General Services Administration: STAR-PBS' New Program for Tracking and Managing Real Property
Released: 1999-10-12T00:00:00

Letter

Background

“The simultaneous launches of New Pricing, STAR, Occupancy Agreements, and a host of other re-engineered business line processes and software constitutes the most significant change to the way PBS does its business since the creation of the Federal Buildings Fund.”

The mission of PBS is to effectively manage over 8,000 owned and leased federal real properties in the United States. PBS had previously used a computer program called PLUS+ to track and manage its real properties. In 1994, PBS’ Central Office decided that the systems it used to support its mission were antiquated and needed to be replaced. New software was needed to support real property inventory, leasing, space assignments, and billing-related activities. PBS did market research analyses from March 1994 through October 1995, evaluating various real estate software packages.

In March 1994, PBS began its initial efforts to obtain new software. It published a notice in the Commerce Business Daily seeking sources to supply software products to support management operations for leased and owned public buildings. Two responses to this notice were received. However, PBS determined that neither of these sources met its functional needs.

PBS also hired a contractor to identify any existing property management software that might meet its needs. The contractor developed a list of 400 software products that it said spanned all facets of PBS’ business functions. Using PBS’ needs as criteria, this list was reduced to 36 products, then to 6 products for further study. However, PBS concluded that none of these products was capable of satisfying all of its minimum requirements, such as the ability and capacity to concurrently manage over 8,000 owned and leased properties.

During discussions with real estate companies and Fortune 500 companies about real estate practices and procedures, PBS discovered a proprietary system called Permanent Record of Managed Property Transactions (PROMPT). This system had been implemented by AT&T during the summer of 1994. According to PBS officials, PBS ran a 4-month pilot test in 1995 on PROMPT. During this test, 30 percent of PBS’ data were diagrammed and selected data elements on leases and space assignments, as well as other areas, were entered into the system. The test was completed in October 1995. PBS concluded that although PROMPT could meet its needs, the data were not in the format that it wanted.

In July 1996, an acquisition plan for STAR was approved by GSA’s Associate Administrator for Acquisition Policy. This plan called for a sole source contract with AT&T for the use of PROMPT, which PBS renamed STAR. On January 17, 1997, the contract, which included a license agreement granting use of PROMPT in perpetuity unless canceled by the licensee, was signed with AT&T. The contract was for labor hours on a best-effort performance basis to convert PROMPT version 2.7 into STAR, which met PBS’ requirements. The base contract was for $8.3 million. Of this amount, $4.3 million was for the perpetual right to use the national license; the remaining $4.0 million was for software maintenance, a STAR reference guide, training courses and manuals, technical support services, hotline support, and travel. The contract also included several options. If all of these options were exercised, the total cost of the contract would have been $17.0 million. On October 19, 1998, the quantities in one of the options—option four—were increased adding 1,000 users, 310 training classes, 2,900 sets of training manuals, and 23,200 staff hours of technical support. This raised the value of the contract to $21.8 million, which was an increase of $4.8 million.

PBS began rolling out STAR in October 1997, and it was available in all regions by January 1998. The first rent bills generated by STAR were sent to agencies in July 1998.

PBS officials said that the introduction of STAR, among other things, has led to a cultural change that has had many effects in PBS. The officials noted that three changes particularly, affected the realty specialists who maintain STAR. First, realty specialists are now required to enter the data directly into the STAR system; second, they are to be held directly responsible for data accuracy; and third, they are responsible for billing the client agencies. In the past, the realty specialists filled out data entry sheets and data entry clerks entered the data. It was not clear at that time who was responsible for the data accuracy. Further, in the past, realty specialists were not involved in the actual billing of the clients.

Scope and Methodology

To determine what functions STAR performs, we observed how STAR operates; interviewed officials responsible for the development of STAR; and reviewed contract documents, training manuals, and the draft desk reference manual for STAR.

To identify problems that users were experiencing using STAR, we judgmentally selected four regions, two of which were identified by PBS officials as having problems implementing STAR, one that was the lead region for STAR, and one from which congressional staff had received complaints. We also included the headquarters unit to get its perspective on STAR. PBS officials identified the users of STAR at these locations, of which realty specialists and realty assistants were identified as the major users. We then interviewed 128 users, 81 of which were realty specialists or realty assistants, in the 5 locations and asked them about the problems they have had using STAR. Our results cannot be projected to the total universe of STAR users.

