Project Accounting and Job Costing are the cornerstones for any government contractor or project-based organization. However, despite its importance, many organizations are not using a fully integrated project-based accounting system to manage their projects. In addition to generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP), government contractors are met with the strict requirements of the Defense Compliance Audit Agency (DCAA), Federal Acquisitions Regulation (FAR), and Cost Accounting Standards (CAS). And now more than ever with substantial cost increases due to inflation, businesses need real-time data monitoring tools to mitigate rising indirect costs.
A modern enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, like JAMIS Prime ERP, will result in more accurate data, real-time cost monitoring, and accurate estimates all within a fully compliant environment.
Compliance
Compliance should be at the forefront of all decisions as a government contractor. With hundreds of pages detailing CAS requirements, combined with stringent DCAA regulations, it is absolutely critical that a system is in place to make sure you remain within compliance. JAMIS Prime ERP takes the compliance guesswork out of the equation by routinely passing DCAA audits. The ability to achieve compliance stems from segregation of direct and indirect costs, segregation and identification of unallowable costs, and cumulative to-date direct costs by worksheet breakdown structure and cost.
Job Costing
An adequate project accounting solution is designed to meet critical accounting, back-office, and operational needs. It should be able to tie every transaction that occurs, in real-time, back to the project, whether it be journal transactions, purchase orders, or timecard entries and expenses for internal employees and subcontractors. Once transactions have occurred, the system needs to be able to generate reports in real-time that allows all levels of management to view key metrics.
Indirect costs are one of the most challenging to track on a job because they cannot be easily traced back to a cost object. They also present the highest risk of an audit. Because of this, it is important to consider how an ERP handles the tracking and allocation of indirect costs. JAMIS Prime ERP simplifies this process by establishing separate indirect jobs which can track detailed cost information for each contract, project, and subtask. Having a clear delineation between direct and indirect costs will give any organization confidence that they will satisfy DCAA and other audit requirements.
Unallowable Expenses
For cost-reimbursable contracts, government contractors need to be able to define the difference between allowable and unallowable expenses. The federal government will not reimburse contractors for unallowable costs, and failure to do so results in heavy level 1 and level 2 penalties. To avoid such penalties, a solution needs to separate unallowable costs into proper cost objectives. With JAMIS Prime ERP, government organizations can easily format unallowable cost elements as well as define internal controls to automatically enforce corporate and governmental expense policies which allow for compliance with FAR Part 31.
Actionable Insights
JAMIS Prime ERP is a modern system that provides decision-makers access to configurable dashboards, for their unique needs, to gain visibility on the front end of project performance they oversee and manage. All of the project data will flow into these dashboards in real-time with reports that are drillable should managers wish to gain deeper insight. These dashboard reports are interactive and can alert you to issues before they become a problem. For example, notifying your organization of a project that has 10% left in funding.
Beyond being able to view these reports on your browser, JAMIS Prime ERP is also built for the mobile workforce with its own mobile app that supports Android and Apple iOS devices. This allows your PMs to access their job details, approvals, or dashboard reports whether they are on the road, standing in line for coffee, or at home.
Closing
Evaluating and implementing a software solution to help manage your projects is an important decision. JAMIS understands this, which is why we offer best-of-breed features and functionality to run your project-based or government contracting business. Are you interested in discussing your needs and seeing JAMIS Prime ERP for yourself? Please contact us today to schedule a demonstration at info@jamis.com.
