SPR TA Webinar Transcript

The following is a transcript of an audio recording of a webinar presented by the Early Learning and Care Division (ELCD), California Department of Education (CDE) providing guidance on the Subsidized Provider Report (SPR).

Webinar Starts

Okay good morning everyone it is 10 o'clock so we're just going to jump right in. Welcome! Today we're going to be going over a technical assistance webinar for the subsidized provider report. Before we get started hopefully everyone can hear all right we'll be looking to the Q&A section of the WebEx for any questions that you all may have as we're getting started, any technical difficulties you may have, please let us know in the Q&A and we will respond as we are able. As is customary with most of our webinars, we'll also have check points for questions after each section. Unfortunately, we weren't able to provide the slides in advance of today's webinar but we will be posting those slides as well as a recorded version of the webinar by the end of this week. So again, just use that Q&A sidebar if you need any help or if you have questions continue to send in questions and we will address them periodically.

Okay so our objectives for this webinar are listed on this slide. The first objective is to provide an overview of the SPR – that's the subsidized provider report – requirements and available resources. We'll define which agencies are required to submit the SPR – again that's the subsidized provider report– I know it's a new acronym so I'll try to define it as much as possible throughout this webinar. We'll also review the data to be submitted by each SPR submission deadline.

Additional webinar objectives are to introduce the file format and clarify some key data definitions. We'll review a step by step SPR upload – we're actually going to do a live technical assistance demo for that today – and we'll also provide an opportunity for Q&A questions and some answers for technical assistance with the subsidized provider report submission. So again, these are our objectives for today just so we're clear about what is within the scope of this webinar.

So, we should be posting momentarily Child Development Management Information System (CDMIS) update number 26 that will be posted in the CDMIS update you know section of the website. The update contains information about upcoming webinars including the CDMIS 801 reporting webinar. That webinar will be held on Wednesday, September 18^th, 2019, from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 o'clock p.m. and that is for technical assistance with reporting your 801s and the child development management information system. CDMIS updates number 26 also covers the delayed transition to reporting enrollment. I understand this is this may be kind of new to folks. Agencies are expected to continue reporting attendance until further notice. More information about that is provided in CDMIS update number 26 that should be posted again momentarily if not by this afternoon you should see that online. Also in CDMIS update number 26 we'll cover some guidelines for agencies who are experiencing technical difficulties with fiscal year 2019–20 age and income CDD-801A reporting. So we understand that agencies are having technical difficulties with reporting some children and families. Our technical staff are aware and we will issue an update when one is available. So again, that CDMIS update number 26 should be posted by the end of the day, for more information you can refer to that update.

Now we'll just go over some additional online resources that are available. So resources for the subsidized provider report are available on the subsidized provider report web page. That is the subsidized provider report web page. On that web page you'll find management bulletin 19-06, you'll find provider notices, you'll find the technical manual for the subsidized provider report, you'll find a submission schedule, and you'll also find soon after this webinar frequently asked questions so we will post the questions that we get through the Q&A through this chat to the SPR web page after the webinar is over so that you can refer back to the answers that have been provided and that you also have a resource for any questions that we were not able to resolve during the webinar. We'll have that FAQ page updated regularly. So a bit more about those FAQs the FAQs they're going to represent common questions from providers and agencies who are seeking assistance with implementing the SPR requirements. Agencies are encouraged to continue to contact CDMIS support with questions. The SPR FAQ web page will be updated periodically with the responses to those questions.

We've provided a contact information slide here for anyone who may have questions and need to contact CDMIS support. The CDMIS office can be contacted by phone at (916) 445-1907 and by email at CDMIS@cde.ca.gov. Visit the CDMIS support web page or the CDMIS website. Again, you can contact the CDMIS office with any questions or concerns regarding your subsidized provider report or implementing your subsidized provider report requirement.

So here we'll get into the definition of a provider. The California Education Code Section 8431(a)(1) states that a family child care provider or a provider means a childcare provider who participates in a state-funded early care and education program as specified in subdivision (c) and is either of the following: an individual who operates a family day care home as defined in Section 1596.78 of the Health and Safety Code and who is licensed pursuant to the requirement in Section 1596.80 of the Health and Safety Code. An individual who provides early care and education in their home or in the home of the children receiving care and is an exempt from licensing requirements pursuant to 1596.792 of the Health and Safety Code. So, we're going over the definition of a provider as it relates to the subsidized provider report.

The subsidized provider report is a monthly data collection report in which agencies provide specific business and/or personal information about all providers receiving state funds for early learning and care. The SPR is required for agencies who administer their contracts with licensed exempt individuals and family child care home providers as defined by law.

So I see a lot of questions already, do I have to submit the SPR, is it really for centers or do centers have to do this, and so per Education Code sections 8430 and 8432, agencies who administer their contracts with the providers as defined above are required to submit the SPR, so the complete SPR must be submitted for all providers who receive state funding from your agency and if any of those providers have questions or concerns they can direct those to CDMIS support for resolution. Agencies who operate center-based contracts and do not administer contracts with providers as defined previously are not required to submit the SPR.

So, what does that mean exactly and I'll relate this back to your 801A report for any of our attendees who may be familiar with that. So on your 801A report you're going to enter a type of care for each provider and each child that is reported. So early learning and care division contractors who report the following types of care in the monthly CDD-801A report are required to submit the SPR. If you submit type of care two for licensed family child care homes, type of care three for a licensed large family child care home, type of care of five for licensed exempt in a child home by a relative, type six license exempt in a child's home by a non-relative, type of care seven licensed exempt outside the child's home by a relative or type of care eight which is licensed exempt outside the child's home by a non-relative. So each of these home-based types of care are required to submit the SPR.

Center-based types of care so ELCD contractors who report the following types of care in the monthly CDD-801A report are not required to submit the SPR. If you submit all of your children and families with a type of care of 04 for licensed center-based care or a type of care of 11 for licensed exempt center-based care, this report requirements does not currently apply to you. You are not required to submit the SPR if you only report services to children and families in licensed center-based care or licensed exempt center-based care.