Further, we reviewed Help Desk reports that organized user complaints about STAR into subject categories. Because of the way that the issues were categorized in the report and the actual number of items reported to the Help Desk—almost 8,000—we were not able to directly compare our interview-identified problems with those reported to the Help Desk. However, we discussed the problems that users had identified in our interviews, and problems that had been reported to the Help Desk, with the STAR project manager. Further, we reviewed some Help Desk reports that showed specific problems identified.

To identify the steps that PBS has taken or is taking to deal with user problems, we interviewed officials who were responsible for addressing STAR problems and reviewed documents on changes being made to correct problems and improve STAR.

Finally, to determine what PBS has done or plans to do to ensure STAR data integrity, we interviewed officials and reviewed plans addressing PBS’ efforts to ensure that STAR data are accurate, reliable, and consistent. We did not independently assess the accuracy, reliability, and consistency of STAR data.

We did our work at GSA/PBS Headquarters and the National Capital Region in Washington, D.C.; the Southeast Sunbelt Region in Atlanta, GA; the New England Region in Boston, MA; and the Mid-Atlantic Region in Philadelphia, PA. Our work was done in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. We requested comments on a draft of this report from the Administrator of GSA. GSA’s written comments are discussed at the end of this letter.

STAR—A System for Tracking and Administering Real Property

STAR is a real estate inventory management software application that maintains data on projects, leases, buildings, and space assignments that is, who is in what space—in an integrated database environment. The data in STAR have been used to generate bills to clients for their assigned space, develop budget plans, track and manage leases, and evaluate performance. STAR’s input/output functions include direct on-screen access to the data, the ability to update the data, access to standard reports, and the ability to sort data and create ad hoc reports.

To develop the fiscal year 2001 budget, STAR data are being used to support the development of the over $5.5 billion rental revenue estimate and as the basis for the Galaxy system’s roughly $3.1 billion estimate of PBS lease expenditures.

STAR has seven major modules: (1) Space Management, (2) Client Billing, (3) Project Administration, (4) Billing, (5) Work Queue, (6) Administration, and (7) Reports. Table 1 describes each of these modules.

Each of these modules has data entry screens. For example, the Space Management module has a Building Details screen for entering specific building information and a Lease Details screen for entering specific lease information. STAR is supported by a contractor-operated Help Desk to aid users if they have problems with the STAR modules and screens.

PBS identified the following benefits of STAR.

Movement of data and information systems closer to the end user.

Direct access to project, lease, building, and space assignment data.

Electronic notification of expiring leases, unassigned space, and other information.

Integration of information technology into business practices.

Direct input eliminates the need for data transcribers and precludes duplicative keypunching.

Easy report generation and exporting of data to another program.

No need to memorize data element numbers, it uses English.

Tutorials on policies and procedures can be placed into help screens of the system.

Will allow for direct update of agency information.

Improves corporate competitiveness.

In the future, PBS hopes to expand STAR’s capabilities by adding more features, such as direct access by an agency to view the information that STAR maintains concerning the agency’s assigned space.

Users Identified Problems and Benefits for STAR

The 128 users we interviewed identified problems they had experienced using STAR as well as several benefits they saw being derived from the use of STAR. Of the problems identified by users, 17 were mentioned by at least 10 of the users. One problem was mentioned by only one user but was included in this report because it involves accounting for rent revenues. According to the STAR project manager, each type of problem that was reported to us had been reported to the STAR project team through the STAR Help Desk and logged into 16 categories. According to the project manager, the PBS project team has taken actions to (1) resolve the reported problems that the team believed were legitimate and (2) add the requested enhancements that the team believed were appropriate.

Further, 116 of the users we interviewed saw at least 1 benefit from using STAR.

Table 2 gives a breakdown of the problems that individuals we interviewed identified.

The project manager said that the STAR project team had taken action or action was being taken on some of the identified problems. Other problems relate to inherent parts of STAR that cannot be easily fixed or occurred because of decisions made during the STAR developmental process. Further, according to another PBS official, user problems may also be a reaction to learning new business processes, such as New Pricing, and other changes.

