New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1913-10-27

derstood by those not skilled i'm accounts.
Under the plan which was in force when
took charge OF the department. the
vouchers or bills for claims against the
city. whe,, received from the outside de-
partmcnts. were first handled by the
bookkeeping group. which | afterward
centralized under the direction OF the
auditor of disbursements. II was neces-
sarv under the accounting plan Of the
office that each Of these vouchers or ie-
partmental bills should be entered, first.
in the fund ledger, and Of not contract
payment second. in the claimants
ledger. and If a contract payment, second
in the contract ledger
These bills or vouchers are received
from the departments on large schedules.
forty or fifty at time. and II was noth-
Ing unusual to have several hundred OF
them received within an hour or two IN
any one of the working days The Ola
plan was to nave clerk take handful
Of these bills or vouchers and 20 10 the
fund ledgerS to post them. The seVtial
volumes Of these fund lcdgors carried In
the aggregate from ten to fifteen thol-
sand accounts / have seen line Of hve
or six clerks standing waiting to post
the vouchers or bills assigned TO them IN
some one book which was being used by
another clerk. That meant a serious lCSS
of time for that clerk before he couIh
make the postings required. The same
congestion existed at the claimants
ledger and at the contract ledgers ~
result. the original posting OF Dill OF
voucher. when received in the depart
ment. ordinarily took not less than t"en-
ty-four hours FOR that initial process ana
REPRESENTED a large amount Of time vast
cd in waiting by the posting clerks.
Now, here came the application OF re-
organization and efficiency methods INTO
the handling Of this simple problem.
prov,ded that each bill or voucher when
received should be put in the hands oi
,vpewritlng operators Ot required only
two). These operators made a pos'lhb
slim for each Of the vouchers, indicating
the fund in which they should De
charged the character Of the expendi-
ture and all other necessary posting da'a'
Time Saved in Payments.
The writing of the posting slips per
mitted. first. that where the voucher or
| hill had heretofore been delayed In its
progress for twenty-four hours In It's
| passage its time with the bookkeepers
was cut down TO about thirty minutes
| the voucher being sent forward "l'mh
that time, but there was left behind on
| the posting slip all the necessary POSING
data for the bookkeeping division. ana
that work could be done without con-
| fusion or delay.
"Besides reducing by this one process
the time OF the passage OF payment
through the Finance Department Dy
practically twenty-four hours, ! was ao'e
| IN release five or six clerks TO other
work OF the bookkeeping division, whlch
under the existing conditions was neglect
ed. and properly to provide for which /
either had to Introduce some such econ
omv system or seek new men for the
work | was thereby able 10 do the
added work and 10 bring up to DATE
neglected work without increased cost
| I'm salaries. and TO increase the total ELL
| cheney of my staff Of fifty clerks in that
division by at least - TO q per cent. l
did the work better and more accurately
than before. and saved twenty-four hours
of time In the progress OF the bills.
In my speeches during the campaign
I have referred to the fact that | have
reduced the average time Of payment OF
CITY claims. which had been from twenty
10 thirty days under the preceding ad-
| minstration, to from five TO seven days
under the present system. This reduc-
ton in time was accomplished through
improvements OF processes all along the
| line OF like character to the one cited.
In no case was the reduction in time ac-
complished without giving actually more
time to each process, permitting greater
accuracy and giving better results than
| before.
my observations OF work In the vail
Gus city departments Cwhile in many In
stances that work is now admirably done)
convinces me that thorough and careful
study can produce just such results In
these DEPARTMENTS as have been able to
I accomplish In my own
|
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