revisions will be made as more system details and requirements become available through the To-Be data gathering process. 

WHAT ARE THE COMPONENTS WITHIN CFS?

The Budget Execution module is used to enter budgetary resources, apportion and allocate those resources, and to record Budget Operating Plans (BOPs).  Each Operating Unit will use their stated appropriations to develop a Budget Operating Plan.  When an obligation is entered into CFS, a funds availability check occurs.   

The General Ledger serves as a repository for financial transactions captured within CFS, as well as transactions processed from external feeder systems. Each approved accounting entry entered into CFS impacts the General Ledger. 

The Accounts Payable module allows users to record, monitor, and control activities related to the disbursement of funds.  Transactions that are approved in the Accounts Payable module automatically update the General Ledger.  Users are able to process payments of goods and services while tracking the progress of the transactions.   The Accounts Payable module also allows users to establish and maintain vendor information, issue advances, process expense documents, and record vendor invoices and applicable Treasury accomplishment information.

The Accounts Receivable module is designed to establish a receivable, produce billings, and record the corresponding revenues.  CFS supports the calculation, generation and posting of customer bills.  Transactions that are approved in the Accounts Receivable module automatically update the General Ledger.  The Accounts Receivable module allows users to generate invoices from a schedule, generate IPAC billing files, and adjust invoice balances through write-off’s, transfers, and dunning of late fees. 

The Cost Allocation module is used to allocate the costs of overhead projects to the benefiting projects.

Workflow Management component ensures that all documents go through proper approval procedures. Users are able to establish administrative approval routing, create document approval routing lists, and review and approve/disapprove system routed documents. 

The Data Warehouse stores data and organizes it in a logical and efficient manner.  Users have the ability to quickly query on the available information and execute financial reports themselves.  The data can be queried and reports executed without affecting daily operations.   

Management reports that are required by each of the different offices are developed and processed within the Reports component.  Reports are run by the CAMS Implementation Team and delivered to users.  The Implementation Team will gather reports requirements data from users to help meet reporting needs. 

The purpose of an interface is to connect the external system (where data is entered) to the modules within CFS.  The Interface formats all transactions that are entered into the system and provides a correction routine for invalid data.

The Labor interface is used to post NFC disbursements to the accounting system and communicate other labor and cost information between the NFC and CFS.  The Labor module processes several types of data from the NFC, including bi-weekly payroll data, receivable data, collections data, and other miscellaneous accounting information. 

The purpose of the Bankcard interface is to reconcile transactions purchased with a Department of Commerce bankcard.