T-PAX/UTS Service is BROKEN!

[MSTCS Jerald P. Motyka]

Our friends at PSC are having MAJOR problems with the new replacement and upgrade for the UTS program we use to do travel claims. For the past several days, ALL travel claims have been flagged for audits - for NO reason. They are screaming at the vendor that provided the program to fix the password system, so the passwords there fit the CG model of alpha-numeric with symbols and capital letters... cuz it doesn't. They are also trying to get the system to recognize the stuff you input for the "Lost Password", as it doesn't accurately match your inputs to what you have on file.

Major pain - for us AND for them.

DON'T call and expect to call for someone. They are so overwhelmed that they have been calling in experts from other areas (Direct Access/MISLE/etc) to help, and the woman I FINALLY got to speak to today said that the phone service is going in and out as it is overwhelmed, she had 60 voice messages herself - at all times - and everything over 60 get deleted (over the limit), and their long weekend coming up is just a dim memory, as they are going to work all weekend.

DO NOT SUBMIT THE AUDITS REQUESTED FOR THE LAST SEVERAL DAYS!!! The lady I spoke to said that for now, ignore the requests, as there is NO way they could process them, and ALL claims were being audited anyway. NEXT month, after the system is fixed (hopefully), they will send out "second notices" to the people that are REALLY being audited. They understand the problems, and they won't look at people cross-eyed for being "a month late."

For now - be patient... PLEASE!!

[PACS Steve Carleton]

One of my Petty Officers received an e-mail about being audited from psc customer service, it says he is being audited, but doesn't provide any attachment or other indication on which claim is being flagged.

I'm not saying ignore them, but it looks like this is part of the same problem.

[MSTCS Jerald P. Motyka]

Senior Chief,
I was told specifically TO ignore them, and to pass the word in anticipation of a CG-wide e-mail or message saying the same thing.

If you miss a request for an audit, you don't get in trouble until after the third miss (90 days).

Don't sweat the problems, just do as you normally would and submit and approve the claims - just ignore the demands for audits for now.

[BMC Chris Gempp]

I have had the same problems trying to do a travel claim for $66.00

[BMCS Jim Madsen]

I just did one yesterday. Only took me an hour and a half and two phone calls.

[BMCS R. Scott Pugh]

I also received an e-mail for an audit without the attachment. I replied with a "where is the attachment?" and I received about three e-mails saying not to worry about the audit, the original e-mail was sent in error.

I filed those e-mails away and went on with my day.

T-PAX does need some work, okay a lot of work! :(

Scott

[BMCS Jim Madsen]

Just to make things worse, now there is a need for a "secondary password" to approve and submit travel claims. How many passwords are we going to have to have before we are "secure"? This is absolutly rediculous.

[PACS Steve Carleton]

Jim,

You needed two passwords on the "old" UTS -- It is OK to use the same password for both, and is a verification when you send a Travel Claim to the Approving Official or if you are an AO, to verify that you are sending it for approval.

[ETC Pat Kaschube]

I think the lack of training provided on the original UTS is biting us in the butt now. I can tell when one of my folks is working in TPAX from all the colorful language drifting into my office. We are trying to work through all little quirks but inevitably, in comes a YN to assist with the travel claim. Generally the TPAX version is the same as the old jetform version just all the fields aren't on the same page. My question is if someone were to list all the aplications on the Worstations we are required to use the list would be pretty long. I know that ESU Seattle has an excellent program for user training but that doesn't help out in my next of the woods in Jersey. ESD's don't have the personnel to dedicate to developing a training program for all the various applications otherwise I would have started that from day one. Of course IT's don't generally use CMPLUS and FEDLOG or C2PC so they wouldn't be the best people to develop a training program to begin with. So I guess my point is is there any way for us to develop a training program, other than a web based training program (maybe I'm old school but I think training from a disc or a computer sucks) for all the applications we use. Is this something that could be added to the A schools or would that be a money issue. I'm just throwing this out there. :confused:

[BMCS Jim Madsen]

I guess I had the same password in UTS for both passwords. I know that I had to either log in as traveler or approving official. I am just frustrated with all the constant changing to something that seems to work just fine. And it is not just one application. It is a constant change in various applications. Seems to me that it should either be acceptable or not, and if it is not, then don't release it until it is. Just because a new car comes out with 10 more horse power doesn't mean I go out and get it.

