S8 Manager User's Guide

Transcription

1 S8 Manager User's Guide Copyright HAB INC June 2009 All Rights Reserved Revised August 2011 Page 1 of 43

2 Page 2 of 43

3 Introduction To H.M.S. Section 8 Manager Overview The H.M.S. Section 8 Manager tm software was developed by HAB INC after spending a great deal of time listening to the information needs of our clients. The consistent feedback from clients was that they felt HAB had really good software to do specific tasks, but compiling management or board level information was always a struggle, pulling information from various software application reports and massaging that data in Excel to create presentable summaries. With the advent of H.M.S. Section 8 Manager tm, agencies now have a powerful tool for monitoring the performance of the key areas of the housing agency s Section 8 program. Key Components The H.M.S. Section 8 Manager tm software currently tracks nine(9) key areas for an agency, neatly organizing each area into a separate tab on the Manager screen. (Items complete for PHASE I) VMS Reporting. For any period (month) summarize all HAP counts and totals by project and voucher type complete with drill-down. Compare finance numbers (paid) versus leasing numbers (based on move-in/move-out dates) with ability to electronically reconcile the differences. Link appropriate line items to general ledger account numbers and/or ranges and pull live balances from the general ledger. Ability to save snapshot with notes for historical purposes. Hold Management. This tab allows finance managers to review requests for holds from caseworkers and review and release existing holds. Monthly Reconcile. This tab looks at a particular month and compares it to the prior month to determine the net changes, with drill-down into all the new, changed or termination activity. Voucher Analysis. Complete on-line access to provide summary totals of all voucher status s (Issued Tenant, Issued Looking, Issued Pending and Available) with drill-down into any status and project/voucher type. Right-click ability on a particular tenant voucher to un-issue that voucher. Annual Certification. Review and summarize by project/voucher type all of the annual certification compliance looking at what is remaining to be done for the current year and what has been completed, with drill-down capability into any month and project/voucher type count. Users can use the convenient Section 8 scheduling tools to schedule appointments, general letters to tenants for their appointments, send scheduled items to Outlook calendars or send s to staff responsible for those certifications. Page 3 of 43

4 HQS Status. Examine what units are in danger of not meeting the annual compliance requirement for Section 8 inspections by reviewing a chart of all inspections overdue, due within 30, 60, 90, 120 days, complete with drill-down capability. Users can schedule inspections (for agencies utilizing WinINSPECT software from HAB) for any unit. Staff Activity. Monitors all activity, whether computer or user generated to allow managers to analyze work loads and staff activity. Users can search thousands of notes to find specific tenant, staff, unit, landlord or other information in an instant. Payments. Review summary and detail information on all payments made to landlords and other PHAS for portability tenants. Landlords. Review by year all active/inactive landlords, counts and drill-downs on tenants for those landlords and year-to-date payments with drill-down. (Items identified for PHASE II) SEMAP Reporting. Fail Log. Forecast. Uses Your Existing H.M.S. Data! This new software requires no major setup, data entry or data conversion work to be done. All of the summaries and detail provided in the H.M.S. Section 8 Manager tm are derived from the existing database information of the HAB H.M.S. systems. Finally, a one-stop source for key information, all without re-entry of data. Access To Existing H.M.S. Software Modules From within the Manager, users in their review of tenant, unit, inspection or voucher and other data can drill-down and inquire further about a specific item by simply right-clicking on the item and calling an existing software module. For example, Landlord tab provides a list of all landlords and counts of their tenants. Users can drill-down into those counts/totals to find a specific list of tenants. From that list, users simply right-click and they can immediately access a number of existing HAB WinHAP options (WinHAP) for the selected tenant. Update their WinHAP record, record a history note, generate a letter. All of these and other functions are provided right from within the S8 Manager product. No retraining of staff, just access the information in a different concise way and then right-click to access known software functions. What could be easier? Page 4 of 43