So at this point we're going to pause for a moment for our first check point and again this is where we'll take any of your questions so we'll give you just a moment to key in any of your questions in the Q&A. Alternatively you could also email them to CDMIS Support and we can address them once the webinar is over but just a good time right now to take a moment to ask any questions in this checkpoint for SPR overview and resources. In this section the following topics were addressed: the SPR online resources, the definition of a provider or types of care required to submit the SPR. So again, we'll take a pause for about 3 to 5 minutes here to give you guys a chance to submit any questions that you may have up to this point. if you are a center-based provider and you realize that this has nothing to do with you, you may exit at this time. Otherwise we'll be right back in a few minutes.

Okay we're going to jump right back in I don't see too many questions but again you're welcome to continue submitting them through the Q&A. The one question that I do see is regarding Stage 1 providers so I would have to direct any agencies who administer their contracts with the providers as we've described with both CDE the Department of Education as well as the Department of Social Services to reach out to the Department of Social Services for further direction and guidance on how to submit your Stage 1 agencies because you are required to report them. So again, if you have providers and if you have contracts with both the California Department of Education as well as the Department of Social Services at this time I would encourage you to reach out to the Department of Social Services for further instruction on how to proceed with reporting your Stage 1 providers.

With that we’ll jump right into the next section where we will discuss the submission schedules for the subsidized provider report. So for report periods during fiscal year 2018–19, agencies are required to submit the April 2019, May 2019, and June 2019 report periods by August 30^th, 2019. For report periods that fall in fiscal year 2019–20, agencies will see that two reports for the first two months of fiscal year 2019–20 will be due on September 20^th, 2019. So the July 2019 and the August 2019 reports will be due on September 20^th, 2019. The September 2019 report will be due on October 20^th, 2019. The October 2019 report will be due on November 20^th, 2019. You'll see that the remainder of the fiscal year 2019–20 submission schedule follows the same pattern as your 801A reporting schedule, whereby the report is due on the 20th of the month following when the report period ends. So you'll see that as you guys begin your SPR reporting, you'll see the reports kind of taper off so the first three sets of reports for fiscal year 2018–19 will be due on August 30^th. You'll submit three reports on August 30^th. Then you'll submit two reports for July 2019 and August 2019 on September 20^th. Then every month you'll only be responsible for submitting one report by the 20th of the month following when services were provided.

So we've got another checkpoint here just for any questions about the submission schedule or what's supposed to be included in each report. In this section we addressed the topic of the SPR submission schedules. I'll pause for just a moment here to see if anyone would like to submit questions through the Q&A regarding the SPR submission schedules.

Okay thank you for your guys’ questions. We have I'm just going to address a few that I think came from the first checkpoint just so that everybody gets their questions answered all that we're able to answer at this time. So someone asked about whether or not Management Bulletin 19-06 is suspending current Title 22 Regulations, I would encourage anyone who has questions about the regulatory backing to be submitting data. I would recommend that you send those in writing so that we can properly address them, but you are required to submit the data according to the instructions that have been provided by the deadlines that are provided but if you do have questions about the regulatory authority please do email those to us in CDMIS Support. An LEA district CSPP – do I need to submit the report? You do not if you do not need to submit a report unless you guys have a family child care home education network. I'm only aware of one that does so most likely you do not need to submit the SPR if you are an LEA with a district CSPP. I again will have to direct any questions regarding Stage 1 over to the Department of Social Services for resolution at this time. The provider questions about what's supposed to go in each field I'll address that one as we get to the data definition section. Is the SPR different from the 801A? This is actually a really good question – yes, it's different from the 801A in that it's a different report that requires different information; however, both reports are submitted through the Child Development Management Information System. We have a question about a licensed CSPP center-based program – as long as you're not using a family child care home education network for your CSPP, you should be reporting all of your children in a licensed center-based program or type of care 04 so you would not need to attend this webinar at this time. We have some questions about translating materials – if you could just please email those questions to us if you have concerns about languages that you would like to request materials be translated to. Should the SPR be submitted through the same website as the 801A? That is correct. Okay so a good question about the report schedule. I was under the impression that the first report was to be combined – are we supposed to submit three reports in August? So, similar to your 801A report, you'll submit one file for each report period so you will actually be submitting three separate files into the CDMIS. We do have a question about adhering to the deadlines – if you guys have concerns about those, please email us directly and we can address them.

Okay at this point we're going to jump into the next section of the webinar. You guys have had some great questions so far, please continue to send those in and we will address them as they come up. And if you don't feel that you're getting an adequate resolution to your questions please go ahead and send us emails, we are all very much you know happy to help and address anything that you're still concerned with, so please continue to send us emails and we'll work to get those questions resolved. In this next section we're going to talk a little bit about the file format. I'm just going to go over some really general topics about the file format. I'm going to jump through this section and then you guys will see a live demo at the end of it all. So we'll again discuss the file format, we'll have a check point for any questions that you have, and there will again be a demo of how you're submitting this file at the end of the webinar. So the file format agencies must follow the file format below, which means that the files they must be a tab-delimited text ASCII file. Files must not be compressed i.e., zipped. The files must contain 24 columns and the files must contain at least one record.

Agencies must also follow the file format requirements that are listed below, which include character fields. Those may contain both upper- and lower-case letters, numbers, dashes unless there's some other note in the technical manual about the field. Number fields must only contain numbers. Date fields must contain dates in the format of month month day day – month month sorry slash day day slash year year year year. So, you will see any error messages if your file does not conform to these file format requirements.

So again, that was just a really brief overview of the file format. There's a lot more detail in the technical manual, but we'll pause for just a second and continue to answer questions that may have come up about the file format which is the topic that was addressed in this section. So I'll pause for just a moment and any questions that are kind of still out there please do continue to send those in, I'll do my best to answer as many as I'm able during the time that we have here today.