Table 3 contains PBS’ responses to examples of the problems we identified through interviews.

The STAR developmental process also affected STAR, particularly in relation to the user friendliness problem. According to the project manager, the time frame for developing STAR covered from January 1997 until October 1997. A different team developed each module in STAR, and communications among the teams may not have been effective because of the time constraints. The project manager thought that the lack of communications may have resulted in inconsistencies and duplication among modules. Further, she said that STAR’s development was hindered because during the development phase it was learned that STAR would have to handle both the old pricing policy for client space and the new pricing policy for client space, not just the new pricing policy as originally planned. This resulted in having to change STAR’s design. Also, she suggested that PBS may have released STAR to the regions before it was ready, resulting in some of the problems that have been identified by users.

The project manager said that a cultural change occurred for realty specialists that probably affected their view of STAR. Before STAR and other business changes, realty specialists were not responsible for entering and maintaining data using a computer or for billing client agencies for their assigned space. With the introduction of STAR, New Pricing, New Billing, and the Occupancy Agreement Tool, additional workloads were placed on the realty specialist. Also, each initiative had its own implementation problems that the realty specialists had to deal with in doing their jobs.

The nearly 8,000 service tickets handled by the Help Desk reflect PBS-wide problems and other issues reported by users. PBS had classified these tickets into 16 different categories. According to PBS officials, the same problem may have been reported on many different service tickets. Table 4 shows the Help Desk’s breakdown of these service tickets received and the status of the tickets by the 16 categories, as of August 12, 1999. Definitions of the categories can be found in appendix I.

Trouble tickets refer to any part of the system that the user may be having problems with, except for the report function, including essential nonfunctioning software. The contractor is responsible for fixing the problems associated with all tickets categorized as trouble at no cost to PBS. The three enhancement categories contain requests to make changes to STAR. Any changes to STAR resulting from these tickets categorized as enhancements have to be negotiated between PBS and the contractor, with PBS’ paying for the change. The CRT leader said the team had processed 511 enhancement tickets, of which about 44 were still open. The official said that this tally and the contractor’s tally of tickets categorized as enhancements, as shown in table 4, do not match because the two had not been recently reconciled. She said the contractor’s system probably had some items in the enhancement categories that were not enhancements and CRT had probably closed some other tickets that were not yet recorded in the contractor’s computer database as closed.

While the 128 users we interviewed reported problems with STAR, 116 of them saw some positive benefit from STAR. Users identified the following as the top five benefits.

Information is current and readily accessible.

Can see that changes to data have been accepted by the system.

STAR makes it easy to make minor changes.

STAR directly controls billing and lease payments.

It is good to have control over the data for which you are responsible.

PBS’ Efforts to Improve STAR

As previously mentioned, as part of the STAR project, a contractor- operated Help Desk and PBS’ CRT were set up to solve STAR problems. The Help Desk and CRT have handled about 8,000 service tickets, of which 95 percent have been closed. Further, other actions, such as additional contract help, are now available to the regions to help with STAR problems and training.

The Help Desk is to record user complaints, enhancement suggestions, or other issues concerning the use of STAR on service tickets. CRT reviews and determines how to handle enhancement tickets and trouble tickets that require a fix through a new release of STAR. Guidance on the review process states that no action on a service ticket usually means that a ticket resulted from a user’s momentary frustration with the system, a passing thought of a user, or that other users had already identified the problem.

If the enhancement or trouble service ticket is accepted, CRT is to edit and define the ticket to clearly identify the issue. CRT is also to assign each of these tickets a priority—high, normal, or low. Working with the contractor, CRT then decides how to implement any change considered needed. By the end of November 1999, eight versions of STAR will have been issued. According to PBS reports, STAR releases 3.0, and 4.0, combined, have about 40 enhancements. Version 4.0, which is to be released by the end of November 1999, for example, is to address the problems of (1) having to enter the same information repeatedly in different modules because modules are not linked and (2) not having the ability to enter the same date twice in the Payment Schedule screen. A category named “zero square foot leases” is also to be added to STAR to cover the national antenna program in a release scheduled for the spring of 2000. As of August 12, 1999, additional enhancement tickets are still open, although the exact number was unclear because PBS had not reconciled the data between the CRT and the computer-based Help Desk report. Other efforts to improve STAR include the following:

A desk reference manual for STAR is to be issued in November 1999. This manual should help with the problem of the need to have better prompts that make where to go clearer. The users should be able to look up what to do.

