Deposit of Checks, Cash, and Credit Card Receipts

Policy Summary

All cash, checks and credit card receipts must be deposited on the same day they are received at the university. All check payments must be made payable to “George Washington University,” “GWU,” or “GW.” The university maintains standard operating procedures related to cash deposits.

Who is Governed by this Policy

• Staff
• Faculty

Policy

All cash, checks, and credit card receipts must be deposited on a daily basis.

All check payments to the university must be made payable to “George Washington University,” “GW,” or “GWU.” Payments to the university may not be made payable to an individual or a department. All payments to the university must be deposited in a university account. For departments operating with a Remote Deposit On-Site scanner, all checks must be scanned on a daily basis. Physical checks must be maintained securely for at least 60 days before being destroyed. Two employees must shred the checks together to ensure proper destruction protocol. Alternatively, the checks can be disposed of via an external secure shredding service. For departments that do not have a scanner, checks should be mailed to a designated lockbox at PNC Bank. A copy of the cash departmental journal entry prepared by the department must be mailed with the checks. Please see Departmental Deposit Process for details.

For departments that are set up to process credit cards, all credit card receipts must be processed on a daily basis. After the authorization code is received, no documents containing full credit card numbers should be kept on file. If under special circumstances you have to keep the credit card number on file after the authorization, it is crucial to render the PAN unreadable by blacking out all but the last four digits with permanent black marker; photocopy or scan the redacted document, and then upload in to BOX.

Departments will retain legible images of customer’s sales drafts, cardholder consents for pre-authorized orders, or credit drafts, in a GW BOX directory for a period of three years from the date of the card transaction. The merchant’s obligation to retain records does not provide authority for merchant to retain full card track data. As explained above after receiving the authorization code, all credit card numbers must be redacted. 

Definitions

PAN: Primary Account Number

Procedures

Departmental Deposit Process

Contacts