Okay we've got a good question about the file format. So we have one question, it says are there templates available, will electronic files be accepted, and how can the technical manual be accessed? So great questions, please continue to send these in. So with respect to the file format template, right now we don't have a template available that we're able to kind of post online but I would encourage you to go on and just send us an email and we might be able to provide some technical assistance on the template via email. Will electronic files be accepted? Another great question. As you'll see in the demo, only electronic files will be accepted. How can the technical manual be accessed? You should be able to access the technical manual from the subsidized provider report web page. If you were to go right now if you're in front of your computer and you're looking for that technical manual, you should be able to go to the CDE website, enter that into a web browser, and in the search box on the top right hand corner of the CDE website, you should be able to enter Subsidized Provider Report and find the Subsidized Provider Report web page. If you do need additional assistance with accessing the technical manual, please email CDMIS and we can provide that technical assistance. Will there be a test site like the 801A? Another really great question. As you'll see in the live demo this is actually a real-time file upload, so you'll get the results for your file immediately instead of having to wait an hour or even 24 hours like you're accustomed to with the 801A. So you'll actually find you don't really need a test site because you're able to test files immediately. If you have questions about revising reports after the posted deadlines, please email us those questions directly so that we can consider each of the different situations and provide more targeted assistance on how you would resubmit a submission. Again, if you need help with a template file please email CDMIS directly and we should be able to provide some technical assistance with that.

We've got a couple of questions about data definitions, specifically including the subsidy start date. We'll get into the data definitions in the next section I believe and so I'll just hold off on any questions about specific data definitions at this time and we'll we will address data definition questions momentarily. A lot of questions about how to access this webinar and we've got some attendees that have joined since the beginning so I'll repeat that the webinar the slides and a recorded version of the webinar as well as a frequently asked questions page will be available on the subsidized provider report web page by the end of this week. So we're working really hard to get this turned around really quickly for you all because we do understand that it's a new requirement and it's a really heavy lift for everyone involved. So there will be slides there will be a recorded webinar that is available for you all to watch prior to the report deadline if you do continue to have questions or clarifications in the meantime please contact CDMIS Support with any questions or anything that you'd like clarified prior to these slides and recording being posted. We should be able to address via email so please continue to send us your questions so that we can report-- sorry so that we can work-- to meet the report deadlines.

If you have questions about how to comply with different parts of the regulations in regards to how are you noticing your providers who are you directing provider questions to please send those questions via email to CDMIS and we can provide much more targeted direction on how to support your providers and any questions that they may have about this new data collection.

And with that I am going to jump into the data definition section. I think this is where we will have a lot more really great questions. This is a new report for us all and so I really highly encourage questions and we will continue to kind of refine these data definitions and will enhance the technical manual with your questions so please continue to ask the difficult questions, the initial questions that you guys have and we will work to resolve those through the frequently asked questions and the data definitions. So in this section we have Subsidized Provider Report data definition highlights CDMIS staff have highlighted data definitions on the following slides. These are data definitions that vary significantly from the CDD-801A. Advance clarifications of these data definitions may be helpful as agencies begin subsidized provider report submission.

Ok so we're going to jump right into probably the most new, different, complicated data definition of the subsidized provider report so I'm going to take a deep breath everybody else can take a nice deep breath too. It doesn't look as scary as it is, I promise. Right now we're going to cover the data definition for the combined contract code. So the combined contract code is a field in the subsidized provider report. So if you're looking at the technical manual you will see a data definition for the combined contract code. In order to create the data that goes into that field agencies can use the table below to determine what the combined contract code would be. So the place values for the combined contract code must be assigned in the order on the slides and in the table. So we'll begin with the following contract type CCTR, CMIG, CMAP, CSPP, CFCC, CAPP, C1AP, C2AP, and C3AP. So agencies will enter a 1 into the place value for each contract type to note its applicability for a given provider. So agencies would enter a 1 into the place value if a provider was paid for that contract type. It is 0 if a provider was not paid for that contract type. So this is just a template table that as you are determining which combined contract code to enter you would fill out.

On the following slides we will cover examples of how you would complete the combined contract code in the subsidized provider report. So here is an example. Example 1: a provider paid from a single contract. The table below identifies each place value of the combined contract code for a provider who provide services only in a CCTR contract. So you'll see that the contract types applicability for CCTR is indicated with a 1. The CMIG is 0; CMAP: 0, CSPP: 0, CFCC: 0, CAPP: 0, C1AP: 0; C2AP: 0, C3AP: 0. For example 1 the agency would report a combined contract code of “100000000” into the subsidized provider report. You would not include quotation marks, just those numbers to indicate a provider who is paid from a single CCTR contract.

Here's another example. For the combined contract code this is an example of a provider paid from multiple contracts. The table below identifies each place value of the combined contract code for providers who provide services under a C2AP and a C3AP contract. The contract type applicability is as follows: CCTR: 0, CMIG: 0, CMAP: 0, CSPP: 0, CFCC: 0, CAPP: 0, C1AP: 0, C2AP: 1, C3AP: 1. So for example 2 the agency would report a combined contract code as “000000011” (without the quotation marks) to indicate that a provider was paid for multiple contracts, both C2AP and CAP. So if you're with me so far I think that's the most complicated data definition there is. And again you'll just make sure to list each contract type exactly in the order that's provided on the tables, also provided in the technical manual, and enter a 1 if the contract type applies to the provider and a zero if the contract type does not apply.

Now we'll cover the data definition for the local provider identification number. So the local provider identification number is a unique identifier or case number that an agency assigns to a provider. This field is optional. The same local provider ID number cannot be used for more than one provider in a file and the local provider ID number should not change between SPR report periods. The local provider ID number cannot contain a social security number, the first and/or last name of the provider, or the child served, cannot contain symbols, including dashes, slashes, or commas. And it cannot contain more than 15 characters. So you'll notice that the local provider identification number is very similar to the family identification case number in the 801A report where each agency may have a number that they assign to each provider to identify that particular provider in your local data system. You would enter the provider identification number in your subsidized provider report.

As indicated on these slides the provider license number is also a field that is not currently required in the 801A so we figured that we would highlight it in the SPR data definitions for this webinar as well. The provider license number field indicates the license number of the provider. The information is not required for license-exempt providers. The license-- the provider license number must contain nine digits including leading zeros. So if you're in like counties one through nine you will can include that initial zero before your license number. And I think that's the most important bit on this slide is you will receive an error message if your license number does not contain nine digits. So just make sure you get all nine of those digits including leading zeros. You'll enter the license number exactly as it appears on the license from the California Department of Social Services, Community Care Licensing Division.