5 Credits HAB would like to personally thank members of the Boulder County Housing Authority, the Housing Authority of the City of Santa Barbara and the Housing Authority of Colorado Springs for their participation in this development effort of the H.M.S. Section 8 Manager tm. Without their input, testing and feedback this product would not be where it is today! Boulder County HA Chuck Schloz Lisa Bangs Bob Magill Frank Alexander HA City Of Santa Barbara Rob Fredericks Skip Szymanski Rita Lawrence Veronica Loza Andrea Fink Toni Hood Andrew Gonzalez HA Of Colorado Springs John Rasmussen Jeff Kunkle Nadine Garcia John Gaster Page 5 of 43

6 Design Concepts Lookup Capabilities Parameters. User can choose from a variety of parameters on each tab to narrow the results to what they are interested in. All tabs within the H.M.S. Section 8 Manager tm allow users to enter various parameters that will affect their inquiry. As depicted above, various years can be reviewed, along with the option to choose other parameters related directly to that tab. For example, the Landlord tab depicted above allows users to look at a particular year, a particular group of projects, landlord/pha or both and a check box to indicate whether to retrieve YTD payment information as well. Most of the tabs contain a date (month and/or year) parameter as well as other items specific to that sort of search. FIND button & Sound-ex After identifying all of the parameters, clicking the FIND button retrieves results from the database. If the result set is more than a screen full of rows, users can always enter what they are specifically looking for (project name, address, tenant name) in the sound-ex yellow box and the system will search through the results and display only those rows that it finds a match on. The sound-ex is very powerful in that it will find a match on ANY characters in the row. If the user types Smith in the sound-ex after display many records, the system will display records with the name Smith, as well as any records with an address of Smith Valley Road for example. Drill-Down Detail User Tip: Function key #2 (F2) will also click the Find button. For A Total Line. Users can click on the total count and then click the drill down button ( ). Nearly all counts or totals presented in the HMS Section 8 Manager tabs have drill down capability. Simply click on the total or count and drill into it! Page 6 of 43

7 Right-click Menus On many of the tables within H.M.S. Section 8 Manager tm, users can drive into various software functions for the selected row by simply right-clicking on that row. A menu of available choices will be displayed and the user can select the desired choice. Below is an example from the Landlord tab. By right-clicking on the selected landlord, the following menu is available for that landlord. Specifically for landlords, users can call the UPDATE function in WinHAP to access the landlord maintenance screens, drive into the HMS Notes screens for that landlord to review or enter a note or generate a landlord mail/merge letter through the Letter Assistant product. In this manner users can review key information provided by H.M.S. Section 8 Manager tm and then utilize existing software functions to review or change information in the system. Simply right click on a selected row to drop down a menu of available options. Key Components Some standard functionality is available on every H.M.S. Section 8 Manager tab, identified by the row of buttons above. Below is a description of what each of the buttons does. The E button allows the user to export information contained in the table in a variety of ways. Clicking the button will display a drop menu of available options. Users can take information directly into Excel, create an HTML file for publishing on internal or external web sites or send a copy of the information to a printer. All of the exports include the column headings, any color coding contained in the tables and any totals at the end of the table. The projects button will allow users to toggle on or off various projects that they are allowed access to. This capability is very useful in narrowing the search to a few specific projects or quickly looking at all projects. Clicking the projects button will display the standard Program/Project check list dialog box that allows users to alter their current view of programs and projects. Page 7 of 43

8 The Setup button allows users to set various defaults for H.M.S. Section 8 Manager or perform other functions related to how it retrieves or analyzes data. A separate chapter is devoted to setup and the various options available when this button is clicked. The Exit button exits from H.M.S. Section 8 Manager and terminates the application. Security The H.M.S. Section 8 Manager tm can be uniquely configured to grant or restrict access for a particular user. Every tab, menu item, button and data element can be secured so as to grant or restrict a user from particular functionality. Users with system administrator rights can access the option from the File menu item as depicted here. Clicking this menu item launches the standard HAB Staff program that controls access to various aspects of the H.M.S. system for each user. The Program Security tab has a combo-box that will have the hmsmgr application listed. System administrators can then restrict access to a particular tab, menu item, button or other area by clicking off that user s access. Change this screen for sec 8 mgr Page 8 of 43

