Senate Bill No. 399
(By Senators McCabe and Snyder)
____________
[Introduced February 2, 2011; referred to the Committee on
Government Organization; and then to the Committee on Finance.]
____________
A BILL to amend and reenact §5A-7-4a of the Code of West Virginia,
1931, as amended, relating to adding new language allowing
invoices under $75 to accumulate and be mailed in one
statement near the end of the fiscal year.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That §5A-7-4a of the Code of West Virginia, 1931, as amended,
be amended and reenacted to read as follows:
ARTICLE 7. INFORMATION SERVICES AND COMMUNICATIONS DIVISION.
§5A-7-4a. Payment of legitimate uncontested invoices for
telecommunications services; procedures and powers of
the Information and Communications Division and
Secretary of Administration.
(a) The Legislature finds that it is in the best interest of
the state, its spending units and those vendors supplying
telecommunications services to the state and its spending units
that any properly registered and qualified vendor supplying
telecommunications services to two or more spending units under a shared account is entitled to prompt payment upon presentation of
a legitimate uncontested invoice for telecommunications services to
the division, as provided in the following subsections.
(b) To facilitate the administration and payment of
telecommunications services, there is continued in the State
Treasury a special revenue account to be known as the
"Telecommunications Services Payment and Reserve Fund." All moneys
transferred from state spending units pursuant to the requirements
of this section shall be deposited in the account. Expenditures
from the fund shall be made by the director for the exclusive
purposes set forth in this section: Provided, That no more than
$150,000 or the actual amount collected pursuant to subsection (j)
of this section in any fiscal year, whichever is less, may be
expended from the fund in any fiscal year to defray the costs of
administration of this section.
(c) Upon receipt of any telecommunications charges from a
properly registered and qualified vendor, the division shall
conduct a preliminary review of the charges. If the division
determines during this preliminary review that: (1) Any of the
charges are not authorized by law or by the contract under which
the telecommunications services are provided; (2) no specific
spending unit is designated for any charge; or (3) any charge or
service is not in accordance with contract pricing, the division
shall reject those charges. Within fourteen days of receipt of any
telecommunications charge, the director shall notify a vendor of
any rejected charges and shall include in the notice a description of the rejected charges, the reasons a charge was rejected and a
proposed resolution of the rejected charge. The director and the
vendor shall attempt to resolve the matter in good faith. Within
ninety days of the receipt of the vendor's invoice or a time period
mutually agreed to by the vendor and secretary, the secretary shall
make the final decision as to the legitimacy of the rejected amount
and determine if payment is warranted. If the final decision of
the secretary is to require payment of the rejected amount, the
secretary shall cause the division to bill that amount to the
appropriate spending unit which shall remit payment of the amount
as required in subsection (d) of this section. If the final
decision of the secretary is to refuse to pay any amount, the
vendor may proceed in accordance with the provisions of article
two, chapter fourteen of this code.
(d) Following the preliminary review of the charges, the
director shall fully apportion all telecommunications charges not
rejected during the preliminary review required by subsection (c)
of this section among spending units based on the spending unit's
service and usage, as determined by the director. The director
shall send each spending unit a statement of the spending unit's
proportionate share of any telecommunications charges within thirty
days of receipt by the division of the invoice detailing the
telecommunications charges. Monthly statements for a spending unit
of less than $75 may be accumulated and sent to the spending unit
on one statement near the end of the fiscal year. The statement is
to provide a date of no more than thirty calendar days from the date the division sends the statement by which the spending unit
shall submit payment or transfer to the telecommunications services
payment and reserve fund all funds necessary to pay for the
spending unit's charges in full: Provided, That the statement sent
in last month of the fiscal year shall provide that the transfer
shall be made by July 31. If feasible for the spending unit, the
preferable method of payment is by inter-governmental transfer.
(e) All spending units shall budget for telecommunications
service expenses. Prior to the date provided in each statement
sent to a spending unit pursuant to subsection (d) of this section,
each spending unit shall pay or transfer the statement amount to
the telecommunications services payment and reserve fund.
