FM transformation underway Published June 15, 2007 Courtesy 1st SOCPTS HURLBURT FIELD, Fla. -- The Air Force Financial Management transformation currently underway is the greatest single change in the organization's 60-year history. "We, and all of Air Force Financial Management, are transforming the way we conduct business to better provide expert decision support and analysis to commanders while continuing to provide high quality financial services to all Airmen," said 1st Lt. Thomas Cook, 1st Special Operations Comptroller Squadron Financial Services flight commander. One of the cornerstones of the financial transformation effort is the opening of the Air Force Financial Services Center this fall at Ellsworth Air Force Base, S.D. The AFFSC will centralize and streamline most financial processes now being handled by individual bases. "The AFFSC will be established through two phases, ultimately resulting in Airmen having the total force expertise of FM matters available at one location," said Roger Bick, Director, Air Force Financial Management Strategic Planning and Transformation Program Management Office, Pentagon. Phase I will begin with the opening of the Central Processing Center in October. The CPC will focus on consolidating base-level back-shop operations, including processing travel and military pay documents. Phase II operations will begin in October 2008 when a round the clock full-service contact center is established. The contact center will be staffed by Financial Management experts, Lieutenant Cook said. "Using phone, Web, interactive voice, e-mail, mail and face-to-face interaction, members will be able to get answers to their finance questions anytime, anyplace," he said. The new system will streamline the customer service process, said Lt. Col. Howard Osborne, Financial Services Transformation director. "From this point onwards, Airmen will only need one telephone number to find solutions to their financial issues," Colonel Osborne said. To prepare each base for transition to the new Financial Service Center, the Financial Service Transformation team has launched a cutover initiative. Cutover includes both the preparation for migration of the workload and the actual migration of the workload to the Financial Service Center. The cutover for Hurlburt Field is scheduled for December 12. "The cutover process will be transparent to the customer," Lieutenant Cook said. "They will still drop off military and travel pay documents to be processed; the only difference is we will not process them." Instead, the documents will be sent via scanner to Ellsworth AFB for processing. During the next 10 years, the financial management transformation will save the Air Force $200 million, said John Vonglis, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Financial Management and Comptroller. The money saved will now "be available for other programs supporting the warfighter," he said.