Procurement

The Procurement tab in FRMS takes you to several purchasing related options, including UT Market.

If you don't have the time or inclination to read all of the information in the section below, here is the short and fast benefit you can get from accessing UT Market:

• When you need to purchase something for your unit or a faculty member, you can use the UT Market link to browse the available products.
   
• By going directly into UT Market to source products, you cut down on the time needed to complete the order because you've selected from approved UT vendors and the person processing won't need to also search and confer.
   
• You can, at the very least, share the link to the specific product or the product details via email or the online form you fill out for submitting purchasing requests. 
   
• If you want to go a step beyond, there's a way for you to select the products you want, drop them in a cart and then assign the cart to your official purchaser in CoLA. But if you want to learn about that, you'll have to get through the long version!

UT Market, a subsystem of the Financial Resource Management System (FRMS), is an electronic procurement system that enables shoppers to browse for products across multiple suppliers, select items for purchase by placing them into a include shopping cart, and assign the cart to an authorized departmental buyer. Buyers make the decision to check carts out of UT Market and then turn them into requisitions in FRMS Procurement or submit them as orders to internal suppliers. Final approved requisitions are then electronically dispatched to suppliers as purchase orders.

Authorized departmental shoppers and buyers enter UT Market from the eCommerce tab in FRMS: https://utdirect.utexas.edu/apps/frms/utmarket/ecommerce/.

Orders initiated through UT Market result in many benefits to the department:

• Interactions with suppliers are electronic. This eliminates the need to call, e-mail, or fax suppliers to get quotes, or to inform them of approved purchase orders.
• When purchase orders are electronically received, suppliers immediately begin processing orders for shipment.  This greatly reduces the amount of time it takes a supplier to fill an order.
• Because details about items to be ordered are received directly from the supplier, less data entry is required on UT Market orders.
• Items are still shipped to either Central Receiving or directly to the department. Regardless of where items are delivered, all invoices and payments for UT Market purchase orders will be processed by Accounts Payable in Payment Services. Orders from internal suppliers are paid via the IDT (VT5) process. The payment process is initiated by the internal supplier.

Buyers and Shoppers in UT Market

Buyers are users who are authorized to create electronic requisition documents in FRMS Procurement. Buyers are authorized to check out carts in UT Market and turn them into electronic requisition documents in FRMS Procurement or into orders to internal suppliers.

Shoppers are users who can browse product catalogs in UT Market but do not have authorizations to create electronic requisition documents. They can create and put items into carts, but those carts must be routed to a departmental buyer in order for them to become orders.

Each department must determine how UT Market carts will be routed before they are assigned to the departmental buyer. For example, a department may choose to have staff members create and put items into a cart, then assign the cart to a supervisor for review. The supervisor can review or edit the shopping cart and then assign it to the department's buyer. The buyer would then check out the cart from UT Market and turn it into an electronic requisition document or into an order to an internal supplier. Contact a department’s buyer for more information about that department’s procurement procedures.

• And yes indeed, there is a handout - not just any ol' handout, but a 16-page UT Market Shoppers Manual that's a sure-fire way to melt your brain - hurry while supplies last!
   

If you have sufficient access to FRMS, you may also be able to see this published list of UT suppliers.

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