9 H.M.S. Section 8 Manager Annual Certifications Page 9 of 43

10 Annual Certifications Annual Certification - Overview The Certification tab was designed to analyze what annual rent recerts have and need to be done for a particular year. Annual certification information is summarized by project, voucher type and optionally by staff assigned, providing counts by month of either the number of rent certifications needing to be done (based on NEXT RECERT DATE in WinFAM) or that have been done. This tab can be used to begin or review the interview scheduling process as well, showing which staff has what case loads for particular days or months. Staff can schedule interviews by simply drilling into a particular count on this screen and using the scheduling feature. The overall intent of this Annual Certification tab is to make sure all recertifications get done in a timely manner and give management and staff a tool for summarizing annual certification activity. To use this tab, users simply identify various search parameters to narrow down the list of certifications and click the FIND button. The system displays a summary by month, by project and by voucher type for the certifications shown for the selected parameters. Users can then drill into this information and take Powefulr new scheduling tools available for scheduling appointments, generating letters and Outlook calendar items. Drill-down into any total simply by clicking in that column and clicking the drilldown button additional actions if desired. Page 10 of 43

11 Search Parameters Users enter or click-thru the years to locate the year they would like to analyze. The system defaults to the current calendar year. Users click the FIND button to use the current parameters and find all recertification records associated with the selected parameters. VMS Report groups allow users to specify sub-sets of projects to include in reporting. This is a convenient way to separate projects for one agency or program from another for agencies that administer multiple Section 8 programs. These radio buttons allow users to specify whether to look at the work that needs to be done (To Do) or the work that has already been done for the year. When the certification information is summarized, users can specify how they would like the information presented, either by project, voucher type or both. Users can specify all or specific staff members to report on for annual certification information. Theses are the case workers permanently assigned to a the tenants. The SHOW CALENDAR button will display a calendar that allows users to scroll through days for all or selected staff members and see their scheduled interview activity by day. Page 11 of 43

12 Annual Certification Drill-Downs Users can drill-down into any line or grand total and derive a detailed list that comprises the total being drilled into. Tenant Drill-Down Sound-Ex Allows users to quickly locate a tenant or any other data by simply typing in the yellow box. The system searchs the entire table looking for a match on that data. Excel Interface Users can send all or SELECTED rows directly to Excel for further analysis. Scheduling Interface For SELECTED rows, the user can call the appointment scheduling tool to begin scheduling re-cert appointments. Assign Case-Load Function For SELECTED rows, users can change the case-worker that is permanently assigned to that tenant. This button can be secured to only authorized users in the security control area under Setup. This tool is convenient for shuffling case-loads when employees of the agency leave or just adjusting case-loads based on activity levels. Assigning a case load is permanent. Scheduling an appointment changes only who will conduct the interview, but does not change the permanent case-worker. Page 12 of 43

13 Right-Click Access To Other Applications Users can access WinFAM s Rent Certification module and the standard Letter Assistant simply by right-clicking on a tenant that is SELECTED and then clicking on the desired option. Outlook Calendar Interface Clicking this button will send any SELECTED rows to the current user s Outlook calendar. Although users can schedule appointments for other case-workers, users can only send items to their own personal outlook calendars. Case-workers would need to log in and send their own items to Outlook calendars. Letter Assistant Interface Users can send any SELECTED rows to Microsoft Word s mail/merge function using the HMS Letter Assistant. Several new fields for Interview Date Time, Interview With and Interview Location are now available as mail/merge fields to allow users to set up and print appointment letters. Only SELECTED rows are sent to Word. Clearing Appointment Data The clear button will clear the appointment date/time, location and interviewer for any selected rows. This can be used to cancel any appointments. When a WinFAM annual certification is completed (finalized and saved), the WinFAM software will auto-clear these fields in preparation for the next annual recert. Page 13 of 43

14 Annual Certification Scheduling Users select tenants from the detail drill-down, click the SCHEDULE button and the system displays the selected tenants to be interviewed. Users then set their interview date and time and interval between interviews and then begin clicking on the tenants to schedule their interviews. Users can specify a interview location and who the interviewer should be if it is other than the normal case worker. Page 14 of 43