The subsidy start date is another field that is new to the subsidized provider report so we're highlighting it here. The subsidy start date information field indicates the first day a provider was paid by the agency for providing state subsidized child care services. This information field is required. The subsidy start date cannot be after the report period so you can't say I'm going to pay someone in the future. So I'm reporting them now and you must enter the date in the following format mm/dd/yyyy. You will include the slashes for these date fields.

And finally we'll cover the subsidy end date data definition. The subsidy end date information fields indicates the date the provider was last paid for providing state subsidized child care. This information field should be left blank for providers who have not ended subsidy care. The subsidy start date cannot be before the subsidy-- sorry the subsidy end date cannot be before the subsidy start date. And you would enter the date in the same format which is mm/dd/yyyy. Again you will include the slashes.

So at this point we will pause. I will give you guys a good long pause for this one because I know there's a lot of questions. So in this check point for data definitions we can answer any questions about the following data definitions that were highlighted including the combined contract code, the local provider identification number, the provider license number, the subsidy start date, and the subsidy end date. If you have questions regarding data definitions that were not highlighted you may also submit those. Please keep in mind that these data definitions are new for everyone so if you have questions please do submit them, we'll we will address them to the best of our ability. Some of the data definition responses may have a big impact on the data that's being collected, so we may not be able to answer all of your questions immediately but if there is a question that we identify as needing maybe a policy interpretation or legal review to make sure that we're complying with this new statute properly and we will make note of those and issue the responses on the FAQ page for any definition that we aren't able to clarify today. So again we're going to pause for a moment for about three to five minutes for any attendee who would like to submit a question through the Q&A regarding data definitions.

Okay I am going to hop on and start answering questions please bear with me as I am reading them and answering them kind of as I go, but continue to send them in. We're getting some really great questions and I hope you guys are-- hope you guys are finding this valuable. For the subsidy start date can it be for any contract or only for the one that is indicated in the contract field? So the subsidy start date should be the first date that a provider received a state subsidized payment. So if the payment came from the state regardless of which program type it was for you should enter the initial date of subsidy start.

If the first day of provider was paid was you know ten, twenty-five years ago you should enter the first date that a provider was paid. So if you do know that it was you know August 20, 2008 when a provider was initially paid you would enter that in the provider start date field. If you don't have knowledge of a provider being paid prior to you know you having them again or them contracting with your agency you would just enter the first date that you gave that provider a subsidized payment. And so again just report the date that you know for the first date when you provided a subsidy to that provider no matter how early that date was. So again not necessarily the first day of the fiscal year. It's going to be the first day that provider received a state subsidy, period. And if a provider takes a month off is there an end date and a restart date? So the start date should always reflect the first date that a provider received services--or sorry that our provider received a subsidy. And if you know, okay, I'm not paying this provider you would enter an end date into the end date field for that report month. If the provider came back you would retain their initial start date and if they are active you would not indicate an end date,

Someone asked whether the test server will be available to assist with submission. We will show a demo in just a moment and you'll see that the SPR app file upload function is actually in real time. So you will see that there's not really a need for the test site because the files get validated just about immediately. It takes maybe 30 seconds even for the kind of the largest files so you should be able to test your file on the live site just fine. I, again, will have to direct questions regarding Stage One to the Department of Social Services at this time. And just kind of a general note again for anyone who may have missed it each of the slides. So a file with the slides as well as the recording of the webinar as well as a frequently asked questions page will be posted to the subsidized provider report web page by the end of the week so you will have a place to access these PowerPoint slides as well as a recorded version of this webinar online by the end of the week.

And I also notice that there's a lot of questions about-- or a lot of folks who said “I sent this question.” We do apologize for that but I do want to assure you that we've taken all the questions that we've received and we're working to respond to those. If you do have a question about the status of your response, we do encourage you to continue emailing us. By all means, hold us accountable, ask us for a follow-up that is perfectly fine. And we're more than happy to give that to you. So again, if you have questions please submit them. If you've already submitted them, resubmit them and follow back up with us and we'll work to get them resolved hopefully before your guys reports are due. Again this is a new report for all of us so we're all working through all of the kinks all of the legal and policy review that's needed for a lot of the really great questions you all are bringing up.

The error report will be available immediately. You will see that in the demo. If the subsidy end date is blank you must leave the report blank. So there's a question that says “can I show a dot in the fields if the subsidy end date should be blank?” That will throw an error message. So the format of each of the fields in the subsidized provider report must be followed exactly in order for your file to pass. So if you were to enter a dot in fields where you're instructed to leave the field blank, that will result in an error message and your file will not be saved.

If you have a question about a notice and a report please direct that to CDMIS and we can answer that directly. There's a question about whether the start date is the first day that a provider was providing services or the first day that you actually paid the provider. The subsidy start date should be the very first day that you paid the provider. The report period would indicate the month in which care was provided. That subsidy start date would indicate the first day that a subsidy was received for care. You should report the start date as far back as you have available. So the question is, “how far back should we report it if you've been paying a provider for several years?” Again the first date that you have on your records for having paid a provider should be entered into the subsidy start date field. The report schedule is available on the subsidized provider report web page. We did have a question about when reports are due. The unique provider ID number is the same number that the agency assigns the provider? That is correct. So it's going to be whatever number that you use at your agency to identify the provider would be entered into the unique provider ID field. And that's really just a reference primarily. It's a reference point for you all to be able to connect the data that you're submitting in the SPR back to your data system.