(f) If a spending unit fails to pay or transfer funds by the
date specified in the statement sent pursuant to subsection (d) of
this section, the Secretary of the Department of Administration
shall transfer to the telecommunications services payment and
reserve fund the statement amount plus an additional penalty in the
amount of three percent of the statement amount from any funds
supporting the administration of that spending unit: Provided,
That the secretary shall complete all such transfers by July 31 of
each fiscal year. Upon exercising a transfer under the authority
of this subsection, the director shall provide a notification to
the spending unit, including, but not limited to, the date, time,
total amount of the transfer, statement amount and penalty amount.
If a participating spending unit does not maintain funds in the
State Treasury, the Secretary may transfer funds by wire from any depository outside the State Treasury. A participating spending
unit maintaining funds in depositories outside the State Treasury
shall furnish the secretary access to those funds for the exclusive
purposes of this section.
(g) If a spending unit contests any portion of its statement,
it shall nonetheless remit payment for the entire statement amount
and notify the division in writing within thirty days of statement
receipt by the spending unit. The secretary shall consider any
contested apportionments of charges and provide a final
determination on the apportionment of legitimate charges.
Corrections or adjustments to apportionments may be effected on
future transfer payments: Provided, That legitimate vendor charges
are to be fully apportioned. If the basis of the contest is vendor
error, overcharge, service failure, failure to terminate services
as required by the division, or other failure of or error in vendor
performance, the director shall withhold the contested amount from
current or future vendor payments, pending resolution by the
secretary, and the director shall bring the contested matter to the
attention of the vendor. The director and the vendor shall attempt
to resolve the matter in good faith. Within ninety days of the
receipt of the vendor's invoice or a time period mutually agreed to
by the vendor and secretary, the secretary shall make the final
decision as to the legitimacy of the contested amount and determine
if payment is warranted. If the final decision of the secretary is
to refuse to pay any amount, the vendor may proceed in accordance
with the provisions of article two, chapter fourteen of this code.
(h) The director shall provide for full payment of legitimate,
uncontested telecommunications charges within ninety days of
receipt of an invoice detailing the telecommunications charges by
the division. Payment for the charges shall be made by the
director from the telecommunications services payment and reserve
fund.
(i) The director may direct the discontinuance of
telecommunications services to any spending unit that fails to
comply with the provisions of this section and the vendor supplying
telecommunication services shall comply with the written direction
of the director on discontinuance of services.
(j) To help defray the additional cost of administering this
section, the director may assess a proportional fee of up to
$150,000 in aggregate per fiscal year to the participating spending
units based on each spending unit's portion of service and usage.
This fee is to be included in the statement sent to spending units
pursuant to subsection (d) of this section and transferred to the
telecommunications service payment and reserve fund by the date
specified in the statement for the transfer of payment.
(k) Notwithstanding any other provision of this code to the
contrary, for purposes of this section, an invoice is considered
received by the division on the date on which the invoice is marked
as received by the division, or three business days after the date
of the postmark made by the United States postal service as
evidenced on the envelope in which the invoice is mailed, whichever
is earlier: Provided, That if an invoice is received by the division prior to the date on which the telecommunications services
covered by the invoice are delivered or fully performed, for
purposes of determining the ninety-day time period for payment in
subsection (h) of this section, the invoice is considered received
on the date on which the telecommunications services covered by the
invoice were delivered or fully performed.
(l) For purposes of this section, "telecommunications service"
means and includes not only telephone service regulated under
chapter twenty-four of this code or under federal law, but also may
include, at the discretion of the Secretary of Administration,
wireless service, voice over Internet protocol service, Internet
service and any other service or equipment used for the electronic
transmission of voice or data: Provided, That such service is
provided under a statewide contract.
(m) The director may propose rules for legislative approval in
accordance with the provisions of article three, chapter twenty-
nine-a of this code to effectuate the purposes of this section.
The initial rule filed by the division pursuant to the amendments
to this subsection enacted during the regular session of the
Legislature in 2005 shall be filed as an emergency rule.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to allow the Information
Services and Communications Division to accumulate invoices under
$75 and send them to the spending unit on one statement near the
end of the fiscal year rather than within thirty days.
Strike-throughs indicate language that would be stricken from
the present law, and underscoring indicates new language that would
be added.