Report 2016-125.1 Recommendation 12 Responses

Report 2016-125.1: The University of California Office of the President: It Has Not Adequately Ensured Compliance With Its Employee Displacement and Services Contract Policies (Release Date: August 2017)

Recommendation #12 To: University of California

To maximize benefits from the systemwide procurement initiative and to ensure that the university uses those benefits for its teaching, research, and public service missions, the Office of the President should direct all university locations to provide better documentation to substantiate actual benefits they claim related to their procurement decisions.

Annual Follow-Up Agency Response From October 2019

Full implementation of UC Health's new benefits (cost savings) tracking application was completed on July 1, 2019. From the information maintained in the application, dashboards by medical center and system wide opportunities are generated to show completed and/or rejected initiatives and identified and realized savings. The dashboards are shared with the UC Health supply chain teams and senior management.

California State Auditor's Assessment of Annual Follow-Up Status: Fully Implemented

1-Year Agency Response

UC Procurement Services distributed communications to refresh all users across the UC system on reporting benefits in accordance with the instruction that "Total UC Benefit is defined as the total annual benefit generated by procurement actions". The communication also provided reminders about the process/documentation for benefit submissions, approvals and audits; and, referenced the website that provides additional job aids/documentation.

https://www.ucop.edu/procurement-services/procurement-systems/uc-benefit-training.html

UC Health continues its efforts as outlined in the 6 month update. A new tool has been identified to enhance UC Health's ability to evaluate the value and impact of each initiative for the system as well as for the local medical center and to identify loss opportunities for the failure to implement all saving recommendations. It is anticipated that the new tools will be in full operations by the fourth quarter of the 2018 calendar year.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 1-Year Status: Pending

The university's Procurement Services updated its training to emphasize the need to substantiate actual savings from procurement decisions.

The university's action regarding its locations that are health centers (Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, San Diego, and San Francisco) is pending due to an outstanding implementation date (end of 2018).

6-Month Agency Response

The Office of the President oversees two systemwide procurement functions: UC Procurement Services and UC Health.

UC Procurement Services is currently generating communications to refresh all users across the UC system, including UC Health locations, on appropriate back-up documentation. These communications will be delivered by 3/31/2018.

UC Health currently maintains a master dashboard of contracting and saving initiatives. The information maintained in the dashboard includes but is not limited to initiative description, start and end dates, estimated and realized annual savings by system and individual medical center. This dashboard is used to monitor all contracting and saving initiatives for the system as well as work completed at the local level by each medical center. For system wide initiatives, savings per each medical center are noted for each initiative. A cost benefit analysis is completed for each saving initiative and clinical impact is discussed with the appropriate clinical teams. All information is documented and shared with the appropriate UC Health medical center departments and staff. UC Health is currently evaluating a new tool to replace the existing dashboard. In addition to the information currently collected, this new tool will allow UC Health to document the value of each of the initiatives as well as any loss opportunities for failure to implement all saving recommendations.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 6-Month Status: Pending

60-Day Agency Response

UC Procurement will update Benefits Bank instructions to make it clearer that source documents and other documentation, while not available in Benefits Bank, are available. The Office of the President will provide Benefits Bank refresher training to ensure all users understand the process of recording and documenting benefits and are using it correctly.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 60-Day Status: Pending

All Recommendations in 2016-125.1

Agency responses received are posted verbatim.