We have a question whether or not the data definitions are elaborated in the technical manual. Yes they are. That is the absolute best place to find the data definitions and the file format for the subsidized provider report. The sub—“Is the subsidy start date the contracts date or the date of the first check payment?” Again your subsidy start date should be the first date that you provided a subsidy to the provider. If the file format is incorrect is the submission going to be rejected? Yes will you have to follow the file format that is outlined in the technical manual exactly as it appears in the technical manual. Are all of these mandatory fields? Another really good question. The technical manual will identify whether a field is required or not. If you want to see really quickly whether it feels is required you can check out the file format specifications in the subsidized provider report technical manual. I believe is on page 10 where that starts and it's a just a two-page table. And it's got just kind of each of the columns that are in the report listed in that table. And it lets you know whether or not that particular field is required. If you have questions about how to report specific cases of a provider I would have to direct you to CDMIS at this time to get those questions that are specific to certain providers stopping and starting resolved appropriately. What if I have a provider that's been serving for 12 years? How do I find a start date? Again the earliest payment date that you have in your records should be indicated on the subsidized provider report. We can't ask you to report something that you don't have a record of. But you will be, you know, expected to report what you do have a record of.

Okay I'm going to pause there on questions. We can continue-- please continue to send those in. Again, any questions that we're able to answer during the time we have for the webinar we will answer. Any questions that were not addressed during the webinar we will be taking a transcript of all of the questions that you send in and condensing those into questions for the FAQ page which will be posted to the subsidized provider report web page. So again we will address each of these questions in the time that we have available to address them. So at this point I'm going to jump back over into the PowerPoint and we're going to go over how to submit the subsidized provider report.

You'll see on the slides there's a step-by-step on how to submit the provider report, so I'll quickly go through each of the steps that are on the slides and then I'm actually going to hand it over to Haley, who a lot of you all may be familiar with and interacting with on the phones right now for technical support or via email, and she's just going to give you a step-by-step walkthrough of each of the steps that I'll cover on the following two slides. So how to submit the subsidized provider report, step one: You'll log on to the CDMIS Production website and navigate to the main menu. Select the function Subsidized Provider Report Upload. Select the Submit button. Select the file to upload. You'll locate the file on your computer, select the browse or select file button, depending on which browser you're using, then the Open File dialog box is displayed and to locate the file on the computer you'll select the Browse button. Search your computer for the file. Click the file name. Select the Open button, then you'll select the submit button to process the file and you'll see after a few seconds the file is either accepted or rejected. So we'll pause here for just a moment. We're going to jump over into the CDMIS to give you a live demonstration of how one of our test files behaves in the CDMIS. Please continue to send any questions that you have about these steps or about the live demo into the Q & A and we'll address them at the checkpoint.

Hi everyone my name is Haley. I work in the CDMIS support office. I'll be doing a live demonstration of the Subsidized Provider Report upload function. During the demonstration I will first upload a file with no errors and show what appears when your file is successfully uploaded to the CDMIS. Then I will upload a file with three errors to give an example of what you will see when you get error messages for your file. To begin, we're going to navigate to the main menu of the CDMIS. In the select a function drop down menu, we will select the function titled “Upload Subsidized Provider Report.” You do not need to select a report month and year as the report period for your file should be indicated in the report month and year field. You can click Submit to navigate to the file upload function. On your end, it will only show the menu for your agency but since I'm on administrator view I'm going to go to a sample agency. So this is the screen that you'll see when you're going to upload your file. You'll click the choose file button and select the file that you're going to upload from your computer. First, I'm going to upload a file with no errors. So I'm clicking upload, as you can see the file was successfully uploaded to the website. You will see the phrase “Your source file has been successfully uploaded to CDE.”

Okay, so at this time I'm going to upload another file. I'm going to click that button here going to navigate back to the test agency's page. So now I'm going to upload a file with errors to show an example of the kinds of error messages that you might receive for your file. The file in question has three specific errors. In line one of the file, the provider home FIPS code is missing. In line three of the file, a period has been entered after the providers middle initial, and in line five of the file, the provider license number is one digit too short. So let's go ahead and upload the file and see what happens. I'm going to select “choose file.” I'm going to select the file from my computer that I want to upload. I'm going to click the button that says “upload file.” It will upload. What I'm seeing here is the provider file error list. From this screen, you will see an error report that shows you the exact line number in your file where an error is occurring. You can scan that line on the error report and it will show you the exact column and field where the error message is located. So in line one we can see that there is an error: “The home FIPS code cannot be blank.” In line three, if we scan along the line, we'll see that there is an error in the middle initial field. It is showing that there is an invalid value. The reason we are receiving this error is because there is a period entered after the provider’s middle initial. You should only be entering one letter in this field with no period. In line five, if we scan across the line, we see here that the error message is located in the license number column. It says invalid value. The reason for this is because the license number is not 9 digits and it must be exactly 9 digits.

Note that you can export your error message to Excel. Your error report, excuse me, so that you can see a full Excel file of any error messages that are in your file. After reviewing your error report and making the necessary changes in your file you can re-upload your Subsidized Provider Report until it passes with no errors. When the upload is successful, you will see the message that reads “Your source file has been successfully uploaded to CDE.” I hope that this demonstration was helpful. If you have any additional questions or concerns please don't hesitate to reach out to the CDMIS Support Office for guidance. It will likely be me who will be answering your emails and calls and we can go over this process over the phone if you have any specific questions about the file upload process. At this time we're going to pause for a brief moment if you have any questions about the file upload process continue submitting them in the Q&A section and I will hand it back over to Charday to wrap up our webinar.

Okay so we are back now. What we'll do at this point, I'm just going to finish off the webinar. I've just got a few slides and then we can spend the rest of the time answering each of your questions. I saw that some people had a question about maybe viewing the actual template files that we were uploading so I can certainly show you what that looks like in just a moment. Okay so we made it to the checkpoint on how to submit the Subsidized Provider Report. In this section, we covered the following topics: How to submit this Subsidized Provider Report; Accepted files as well as rejected files; and so we will answer any questions about each of these topics as well as any of the rest of the topics that were covered in this webinar right now. So what's next: a recorded version of the webinar will be made available on the subsidized provider report web page; The 801 reporting webinar on September 18th will feature a brief update on some of the FAQs that we're discussing here; And the SPR FAQ web page will be uploaded up, sorry, updated, periodically to include additional questions and report clarifications that we're going over now. So I'll leave the contact information slide up if anybody wants to just start drafting an email to CDMIS right now, you're more than welcome to do that as we work through some of the questions that we've received. Through our contact information again, the CDMIS office can be contacted by phone at (916) 445-1907 and by email at CDMIS@cde.ca.gov. Visit the CDMIS support web page or the CDMIS website.

