OPM signs up with Bureau of Public Debt for financial services

The Office of Personnel Management has become the first large agency to move to a center of excellence under the Financial Management Line of Business Consolidation initiative.Agency officials signed an agreement with the Treasury Department’s Bureau of Public Debt to use their Administrative Resource Center’s core financial management and procurement systems.ARC is one of four financial management centers of excellence named by OMB in the fiscal 2006 budget request. The others are the General Services Administration, the Interior Department’s National Business Center and the Transportation Department.Clarence Crawford, OPM’s chief financial officer, said the move to ARC will remove the costs for the agency to maintain, implement and operate a financial system.“This partnership will enable OPM to conduct all core financial processes in an environment of strong internal controls,” Crawford said.OPM will transfer its data and integrate its feeder systems into ARC’s Oracle Federal Financial System 11i. Fred Phillips, ARC’s deputy executive director, said OPM will be using ARC’s system by Oct. 1, 2006.“OPM is one of our largest agencies, and with an organization of OPM’s size, we understand their needs,” Phillips said. “The system they are using is one we are familiar with, and we have experience with conversions in the past.”OPM chose to work with ARC instead of updating their current systems—something OMB wants all agencies to justify.ARC also will perform financial management work for the Executive Office of the President and the National Archives and Records Administration starting Oct. 1.