A report is under development that would be similar to the combined space report, which provided such information as building address, square footage, and lease-specific information.

Renewed emphasis has been placed on examining a preview of the bill in STAR before actual bills are sent.

An ad hoc exception report on bills is being sent to the regions each month to catch errors more quickly.

PBS has set a specific accuracy goal that targets a specific data problem for improvement and rewards regions for meeting the improvement goal. We were told that this data accuracy goal would be changed on a regular basis. It currently focuses on the issue of chargebacks and missing rates.

PBS’ Efforts to Ensure Accurate, Reliable, and Consistent Data in STAR

PBS knows that it has data problems, and these problems have been well documented. Examples of the problems follow:

The GSA IG concluded that over half of the space assignment drawings are off by more than 5 percent.

Price Waterhouse Coopers, in its audit of GSA’s fiscal year 1998 financial statements, found a reportable condition that improvements are needed in the controls over the integrity of rent and leasing data used to manage the Federal Buildings Fund.

Exception reports and queries indicate that there is significant regional variation in how well data in STAR are maintained, how well PBS produces occupancy agreements, and the accuracy of rent billings. PBS had to do extensive reconciliation of all congressional rent bills, the Federal Bureau of Investigation had to tell PBS that it was not being billed for $3.0 million worth of assignments, and 40 percent of the first wave of Census Bureau offices that PBS had delivered had not been billed as of January 1999.

PBS said it has taken various actions to ensure that STAR has accurate, reliable, and consistent data.

STAR was designed with built-in features to help ensure the reliability of some data elements.

PBS ran edits against the data to be transferred to STAR and ran additional edits after data were transferred.

PBS has an initiative to validate all space assignments.

A special study was done that produced a report identifying data problems and made recommendations for solving the problems.

A team was set up to determine how to implement the report’s recommendations.

PBS is developing a quality control system.

Controls have been built into STAR to make the program provide more accurate, reliable, and consistent data. For example, STAR has fields that have to be filled in before you can go to the next step of your task. This is to ensure that all of the required data for a task are entered. Another example is work queues, which automatically generate requests for such things as approvals of leases, corrections, or notifications of missing information and may also be used manually to send information. This feature is also designed to automatically notify the budget analyst responsible for rent expenditures of changes so that the analyst may anticipate the effect of the change on expenditures. STAR makes certain calculations using data entered in the database to reduce the chance of human error.

During the transition to STAR, a PBS team was formed to work with each of the teams that was developing STAR modules to assist in data transfer. According to the team leader, this team developed diagnostic edits for each module that were run on a region-by-region basis to determine missing or incomplete data before the transfer of data to STAR. Further, AT&T wrote a conversion program that included a list of edits to run against the data once they were transferred to STAR to identify missing or incomplete data. Finally, the post-conversion STAR team was tasked with regularly identifying queries, exception reports, and flags that are to be added to STAR to help identify pockets of bad data.

To further ensure accurate, reliable, and consistent data, PBS established a Go Team in January 1999 to identify and quantify the real and perceived problems with inventory data—space assignment drawings, lease files, assignment files, rent rates, bills, and information in STAR and Occupancy Agreements. For example, as previously mentioned, the GSA IG found half of the space assignment drawings were off by more than 5 percent. The Go Team found considerable problems with how well PBS was creating final rent rates—the proper calculation and application of fees and other charges. In a spot check of 20 Client Billing Records, the team found minor errors in 100 percent of the cases. Also, the team found errors in parking information. In one region, a discrepancy between total parking and assigned parking, which should match in STAR, was found in about 5 percent of the buildings. This problem could affect revenues. Further, the team found errors in design gross square feet and gross square feet, which should match in STAR. In three regions in particular, substantial variances between the design gross square feet and the gross square feet were found. Again, this could affect revenues.