I want to thank all of the attendees who have come with all of your attention who have brought all of your great questions. I think that this is kind of a learning experience for everyone involved it's a new regulation and it can be a lot, quite overwhelming at times, so we're going to do our best for the next 40 minutes or so to make it through the rest of the questions and concerns that you guys have brought up. We really just want to use this time to resolve any questions that we weren’t able to and, any questions, and collect any other questions that we're not able to resolve so that we can update that FAQ page appropriately and within enough time before your guys’ report is due on August 30^th, next Friday. So at this point I'll cover a couple of the questions about the Subsidized Provider Report that we've received so far and after these kind of SPR questions I'm just going to again go back through the list of questions that may not have been resolved in other sections and we can kind of have an ongoing Q&A for anyone who's interested. Anyone who maybe wants 40 minutes of their time back is welcome to tune in and listen to this Q&A session once it's recorded on Friday, that's completely up to you, but at this point we're just in Q&A and that is the end of the presentation slides that were prepared for this webinar.

Okay so one of the questions that we had during the SPR demo was “can we see a copy of that file that was uploaded and you know accepted in the file that was uploaded and rejected.” So at this time I am going to attempt to share that file with you all, so just bear with me for a moment and you should in just a moment, if not already, be able to see this notepad – this notepad file. So this is what the file looks like that's being uploaded to the CDMIS for the purposes of the Subsidized Provider Report. As you'll see the file starts, excuse me, the file starts off with a line number, and then comes over to the vendor number, then it's the report period, then a local provider ID number, then you'll start to see a provider's first and last name. These are fictional characters, of course. Ten points for anybody who can tell what show these are from. But anyway, this is what the file looks like. To create our original file, you can create this file in Excel as long as all of your settings are formatted properly. If you would like a copy of the template file that you're now viewing please give us -- send us an email and we should be able to help you out with a template file and work through any technical difficulties that you may have while using and adapting the template file. So this is the good template file. As you can see it's been formatted appropriately. It’s tab delimited, which means that there's a tab in between each of the columns that you see in the spreadsheet and that is how the system is reading each distinct data field. You'll notice there's no headers similar to your 801A file, but hopefully this answers the question of “what does the file look like?” and “can I get a copy of the template?”

Okay so at this time I am going to stop sharing this particular notepad file and go back to our presentation. Okay so I'm going to continue to address, again, any questions that have come up during the course of the webinar and you may continue to submit questions as we go on and I will stay here until noon as scheduled and to answer all the questions that we’re able.

So one of the questions that we have, actually a lot of questions, are about the legislative authority for collecting this report or the regulatory authority for collecting the report. So I think there's some folks who maybe they're familiar with bill analysis, may be familiar with Assembly Bill 378, and they're tracking different bills and they're wondering maybe how does this fit into some other legislation that's still out there that maybe hasn't been passed. Please direct any questions that you have about the legislative or regulatory authority for submitting your Subsidized Provider Report to CDMIS and we can point you to the appropriate sections of Education Code and Health and Safety Code where applicable and hopefully that will help. I don't necessarily want to address those verbally because the regulations and the legislation is very clear and so that's a question that I would highly recommend, if you have questions about Health and Safety Code, Title 22, Education Code, requirements that say whether you are or are not supposed to be submitting different types of data, please submit those in writing so that we can adequately actually address and resolve those questions.

We had a question about whether the vendor number is required. The data definition that we highlighted was actually for the local provider ID number. That field is optional. The vendor number, however, is required. We had one question about whether agencies will have to upload a file or whether there will be an add or edit or input or edit or copy forward function that's similar to what agencies currently see in the 801A report. There will not be, or I should say there's not currently a plan to include, an add/edit or web input function for the Subsidized Provider Report. What that means is you won't be able to key your provider information directly into a screen in the CDMIS. You will have to format a file and upload the file in the same manner that Haley instructed us on earlier. So there's only a file upload, there is no web input for the SPR.

We had a question on what to do if a provider is homeless. I would direct that question to CDMIS, again, with that particular provider’s situation and we can address that adequately. Typically, what we do for the 801A report is to enter the agency's address for those providers, but we would encourage you to submit that question in writing so that we can get some more guidance as to how that should be handled. I think that there was also a question, excuse me, I'm sorry. I'm going to just pause one second and go through some more questions and we'll be right back, but continue to send them in. We're getting ready to go kind of back through any questions we might have missed in another section to make sure that we're resolving all that we can right now. So just give me one second, I'm going to read through the questions and we'll be right back in about a minute.

Okay so we're just going to jump right back in, answer questions that have been submitted throughout the webinar. Please continue to submit any questions that you have. Alternatively, if you'd like a written record sooner than we post the FAQs, I would encourage you to email any questions that were not resolved to CDMIS@cde.ca.gov and we can also provide that written response in case you aren't getting one during the webinar. Or if you just would like to you know get your response in your own time and not wait for me to get to your question, you can also just email us.

So someone said they were unclear about the month off question. “Should we end if they did not receive money that month, but we know they will be back the following month?” So you will include providers on your Subsidized Provider Report who actually were paid during that month, and if the provider was not paid during that month, then you would not include them on your Subsidized Provider Report. You would retain the earliest Subsidized Provider Subsidy Start Date and you would only enter an end date if you know that the provider is not returning for care.

So if multiple families are using the same provider, each provider should only be listed in your file one time. So even if that provider provides care for multiple different families under multiple different contract types, you would indicate that in the combined contract code field and you would only enter one row for that single provider, even if multiple families use the provider or the provider provided services under multiple contract types.

“Has CDMIS been in contact with any of the child care software programs for easier submission to the CDMIS site?” So I think we've gotten a couple of questions from software vendors, either directly or via an agency proxy, and that is great. We need back that type of communication so that we can make the SPR submission easier.

