Plant accounting is responsible for:
- Monitoring capital projects; transferring costs from construction in progress to buildings and structures, general improvements, infrastructure, and fixed equipment; and closing completed capital projects
- State capital appropriations claims
- Preparation of loan draws for capital projects
- Capitalization of equipment, software and other capital assets
- Recording campus depreciation on all capital assets
- Maintenance of BFS capital project and plant fund values
Department Transfer of Funds to Capital Projects and Plant Funds
When there is a need identified by a department to transfer funds from Current funds to Plant funds or from renewal and replacement funds/unexpended plant funds to capital projects, the department needs to fill out the Capital Project and Plant Fund Transfer Form (PDF) to provide the current fund or renewal and replacement fund/unexpended plant fund chartstring, transfer amount, the departmental information, and the preparer/approver information for the fund transfers.
Please see the Instructions for Preparing the Capital Projects and Plant Fund Transfer Form (PDF) for completing the form.
Once the Capital Project and Plant Fund Transfer Form is completed with the required information, the form should be submitted as an email attachment to: plant-accounting@berkeley.edu.
Timeline for Processing the Capital Projects and Plant Fund Transfer Form
Financial Accounting checks the email daily for the fund transfer requests and prepares the necessary entries in BFS within three working days after the Capital Project and Plant Fund Transfer Forms are received. The actual current fund balance transfers will be recorded in department IDs. Requesting departments should review the Cal Answers reports to verify the fund transfers are recorded correctly in the current fund balance accounts.
Return of Plant Funds to Current Funds
There are situations for which retirement of indebtedness funds or unexpended plant funds need to be transferred back to current funds or renewal and replacement funds, such as to return capital project surplus funds to funding units. In these situations, Financial Accounting initiates the necessary entries in BFS for the fund balance returns.
Unexpended Plant Fund Transfer to Capital Projects
There are situations for which funds are already recorded in unexpended plant funds, e.g. gift funds, departmental provision, and Campus’ provision. The owners of the unexpended plant funds should submit the Capital Project and Plant Fund Transfer Form (PDF) to request the unexpended plant funds to be transferred or appropriated to capital projects.
Capital Projects and Contracts & Grant Awards
Capital projects funded by sponsored research awards are accounted for on the C&G award, as spending occurs, via fund balance transfers (using account code 34010 Capital Outlay for pre-7/1/22 transactions, and account code 81602 Capital Outlay effective 7/1/22). This activity can be viewed in its entirety utilizing the Multi-Year reports in Cal Answers. If it is preferable instead to earmark the C&G award budget by reallocating the capital project portion to the plant fund, RAs should prepare a budget rallocation for their supervisors to review and approve. Contact cgaawards@berkeley.edu for further information about this process.