In the team’s April 1999 report, it identified the causes of known data problems and identified actions that needed to be taken to fix data problems. The Go Team report identified the following as the root causes of data problems: the lack of accountability and ownership of data; the lack of clear, consistent, complete policies associated with PBS’ new incomplete training; bad data to begin with;

PBS’ reorganization that moved or de-emphasized assignment functions; migration from the old computer program to STAR; personnel turnover, downsizing, and workload; and changing standards, such as moving from occupiable square feet to usable square feet to rentable square feet.

In addition to those actions already under way that were discussed under the previous section of this report, the Go Team identified issues that it said must be addressed to improve data quality. These issues were management responsibilities, accountability and ownership, training and tools, and reports and measures.

Table 5 lists examples of the suggested changes made by the team. Appendix II lists all of the suggested changes.

In May 1999, another team was established to determine how to implement the first team’s recommendations. The second team developed a set of six prioritized action plans that include both temporary stop-gap fixes and permanent solutions. Table 6 lists the prioritized action plans, in priority order.

The team developed the education and involvement action plan to a higher degree of detail than the other five plans due to the extreme time constraints for delivering results on these issues. The PBS Commissioner advised us that under this action plan, as of September 23, 1999, an intense training effort, called Educate 2000, was completed in each region and the central office on the effects of full implementation of New Pricing in October 1999. Also, according to the Commissioner, regions began holding customer workshops in late September to inform them of the changes in their STAR bills and provide updates on Occupancy Agreements. Further, he said that a Customer Advisory Board has been established, and its first meeting is scheduled for October 29, 1999.

For action plans two, five, and six, team leaders have been appointed. Action plans three and four are being run by the Office of the Chief Information Officer and were delayed while a new Chief Information Officer was appointed. A new Chief Information Officer was appointed in July 1999.

PBS is also in the final stages of hiring a contractor to develop and document a quality control system that validates real estate and billing data residing in STAR. The contractor will provide on-site support to regions in such areas as developing diagnostic reports. PBS expects to award the contract in early fiscal year 2000.

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation

On September 23, 1999, the PBS Commissioner provided written comments on a draft of this report. He stated that the report is largely factual and balanced and does a good job of capturing the magnitude of the effort undertaken to move GSA and PBS from 1970s batch process computing to a modern relational database platform. In the comments, the Commissioner also briefly summarized (1) PBS’ transition from its 1970s system to STAR; (2) the cultural changes that drove the need to provide its customers with more reliable information and to measure its own performance in hard, quantifiable terms as envisioned by the Government Performance and Results Act; and (3) actions being taken to improve the data in STAR and elsewhere, including a spatial validation effort using computer-assisted drawings and the development of a quality control system to validate real estate and billing data residing in STAR. He also provided technical clarifications that have been included in this report where appropriate. The Commissioner’s letter is reproduced in appendix III.

We are sending copies of this report to Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell, Chairman, and Senator Byron L. Dorgan, Ranking Minority Member, Subcommittee on Treasury and General Government, Senate Committee on Appropriations; Senator George V. Voinovich, Chairman, and Senator Max S. Baucus, Ranking Minority Member, Subcommittee on Transportation and Infrastructure, Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works; Representative Jim Kolbe, Chairman, and Representative Steny H. Hoyer, Ranking Minority Member, Subcommittee on Treasury, Postal Service, and General Government, House Committee on Appropriations; the Honorable David J. Barram, Administrator, GSA; and to others upon request.

If you have any questions regarding this report, please call me or Ron King at (202) 512-8387. Key contributors to this assignment were Tom Keightley and Mike Yacura.

Definitions of STAR Help Desk Ticket Types

Conversion Issues

Problems or situations pertaining to data that have been converted from the old system.

Database Change

Requests to have data changed within the database, requires written approval.

Enhancement— Application

Requests to change the software.

Enhancement— Ad Hoc Report

Requests to change an existing ad hoc report or add a new ad hoc report.

Enhancement—Report Standard

Requests to change an existing standard report or add a new standard report.

Inquiry

Any question that is being asked to gather information.

Inquiry Reports

Calls specifically related to questions about reports.

Maintenance— Nonscheduled

Requests for maintenance for unexpected problems.