15 Show Appointment Calendar Either from the main tab or by clicking the APPT WITH button on the prior screen, users can review calendars of appointments. Appointments are scheduled by drilling-down into a specific month and performing the scheduling function. Users click to specific days to find all appointments for that day for the selected staff member. Users can click ALL staff and review the entire agency calendar. Action buttons are available on the bottom of the screen to send SELECTED items to Outlook, Word (mail/merge) or clear that appointment. Interviewer Users can pick a specific user calendar of appointments to review or click All staff members to see all appointments on a particular day. Show Days With Appointments The system displays a monthly calendar that highlights in blue background any dates with appointments scheduled. Users can click on these days and display the schedule for that day. Outlook Calendar Interface Clicking this button will send any SELECTED rows to the current user s Outlook calendar. Although users can schedule appointments for other caseworkers, users can only send items to their own personal outlook calendars. Case-workers would need to log in and send their own items to Outlook calendars. Outlook Interface Clicking this button will send one (1) to the staff person doing the interview listing all of the SELECTED appointments with their dates, times, location and interviewer. This capability only exists for agencies using Outlook as their handler. function is disabled when All interviewers are selected. Letter Assistant Interface Users can send any SELECTED rows to Microsoft Word s mail/merge function using the HMS Letter Assistant. Several new fields for Interview Date Time, Interview With and Interview Location are Page 15 of 43

16 now available as mail/merge fields to allow users to set up and print appointment letters. Only SELECTED rows are sent to Word. Clearing Appointment Data The clear button will clear the appointment date/time, location and interviewer for any selected rows. This can be used to cancel any appointments. When a WinFAM annual certification is completed (finalized and saved), the WinFAM software will auto-clear these fields in preparation for the next annual recert. Interface With H.M.S. Notes All scheduling activity (schedule or clear) is written to the H.M.S. Notes system. Below is a sample snapshot of a tenant who had some scheduling done, cleared and then re-scheduled. Page 16 of 43

17 H.M.S. Section 8 Manager Landlords Page 17 of 43

18 Landlords Landlords - Overview The landlord tab of the Section 8 Manager allows users to look at their current/past landlords for a particular year. When the list is built, the system will retrieve the landlords and get counts of active and inactive tenants. Optionally users can retrieve YTD payment counts and totals for payments made to landlords. Users can update a landlord s main record, record a note or write a letter by right-clicking on a selected landlord and accessing that option. Landlord/PHA Sample Tab VMS Report Group Users can restrict the landlords displayed to those that participate in only certain projects. Various projects can be linked to a VMS Report group and by selecting a group, the user restricts which projects to examine when retrieving landlords. Who to Include Users can look at landlords, PHA s that are hosting port-out tenants or both. Additionally, by clicking the Show Payment check-box, the system will retrieve a payment count and total for those landlords/phas. Page 18 of 43

19 Drill-Downs There are two types of drill-down screens available from this tab. By clicking on the Active, Inactive or Total tenant counts will display the Tenant Detail Drill-Down screen. Clicking on a payment count or amount will allow users to drill-down to the Payment Drill-Down screen. Users can click on a particular landlord/pha line item and drill into counts/totals for that entity. Users can also drill into grant total counts/sums at the bottom of all landlords/phas being displayed in the table. Tenant Detail Drill-Down screen Sound-Ex The Sound-Ex box allows users to quickly locate a tenant or any other data by simply typing in the yellow box. The system searches the entire table looking for a match on that data. Excel Interface Users can send all or SELECTED rows directly to Excel for further analysis. Page 19 of 43

20 Letter Assistant Interface Users can send any SELECTED rows to Microsoft Word s mail/merge function using the HMS Letter Assistant. Right-Click Access To Other Applications Users can many other standard HMS software functions simply by right-clicking on a tenant that is SELECTED and then clicking on the desired option. Landlord/PHA Payment Drill-Down screen This screen displays the individual payments to a landlord or PHA providing the details of the payment number, method, status, date, number of transactions and payment amount (total) for each payment. Users can drill-down into the Payment Detail Drill-Down screen by clicking on the transaction count for an individual payment or for all payments. Drill-down Capability Users can drill down into individual payments or all payments to that landlord or PHA by simply clicking on the transaction count and then clicking the drill-down button. Payment Detail Drill-Down Screen Page 20 of 43