We do encourage more questions to come through and again we are resolving each of the questions that we have received. Sometimes they require a policy or a legal interpretation of the response, so it may take us a little bit longer, but if you have submitted a question and you'd like a status update you're more than welcome to follow up and hold us accountable. We can provide a status update on the response to your questions.

If you would like an example of the file format please email us and we should be able to email you a copy of one of our good template files.

The Subsidy Start Date – yes, it should be the check date for the first payment that was made.

We have a suggestion on changing the names of fields which, hey, that's great. If you have other suggestions, please continue to send them in. It will help us kind of get a better understanding of how data is being collected and what you are able to report a little bit easier, and also the nuances, so that we can clarify those in FAQs. So even if you don't have a question and you have suggestions, hey, we're open to those too. Please continue to send them in.

This is -- this is really great. Subsidy Start Date is the date a provider was first paid, not necessarily the service month. That start date should indicate the first date that a provider was paid. Now, the report period should indicate the month in which the provider provided services.

If you are looking for the Subsidized Provider Report web page, I could actually just walk you through where to find that since we've got a little bit of time. I can walk you through the CDE main page, just give me one second here to switch computers and then I'll come back, share the screen, and I can show you guys how to find a lot of really good resources on the website, including the CDMIS support resources and updates, as well as the Subsidized Provider Report web page and technical manual. So I'll jump over to the other computer really quickly and give you guys a demo of how to access some really good information on CDE’s web page and that might be a good place for you guys to start. So give me just one second, okay?

So we're back now. I'm currently, I think, on the PowerPoint is what you guys can see. Give me just one moment, I'm about to share my web browser. So you should be looking at a Google Chrome web browser. In the address bar, I have entered cde.ca.gov and this is the main California Department of Education website. If you're looking for any information about early learning and care, you can find us either by entering search terms into the search box at the top right-hand corner of the website. Alternatively, if you want to get to kind of our main contractor information page, you would navigate to the navigation bar at the top of the CDE website. There is a menu item for specialized programs from the navigation bar. And so, if you click the Specialized Programs menu item, you'll see a bunch of different sections of specialized programs. You'll see Adult Education, Charter Schools, Special Education, Child Development—a lot of different specialized programs that we have here in the department. Underneath Child Development, you'll see Contractor Information and so this is where pretty much anything that the Early Learning and Care Division posts is located.

So I'm going to select Contractor Information under Child Development under Specialized Programs on the CDE website. And now I'm brought to the Contractor Information web page and you'll see an alphabetical list of each of the items that we have posted to the contractor information web page—excuse me—and this is again specifically for the Early Learning and Care Division. This is a really good page to bookmark if you're just looking for resources and that cde.ca.gov/sp/cd/ci. And in alphabetical order you'll be able to find information about the Child Development Management Information System, as well as the Subsidized Provider Report.

If we start with the Child Development Management Information System, you will be brought down to an anchor on the page. You'll click Child Development Management Information System once more and you'll be brought to the CDMIS Support web page. And so we mentioned update #26 will be posted—should be posted now but it may be a little bit longer. So look, here it is. Perfect! So you'll see on the Updates page we talked about in the webinar today CDMIS update number 26. And so this is information about the Subsidized Provider Report Technical Assistance Webinar. You can get a link to the technical manual. You see information about the CDMIS-801 reporting webinar—it's coming up in September. You'll see a note about delaying a transition to reporting enrollment—so we're basically going to keep the 801 a report the same for you guys for a while longer. Technical difficulties with age and income validation—you'll see a note about that as well. So this is how you would access the Updates page.

I'm going to navigate back to the CDMIS Updates web page then back to the CDMIS Support web page. Then I'm just going to go back to the Contractor Information web page, scroll back up to the top, and again I'm back to the alphabetical list of contractor information for ELCD contractors. In order to get to the Subsidized Provider Report web page, click Subsidize Provider Reports. It will drop me down to an anchor where I can find the Subsidized Provider Report and here you will also find a web page that has all of the information that we've been discussing today. You should see at the bottom of this table, by the end of this week, another row for the webinar, as well as, another row for FAQs. So this web page is the web page that will be updated with the PowerPoint, the recorded webinar, as well as, frequently asked questions. Again, you can get that from Specialized Programs, Child Development, and Contractor Information from the CDE website. So hopefully that was valuable. I would, again, very much recommend bookmarking the Contractor Information web page because it does have a lot of really good information for all Early Learning and Care Division contractors.

So at this point I'm just going to jump back into the PowerPoint and answer any more questions that I am able to answer during the 20 minutes or so that we have left okay. So just a few more questions I think that are new here. So if a field is optional do you need to add a blank column or can you eliminate the column? So every single column must be included in your file. So we went over the file format earlier, every file has to have 24 columns. That is the number of data fields in order for the system to properly read the file and check it for accuracy. Every single field must be included, even if it does not apply to all of your providers. Again, you will enter the field as a column but you may not necessarily have anything in that column. If you do not have anything to enter into a data field, you should leave the data field blank. Do not enter any punctuation—not a period, not a dash, not an em-dash, not a parenthesis. Do not enter anything into a field if it does not apply. Please leave it blank. Do not put N/A if it does not apply. Just leave it blank completely if the data field does not apply. The system will ask you to enter data if you have left a blank and it feels where data is required.

Are the login—is the login for the SPR the same as the 801-A? Yes, it is exactly the same. You are going to be submitting it through the CDMIS the same way that you would submit your 801-A report, you'll just select a different function in order to get to the SPR, as Haley demonstrated earlier.

So there's a request for clarification. The question says: Are we reporting based on service month or based on the pay date? So the subsidy start date should indicate the first day that our provider received a payment. The report month should indicate all providers who provided services during that report month. If that needs further clarification, we can definitely—you know—continue to elaborate on that. And we'll post that as an FAQ as well, because I do understand it's a little bit confusing with the report period and the start date and the end date. So we'll refine the guidance on that a little bit.