Maintenance— Scheduled

Issues regarding the monthly maintenance and operation schedule.

Policy and Procedures

Questions concerning policies and procedures.

Rent Bill

Requests regarding a rent bill or the rent billing process.

Security Request

Requests on any security issue coming through the Help Desk.

Table Update

Request to change information in a table that supports the System for Tracking and Administering Real Property (STAR).

Training

Requests that can be solved or partially solved by additional training.

Trouble

Calls about any part of the system the user may be having problems with, except reports, including bugs and essential nonfunctioning software.

Trouble Reports

Calls about any problems the user may be having regarding reports.

Data Issues Identified by PBS’ Go Team and Its Recommendations

Establish national policies, answer questions, and resolve disputes in a timely manner.

Change the Central Office culture of “Information is power so I won’t share it.”

Ensure that changed business practices and new tools are adopted at the working level.

Prepare employees for the business practices and system changes and emphasize the importance of needed training.

Take a proactive position regarding data integrity and commit the resources needed to get the job done.

Resolve issues quickly, so employees do not disengage completely from the issue, making it even worse.

Instill in all employees a big picture perspective to avoid the “That’s not my job attitude.”

Become familiar with the systems the employees must use on a daily basis in order to appreciate the effort needed to learn the system.

Address, buy-into, and communicate a policy on data input by contractors.

Close the gaps that exist between the organizational vision of upper management and the changes that need to take place in business processes and roles.

Decide and publish Central Office roles and organizational structure on who ultimately decides what. Establish accountability for business decisions.

Managers must see the advantages of acting proactively—this must become a core value in PBS.

Establish a management information steering committee that will establish policy, fiscal controls and resolve conflicts.

Start having regular meetings to go over project data.

Job descriptions should include data integrity.

Competency testing and certification should be established for employees who need to understand New Pricing, Occupancy Agreements, and STAR.

Performance ratings should address the issue of employee proficiency in the use of tools and databases required in their specific job functions. Employees should be evaluated on the integrity of their data and the promptness and accuracy of their input.

Deal with the perception that STAR and Computer-aided Design are wonderful systems that absolve us of our individual responsibility to review, track, and know our data.

If individual specialists are to be responsible for their data, then any data manipulation that takes place system-wide must be coordinated and communicated.

Stop continually shifting employees from one area to another.

Decide how much access to propriety data our contractors can/should have.

Need to make sure that everyone who uses STAR gets the right kind of training.

Cross training opportunities between business lines should be encouraged.

More changed business practices training should be scheduled.

Develop systems that can get information to the people who need it.

Set up recurring training/certification programs.

Expand STAR training beyond realty specialists.

Conduct more billing training, emphasizing how and when to do billing adjustments.

Plan just-in-time training and train internally before taking it to the customers.

Regional business lines need to identify their areas for immediate training.

Training for affected personnel must be mandatory and enforced by directors, supervisors, and team leaders.

Look at integrated training of multiple tools—teach STAR, Occupancy Agreements, and the client billing policy as an integrated training session.

Regions need to take advantage of the available training resources recently procured by the STAR national training team.

Regional “Power Users” should be utilized in training and instructing other regional users in some type of regular scheduled sessions to keep users up to date on changes and enhancements to the databases and internal processes.

Identify any strong regional training programs as best practices, and have the rest of PBS learn from them.

Some type of evaluation or testing of users needs to be developed to ensure that they understand the database(s) and process required for them.

A training infrastructure should be developed in each region that provides for regularly scheduled sessions on all of the various databases utilized by GSA. Training sessions should be interactive.

Develop national, regional, and local dialogs/workshops with our customers so they fully understand new pricing, billing, and the changes coming to existing assignments before they arrive October 1, 1999.

Develop meaningful performance measures for data integrity. Any measure that is adopted should identify the magnitude of the data problems and encourage additional accountability and ownership. Possible performance measures for data include the following:

Number of exceptions/flags generated for each region in STAR.

Number and dollar value of chargebacks.

Number of unopened work queues over some number of days old in STAR.

Develop a workload measure that would help management determine when to deploy additional resources, if possible.

Number of billing adjustments.

Number of customer complaints with response times for resolution.

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