Overview: About Financial Authority @ Stanford
Financial authority is used to limit what an employee can see, what they can enter, and what they can approve in Stanford's Financial Systems.
On this page:
Stanford's Authority Management System
Stanford developed a web-based system called Authority Manager to grant authority across many financial systems used on campus including Oracle Financials, ReportMart, PeopleSoft HR, Axess, and Kronos Time and Leave Reporting System. Authority Manager allows employees to:
- View authority assignments for themselves or others
- View all assigned authority records in an organization
- As authorized, grant or revoke authority to others
To grant authority to another employee, grantors will need to specify the grantees organization(s), role or responsibility, and limits (i.e. access to specific projects, project-task combinations, or awards; dollar amount limits, and access to view or not view salary information). In order to grant authority to others, grantors must have an equal or greater authority level themselves and have the "can grant" condition associated with their authority assignment. A grant-only feature in Authority Manager provides the flexibility to identify employees as a focal point in an area with responsibility for granting authority to others without having access to do the tasks themselves.
For more information on how to use Authority Manager, take the Authority Manager (online) tutorial. [link to training overview page].
Types of Authority Privileges
Authority Manager uses privileges to define a specific task or set of tasks that can be granted to an employee. For example, the "administer leave" privilege gives an employee authority to access data and tasks required to administer time and leave records using the Kronos Time and Leave Reporting system.
Authority to Access Systems
This type of authority defines the types of transactions an employee is authorized to initiate or view in the financial system.
- Granting authority to access systems DOES NOT automatically allow the grantee to use those systems.
- In some cases, requirements must be satisfied before system access is enabled.
- Reference Authority and Access Requirements for Using Stanford Financial Systems.
Authority to Approve
Approval authority is defined in terms of the types of transactions an employee can approve, within what organizations, for what specific Projects, Tasks, and Awards, and within what dollar limits.
- Oracle Financials System approvers (i.e. iBudget, iJournal, iProcurement, iOU, Labor Distribution, and PCard) are required to take and pass the online test component of ORA-1101: Cost Policy & Chart of Accounts[link] training. Additionally, they must sign and submit a confidentiality agreement [link] to the Central Office contact listed on the form.
- To learn more about the Oracle Financials System approval process, see Approving Financial Transactions in Oracle: About Workflow.
Authority to View Reports
Reporting authority specifies the data that an employee is authorized to view via ReportMart reports and queries. There are two types of reporting/view access. Salary view allows access to financial activity including detailed salary information. Non-Salary view allows access to financial activity excluding detailed salary information (shows only summarized salary information, not individual salary details).
- Granting authority to access reports DOES NOT automatically allow the grantee to use the reporting system.
- In some cases, requirements must be satisfied before system access is enabled.
- Reference Authority and Access Requirements for Using Stanford Financial Systems.