21 H.M.S. Section 8 Manager HQS Inspections Page 21 of 43

22 HQS Status HQS Status - Overview The HQS Inspection tab gives management and case-workers a good tool to prevent units from missing their inspection deadlines (365 days). The system displays all projects and voucher types and provides counts of all units by categories of the number of days they are due within. Anything in the OVERDUE category should be reviewed immediately to identify whether inspections have been scheduled or whether users just haven t updated the unit record with the correct date of last inspection. Many times, units get omitted from the final step in WinINSPECT that updates WinFAM with the last date of inspection. This summary uses the dates maintained in the WinFAM area for the unit that records the date of last inspection. This date can be maintained manually by recording an inspection on the unit or they can be automatically updated by using the WinINSPECT feature that allows the date of last inspection to update the date in WinFAM. This date is the critical date that is used when filing HUD s and is what gets used for the date of last inspection. HQS Inspection Ticker - Sample Tab VMS Report Group Users can restrict the units displayed to those that participate in only certain projects. Various projects can be linked to a VMS Report group and by selecting a group, the user restricts which projects to examine when retrieving units and their inspection status. Page 22 of 43

23 Inspection Due Analysis This screen breaks out all of the Section 8 units looking at their last date of inspection (from WinFAM) and counts the number of units that are coming due by the various categories depicted here. With drill-down capability, users can drive into detailed lists of the units in those categories and review those records. For agencies using the H.M.S. WinINSPECT scheduler, users can drive into the scheduling product and conveniently schedule inspections for the units overdue or coming due. Drilling down into any of the counts or the grand total counts will display the Inspection Due List screen where subsequent actions can be taken. Excel Interface Users can send all or SELECTED rows directly to Excel for further analysis. Inspection Due List Sound-Ex The sound-ex box allows users to type in any information (name, address, date etc) and the system will locate any records in the drilldown table that match the user criteria. Excel Interface Users can send all or SELECTED rows directly to Excel. WinINSPECT Interface Visual Indicators Of Problems/Issues By having this checkbox on, users can have the system retrieve the date of last inspection in WinINSPECT and compare it against the date in WinFAM. Any rows marked in light green background indicate that although the date of last inspection in WinFAM is overdue, there is in fact a later inspection done and recorded in WinINSPECT and most likely, the dates just need to be updated in WinFAM using the WinINSPECT data. Page 23 of 43

24 Any rows marked in light yellow are WARNING rows that the inspection is overdue (per WinFAM) and there is no WinINSPECT data indicating an inspection is scheduled or completed. These units/inspections should be addressed immediately as they will cause inspection dates to be late per PIC rules. If a unit is overdue, but a WinINSPECT inspection has been scheduled, the schedule date will appear. Auto-Update Using WinINSPECT Information Users have several buttons at their disposal to update WinFAM unit inspection data automatically using WinINSPECT inspection data. Click the SELECT button will select (highlight) any units that have a WinINSPECT inspection completed (with completion date). Subsequently clicking the UPDATE button will update the Unit record in WinFAM s date of last inspection with the WinINSPECT complete date displayed. Scheduling Inspections (Interface with WinINSPECT) Users have several buttons at their disposal here as well to find (SELECT) all units that need an inspection (no inspection scheduled). Clicking the SCHEDULE button will then drive into the WinINSPECT Inspection Scheduling screen to allow users to schedule inspections, pick inspectors, review inspector calendars etc. Right-Click Options For any unit, users can review the WinFAM or WinINSPECT inspection histories on the selected unit by simply right-clicking on that unit row. The system will display the Inspection History chosen. Page 24 of 43

