Effective April 1, 2011, JPMorgan Chase will become the purchasing card (P-Card) provider for Kent State University. This transition aligns Kent State University's initiatives with the Inter-University Council (IUC) Purchasing Group, who previously awarded the commercial credit card program contract to JPMorgan Chase.

The new purchasing card will be a MasterCard issued by JPMorgan Chase to Kent State University employees. All departments and employees who are assigned access to a P-Card or are identified as cardholders, reconcilers, approvers or system administrators must read, understand and comply with the Administrative Policy Regarding Use of the Purchasing Card, 7-02.16. The P-Card administrative policy and procedure will be made available on the Accounts Payable website once the policy has been approved, http://www.kent.edu/controller/accountspayable.

In order to be issued a purchasing card under the new contract, a cardholder application must be completed and approved by the appropriate approving authority, the executive officer of the employee's division and system administrator. Applications have been sent directly to existing purchasing card cardholders. The application is also available on the Accounts Payable website. The approved cardholder application(s) must be received by Accounts Payable no later than March 18, 2011, in order to be issued a new P-Card effective April 1, 2011.

Grant and cost share purchases can no longer be charged to departmental P-Cards. Departments that have grants must obtain a grant P-Card to be used for all grant and cost share purchases.

JPMorgan Chase's electronic reporting solution, PaymentNet, will replace Bank of America's Works application. Works will be accessible for a short period of time following the transition in order to allow time to complete the March 2011 reconciliation. All outstanding transactions with a post date through March 31, 2011 must be signed off within Works by April 22, 2011 at 5 p.m. If transactions are not appropriately allocated and approved within Works by the cut-off on April 22, 2011, the departmental index and office supplies account (72017) will be charged the full amount of any outstanding transactions.

Training for the cardholder, reconciler and approver is mandatory. The cardholder application will not be processed by the system administrator until the cardholder, reconciler and approver have attended training. To attend one of the March training sessions, visit Human Resources Registration site at www.kent.edu/hr/register.

If you have any questions or concerns regarding the new application process, please contact Katie Brown or Rosa York at 330-672-2607 or payments@kent.edu.