Um—someone’s having trouble looking for a Browse button to upload a file. I think that's something that I noticed earlier, too. I would recommend trying a different browser. So if you're currently in Internet Explorer, I would recommend maybe Edge or Chrome or Firefox. Maybe just try another browser if you're finding that you're not able to use the Subsidized Provider Report immediately. It may also be that you just need to completely sign out of CDMIS because we did recently just update the system. So if you're not able to access the Subsidized Provider Report, I would recommend using another browser, making sure that you're completely signed out, and if that does not work, please call or email CDMIS for assistance and we can take a look at what—we might be able to figure out for you.

If the test database is not available and a file is rejected, can it be fixed and resubmitted the same day? Yeah, you can resubmit your file and you know immediately after that's not a problem at all. Any file that's rejected, it's not ever saved to the database. So if you get a file rejection or an error, you can continue to upload that file as quickly as the system will let you do it. You could—you know—upload five files in 10 minutes and correct your report. We were hoping that the real-time processing on the provider Subsidized Provider Report would be helpful for agencies as you work to kind of resolve issues with this new report. So you can absolutely resubmit files within the same day, within the same hour even. You can resubmit them as fast and as often as the system will allow you.

So, first and last name fields are required for the Subsidized Provider Reports. You should be entering the actual provider's name or the license holder’s name. If you have like business names or site names or facility names, please email us so that we can kind of provide some better guidance and get kind of a better understanding of what information you do collect and provide more targeted technical assistance for agencies that might be dealing with just having a business name or a facility name.

We have a question. It says: do you have any requirements on the column headers? For example, will the system accepts a slash if it is in one of the headers? For instance, report year slash month? So, similar to your 801-A files, the SPR files should not include a header. If you do include a header, it will not follow the rules for every column in the file, so it will produce an error message. So, you do not want to include a header row in your final file submission.

Can I submit the information now? Is the website working? Yes, the Subsidized Provider Report upload function was added to the CDMIS, I think, yesterday afternoon. So, we did push out a web page update to the CDMIS at about 2:00 p.m. yesterday, so you should be able to go in right now and submit your provider Subsidized Provider Report.

We have a question. I'll just read it: if we have both a Center CSPP and CCTR and a CFCC, I understand that we need to report the FCC providers but for the center—which has teachers and interns—do we report them as well? For this question, I would refer you back to the definition of a provider as it's listed in—it's in Management Bulletin 19-06. It's also in the slides that we covered today, but the providers are actually being provided with a subsidy for caring for the children. It would not include teachers or interns if they do not meet the definition of a provider that's established in law. And if you have a question about who is a provider and who isn't a provider or interpretation of that law, I would encourage you to send us an email and we can give you a written response on who is required to be included in your Subsidized Provider Report. If you have questions about the notice to providers, I would also encourage you to email CDMIS with that question. As well, the instructions on the notice and the notice were previously provided by our policy office, but we can kind of help with that—liaison—if you need a little bit more clarification on how are you sending a notice to providers.

Oh, okay, so we have another good question. It says it may have been a different question from another listener but we wanted to know is: the vendor number was required in the notice to providers—not on the report? So, for the notice to providers we would strongly recommend that you enter a vendor number on there just in case your—the event your providers call CDMIS, we have an idea of who they're actually working with and we have a way to confirm that they are actually affiliated with one of our contractors. So we would highly recommend putting that vendor number on the notice to providers, just for—you know—the sake of administering the law as it's written.

Do we have to include providers in this report whom are contacted with the agents—I think contracted with the agency who do not have any children enrolled in their program? So if a provider is not currently providing state subsidized care, they would not be entered into your report and so that means they are actually being subsidized for care during that report month. So if you're not subsidizing them, you would not include them. If they have no children or families going to them, you would not be including them in your SPR.

Are there any requirements for the file name? No, they are not. We would recommend that you name your file something that makes sense to you and you kind of keep good records of having submitted your files just as good practice. And the cut—the customary—and the file name for—you know Windows computer, you can't put any of the—you know—strange characters that your computer would—you know—your computer wouldn't allow you to save a file name if you entered strange things. So, the same kind of restrictions on file names that are on your computer—you know—you will have the same ones when updating or—sorry—uploading those to the CDMIS.

Oh we have a note from NoHo. It says that NoHo’s here. They'll have the SPR available to our customers by the end of the week. So that's great news! And, again, we're here to help resolve any technical difficulties that either vendors or agencies are experiencing when trying to get this SPR up and running. It's a new requirement for all of us. So, again, we really welcome and are encouraged by all the questions you guys are sending us because it lets us know exactly where we need to target our assistance and clarification effort. So thank you again. So, again, from NoHo, they'll have the SPR available to their customers by the end of the week.

So, someone asked: if our provider’s name is stored in a single field—duty to separate it into the first and last name? Yes, you are required to submit to your data exactly as the file format specifications indicates. If you don't have a last name entered into a field, it will produce an error message. Each of the fields that are required are listed on page 10 to 11 of the technical manual and you are required to enter the appropriate values into the fields that require an entry.

If you're continuing to have technical difficulties with using the upload button, please do send us an email and we can look into that.

Again, unfortunately, I don't have an update on ChildPlus. I would recommend you contact your vendor directly if you have questions on what—you know—when things that your contracted with them to have will be available.

Someone said: thank you, NoHo. This is the best information I've heard all day. We've got a lot of thank you’s for NoHo.

Yeah, please email us if you're having technical difficulties. It may just be that your computer is kind of saving your login information and you need to completely exit the system and come back in order to get that function. But if there's something on our end, as soon as I leave this room, I'm going to go take a look at it. And, again, just email us if you're having issues and we'll make sure to get you guys a response.

At this point, I think we've answered just about all of the questions that have come in. I do sincerely apologize if I missed one. We've got quite a lot of questions in a really funny system for answering them here, so hopefully we got to all of them. If we didn't, please contact us using the information on the slide. We do encourage you to continue to submit questions. We thank you for your diligence in submitting your reports accurately and timely and complying with these new regulations and the new legislation that's come down. Again, please do continue to contact us for any additional technical assistance needs. So at this time we will conclude the webinar and we encourage any agencies who still require further assistance to contact CDMIS.

Thanks and everyone have a great day!