25 Unit Inspection History Drill-Down Page 25 of 43

26 H.M.S. Section 8 Manager Voucher Analysis Page 26 of 43

27 Voucher Analysis Voucher Analysis - Overview The Voucher Analysis tab was designed to give users an on-line tool that allows them to summarize and analyze their current vouchers. Formerly, users only had the Voucher Master report (hard-copy) available in WinHAP to summarize voucher activity. With this new tool users can look at all of the various voucher status s (issued looking, pending, tenant, available) by project/voucher type. Users can drill-down into any of the counts to look at the supporting detail for the counts. Users can match these reports to the VMS tab totals for finance/leasing to find and resolve discrepancies. It should be noted that this is a live look at the current voucher master. Things change on a day-to-day basis with the issuance or retraction of vouchers to applicants and tenants. If users want a snap-shot of their vouchers as of a particular day, they should make a habit of exporting the summary and detail to Excel on a consistent basis. VMS Report Group Users can restrict the vouchers displayed to those that participate in only certain projects. Various projects can be linked to a VMS Report group and by selected a group, the user restricts which projects to examine when retrieving vouchers and their voucher status. Page 27 of 43

28 Group By Options Users can choose to summarize voucher activity by project, by VMS type of voucher or by a combination of both (both is the default). Excel Interface Users can send all or SELECTED rows directly to Excel for further analysis. Drill-Down Into Voucher Counts Users can drill-down into any line-item count or the grand total at the bottom. Drilling into these totals will display the Voucher Analysis Detail screen that list details about that voucher and its current status. Voucher Analysis - Detail Sound-Ex The sound-ex box allows users to type in any information (name, address, date etc) and the system will locate any records in the drill-down table that match the user criteria Right-Click Option For any voucher, users can release that voucher from the tenant by clicking on the voucher line to select then right-clicking to get the menu choice. Un-issuing a voucher releases the voucher changing its status from IT (issued tenant) to A (available). This function is useful as there are times when a tenant moves out and a user doing the move-out forgets to release the voucher (answers No by mistake). Page 28 of 43

29 H.M.S. Section 8 Manager Monthly Reconcile Page 29 of 43

30 Monthly Reconcile Monthly Reconcile - Overview Page 30 of 43

31 Page 31 of 43

32 H.M.S. Section 8 Manager Hold Management Page 32 of 43

33 Hold Management Hold Management - Overview Page 33 of 43

34 H.M.S. Section 8 Manager VMS Information Page 34 of 43

35 VMS Information VMS - Overview The Page 35 of 43

36 Page 36 of 43

37 H.M.S. Section 8 Manager Payments Page 37 of 43

38 Payments Payments - Overview The Page 38 of 43

39 H.M.S. Section 8 Manager Staff Activity Page 39 of 43

40 Staff Activity Staff Activity - Overview Staff Activity Staff Activity Tab Overview The Staff Activity tab is a managerial tool that can analyze activity by users on the H.M.S. system. All key actions taken by staff on the computer can be recorded to a history file (if agency has purchase H.M.S. Notes). In addition, notes recorded by users for various activities like interactions with tenants, applicants and landlords can also be tracked in H.M.S. Notes and then summarized herein. Text search capability is available to search potentially thousands of records to find a particular computer or user generated note. When analyzing staff activity, users can specify a date range, inquire about all or particular staff members that may have performed an action, and specify one, selected or all action types. Action types are a standard set of activities performed on the computer by users. If the users track phone calls to tenants, a specific action code would normally be set up called Phone Call To/From Tenant. Analysis in this tab then could ask for just that action type. Once the date range, staff, action types and optionally some search text have been entered, clicking the FIND button will locate all history records that match the selected criteria. Initially, the user is presented with a summary format by user, action type; providing a count of the number of action types each user performed. Users can drill down into any count or optionally re-rerun the query turn on the detail immediately using the check-box provided on the tab. Page 40 of 43

41 Sample Staff Activity tab - Summary Clearing Selections Users can easily clear all selected Staff Members of Action Types by clicking on the header. Clicking the header turns OFF all selected rows. Page 41 of 43

42 Sample Staff Activity tab - Detail Search Example Page 42 of 43

43 Drill-Down Example Users can get a summary version of a staff activity query and then drill down into a specific item to find more details. In this example, users can ask for all driver license tags and get a result count of 15. Clicking on the 15 and then on the drill-down button will display the detail. Page 43 of 43