Enterprise IT Finance Policy

• Table of Contents
• 100.00 Introduction
• 200.00 Policy
• 300.00 Procedures
• 400.00 References
• 500.00 Definitions

100.00 Introduction

Information Technology (IT) general funding is insufficient to support all the demands of University constituents. It is primarily intended to support “common good” needs. The cost of infrastructure replacement and expansion can be high and irregular. Chargeback and long-term funding models can smooth out the spending fluctuations, equitably distribute costs and mitigate financial risk.

200.00 Policy

200.10 Board of Regents policies governing the use of university information technology apply to all University faculty, staff, students, and patrons. All users of University information technology must comply with MSU Enterprise policies as well as Board of Regents policies, state and federal law. References to associated policies and laws are provided in section 400.00.

200.20 Central IT departments and distributed IT units may establish chargeback models to recover costs for services provided to users that are not considered common good and are not centrally funded.

1. Chargeback models may recover all costs associated with a product or service.
2. Central IT departments may publish costs for sales and services in advance or may estimate costs as requests are made.
3. Cost estimates are not bids. Actual costs may be charged regardless of inaccurate estimates.

200.30 Central IT departments may establish common or separate fund(s) on each campus for the financing of IT infrastructure replacement and expansion.

1. University entities such as agencies, departments, divisions, affiliations, and the student body may contribute monies to the fund in support of infrastructure replacement and expansion.
2. Central IT departments may assess fees, distribute costs through cost-sharing arrangements, and bill University entities for costs associated with infrastructure replacement and expansion, depositing those monies into the infrastructure plant fund.
3. Infrastructure costs associated with an individual campus shall be tracked and reported separately from University-wide infrastructure costs.
4. Student funds from each campus student population may only be used in support of that campus infrastructure and corresponding portion of University-wide infrastructure costs.

300.00 Procedures

Individual campuses maintain campus-specific standards and procedures that implement this policy. Campus-specific standards and procedures are currently under development; when published, the links to those pages will be provided here. Constituents will be required to comply with any standards and procedures developed for their campus:

No specific procedures or standards currently exist for this policy.

400.00 References

Report broken links to uitmarcom@montana.edu.

• Board of Regents policy 901.1 Renewal and Replacement of Equipment in Recharge Centers, available at http://www.mus.edu/borpol/bor1900/1901-1.pdf.

500.00 Definitions

“Central IT department” refers to the centrally-funded IT unit on each campus that serves campus-wide IT needs and/or University IT infrastructure.

“Chargeback” is a funding model wherein a central IT department can charge internal customers for the costs of services rendered that are not covered by general funding.

“Common good” refers to a service, resource, or activity that supports the best interests of the majority of the University and its mission as determined by campus CIOs or University leadership.

“Constituent” refers to any individual or group associated with the University including students, staff, faculty, or patrons as well as any contractors, regents, committees, councils, groups, agencies, departments, entities, campus, or community.

“Enterprise” refers to all Universities, colleges, and agencies of Montana State University.

“Enterprise Chief Information Officer” refers to the top level information technology leadership role based on the Bozeman campus whose responsibilities include information technology leadership of the four MSU campuses.

“Information Technology” or “IT” refers to any resource related to the access and use of digitized information, including but not limited to hardware, software, devices, appliances, network bandwidth and resources.

“IT unit” refers to any group or individual that provides distributed IT services, support, or infrastructure, including academic and research IT support groups.

“University” refers to any and all campuses, agencies, departments, groups, councils, committees or entities within Montana State University.