[ETCM Joseph Harold]

ESD's don't have the personnel to dedicate to developing a training program for all the various applications otherwise I would have started that from day one.

Pat,

I would hope that you have a weekly training schedule. This is a good time to get unit training on an application. The way I've seen it done is you get a fine Petty Officer who has shown at least some understanding of the application if not outright mastery and have them develop training on it to be presented at your weekly training.

Not only does this bring the shop up to speed on the application, it gets Pracs signed off by the trainer.

If your training plan is healthy, you can fit application training amongst all the required electronics, safety and Military training.

[ETC Pat Kaschube]

The weekly training plan was the first thing I wanted to develop when I took over here and the first thing to take a hit this Summer. One ET1 to D05 in support of Katrina, One ET2 to Baharain and one ET2 to the legacy FT schools for transfer to a cutter. IT's were working through the 5.1 WS image upgrade and the server 2003 migration. It was myself and an ET3 at times. Not complaining it was nice to get my hands dirty and get away from the computer for a while. Now that things are back to normal the training plan is back on the radar.
The issue with the IT's at an ESD developing training to teach users how to use say the PCA application from FINCEN is that they don't use it themselves where I do have an ET1 that does as well as the SK's. Then there is TPAX. Even though there has been a lot of travel recently in this shop, the IT's generally don't travel that often so they don't use TPAX enough to become an expert. The YN's however do. I could use a few more examples but basically my point is that it would be nice to have a centralized point of training for the various applications that we are required to use.
One option I have thought about and I'm not sure were to proceed at this point, is webbased traing for the applications. I'm not a huge fan of this kind of trainng being a former instructor myself but it would be better than nothing. We recently were all required to complete the online sexual harrasment training. I actually though that that website has quite a bit of potential as opposed to CGCentral. It's my opinion that if there were courses developed for the various applications that people could go to the website and get a little training. Again if you don't use it you loose it applies but it would be a good start. I'm just not sure who would develop the course for CMPLUS, C2PC, Captains Program, PCA, TPAX, Peoplesoft, TAIT, etc,etc,etc.

[ETCM Joseph Harold]

Pat,

I hear you and feel your pain.

Hey, I went to the PSC site and they have a T-PAX tutorial. I only looked at it for a second, but it seems rather cool. I know hands on real human training is the best way, but this may be a stop gap for you until your shop is up to speed. The link is: http://cgweb.psc.uscg.mil/index.htm

Just go there and click on the Travel/UTS button and then the Turtorial and Demonstrations link.

Good luck,
Joe

[ETC Pat Kaschube]

We used the tutorial and it is definately a good start. The problem we had was with the type of orders that the guys were doing travel claims for cross fy05/06 and one overseas required a bit more yeoman help than a normal travel claim. Still it was better than nothing but again I will go back to my point that there should be a centralized point were Coasties can go to get training on any application that is on our workstations.

[OSC Mike Tylman]

Not to mention when your tennant ESD only has 1 IT that is responsible for a geographic area from the top of Louisiana to Pittsburg. I agree the ESD's are not staffed to provide software application training support to the rest of the service. Even aboard our cutters the electronics division may not be capable of meeting the challenge.

In all reality, the lack of application training can be boiled down to two things; money and properly staffed and qualified training personnel.

Throwing money and people at this particular problem would actually help.

[ETCM Joseph Harold]

Not to mention when your tennant ESD only has 1 IT that is responsible for a geographic area from the top of Louisiana to Pittsburg.

Not to be a stickler, and I know this is way OT, but I need a few more posts to relieve myself of the Junior Member label. Pittsburgh is spelled with an H at the end.

Go Steelers!

[BMCS Bill Gheen]

Yep, I think you are right. and I think this post will advance me to member, no more Junior. Lets see :D