Getting Started

Federal Centralized Trial-Balance Systems (FACTS I)

Special Points of Interest:

• MAF and ATB Codes
• ATB Trial Balance
• ATB Input
• Notes
• Business Line
• FACTS I User Roles

FMS has replaced the submission of the Federal Agencies’Financial Reports (SF 220, SF220-1,SF 222, AND SF223) with a Standard General Ledger (SGL) base Adjusted Trial balance (ATB). This method of reporting is titled Federal Agencies Centralized Trial-Balance System (FACTS I). FACTS I is an Internet based application that is part of the GOALS II IAS family of applications. GOALS II replaced the old mainframe GOALS family of applications, which included FACTS. The new application is referred to as FACTS I to distinguish it from the FACTS II application used to collect budget execution financial reporting data.

FACTS I is used to collect proprietary SGL account and related attribute balances in trial balance format (ATB), and other supporting and explanatory financial and nonfinancial data referred to as NOTES. This information is used by FMS to produce the Financial Report (FR) of the U.S. Government.

MAF and ATB Codes

Prior to submission of ATB and NOTES data, an agency is required to review and verify their Master Appropriation Files (MAF). The MAF defines the appropriation/fund groups for which ATBs will be submitted. These appropriation/fund groups are referred to as ATB Codes. Agencies are required by FACTS I to submit a pre-closing ATB at the Treasury appropriation/fund group or ATB Code level. The pre-closing ATB includes balances from all revenues earned and all expenses incurred during the reporting period as well as all balance sheet accounts. The ATB Code is the four digit identifier corresponding to the Treasury Account Symbol in the Federal Accounting Symbols and Titles book and is the ombination (roll-up) of all fiscal year reports for each agency appropriation or fund account symbol.

ATB Trail Balance

The ATB provides SGL account balances and related attributes. FACTS I has edits to verify that SGL data being input has valid SGL accounts, valid attributes, and has equal Debit and Credit balances.

Agencies with SGL account balances in proprietary accounts whose treasury fund symbol has been cancelled must report those balances in the appropriation/fund group from which the funds were originally appropriated, or in an ATB based on the agencies internal reporting procedures.

ATB Input

There are two methods of inputting ATB data into FACTS I: on-line data entry, or transfer of an ASCII text bulk file. The layout of the bulk file is available on the FACTS I public Web site. Bulk file transfer is part of the FACTS I application and requires no additional software beyond the Internet access and browser required to access the FACTS I application itself.

NOTES

The NOTES file contains additional textual information and amounts. NOTES used to be submitted via a telecommunication/FMS Intranet platform, but is now incorporated into the Internet based FACTS I application. Agencies submit NOTES by department and business line. Business lines are defined in the MAF as being related to certain ATB Code fund groups.

Business Line

Agencies categorize ATB Codes by business lines in their MAF. A business line may be a program, substantial commercial activity, bureau, agency, corporation, department, or a group of unrelated small entities that, when combined together, represent the term “other.” One set of NOTES is submitted for each business line. FACTS I compares certain amounts in NOTES with identified SGL balances in the related ATBs and reports differences between the note and the ATB SGL amounts. These differences must be corrected.

FACTS I User Roles

The old GOALS FACTS application used a seven digit alpha-numeric character called the FACTS Entity Code to identify agency data. The new FACTS I application has different user roles, each of which has its own access ID and password. The MAF/ATB Preparer is the only role that can revise the agency’s MAF file and input ATB data. MAF/ATB Preparers are assigned to specific sets of MAF records, and those are the only ones they may access. NOTES data can be input by either MAF/ATB Preparers or NOTES Preparers, so long as they are assigned to the business line. Supervisor, CFO and IG roles may only view MAF, ATB, and NOTES data but not input or alter it.