Release Notes 8.055.0

eSign: The ePacket Dashboard has been updated as follows:

Livestock: A request was received to add functionality allowing users to print Policy Declaration Pages for canceled coverages for Dairy Revenue Protection (DRP) policies. With this ticket, a new print option, "Include Canceled Coverages", was added to the Policy Declaration Page form on the Print tab for DRP policies only.

NOTE: A latency issue was found internally by QA after printing the Dec Page with the "Auto Attach" print option selected. The form generates as expected but does not appear in the Attachments tab right away. It has been taking up to a minute in lag time before it displays. This issue will be fixed with TFS #110807. The temporary workaround is to manually refresh/reload the Attachments tab.

It was reported that the Production Report was printing zero values in the year where the production needs to be reported when the form was printed with the "Pre-print the next year" print option selected. The Production Report was updated to not print these zero values in this scenario.

NOTE: When the Production Report is printed with PP acres, the form is printing zeros.

The Federal Crop Insurance Corporation (FCIC) revised the Fresh Market Bean Crop Provisions to allow separate coverage levels by type (planting period) and to make other policy clarifications. These changes are applicable for the 2020 Crop Year.

The Commodity Exchange Price Provisions (CEPP) are used in conjunction with either the Common Crop Insurance Policy Basic Provisions or the Area Risk Protection Insurance Basic Provisions, along with the Crop Provisions for the following crops: Barley, Canola (including rapeseed), Corn, Cotton, Grain Sorghum, Rice, Soybeans, Sunflowers, and Wheat. In accordance with section 1 of either the Common Crop Insurance Policy Basic Provisions or the Area Risk Protection Insurance Basic Provisions, the CEPP specifies how and when the projected and harvest price components will be determined by crop. There are two sections contained in the CEPP:

The Risk Management Agency (RMA) updated the following CEPP document for the 2020 and succeeding Crop Years:

These revised CEPP Crop Provisions are effective for the 2020 Crop Year.

RMA released revised Margin Protection Crop Provisions for Rice for the 2020 and succeeding Crop Years (CYs). The revised Margin Protection Crop Provisions that will be effective for the 2020+ CYs for Rice have been implemented.

NOTE: TFS #105392 implemented the revised Margin Protection Crop Provisions for Corn, Soybeans, and Wheat.

Production Report: A new prototype for the Production Report has been created and introduces some changes to the way in which data is presented on the page. This new prototype was developed to continue making base forms more readable and user friendly for agents and growers. In addition to moving some data around on the page, horizontal boxes were removed; redundancy of crop/county/plan on each grid was removed by adding crop banners to separate APHs; and the crop, unit, and approved APH yield were highlighted by bolding and using an increased font size. The vertical height of year 10 in the APH was increased to allow for more white space for the farmer’s handwritten production information. Additionally, skip row columns were added within the APH display for Cotton, and the record type that was introduced for the 2018+ RYs was added.

There are several forms that may be used to report production annually. Changes made to the contents of this form (Production Report) may not be extended to other production reporting forms. Each form’s contents must be evaluated as a balance between the DSSH requirements, current form design, and real estate available on the page.

RMA introduced Point of Reference (POR) with the 2020 Rainfall and Vegetation Index Handbook as an acreage reporting requirement to report Latitude and Longitude with Acreage Reporting. RMA is not requiring Point of Reference data on the Schedule of Insurance (SOI); however, it was requested by agencies that this piece of data be included on the SOI. The SOI format used for API and PRF was updated with the following changes for all years:

A bug was found in LGM and LRP policies where, when in the Policies tab, the Forms hyperlink did not take the user to the Print menu for LGM and LRP policies. The Forms hyperlink was updated to take the user to the Print menu for LGM and LRP policies.

The "Release Notes" menu option was not displaying in the Help (?) dropdown from the System Header. This issue has been resolved.

For LGM and LRP policies only, to prevent future eDas errors, a validation has been added to the Maintain SBI page and Add New SBI page that will require the user to enter a value in the Livestock SBI Share field before they can successfully save the page. This validation is a hard edit and users will not be able to proceed without entering a value greater than 0.000 in the field. If a user attempts to save one of these pages without entering a value in the field, the following error message will display in red: "A value must be keyed in the Livestock SBI Share field."

NOTE: This change this will not affect Plan 83 (DRP) policies.

With this ticket, a blue information icon was added to the policy header of Livestock policies. Clicking this icon will open an information popup that displays policy information. This mirrors current functionality available for MPCI policies.

Master Yields: RMA provided updated regulatory changes for the 2020 RY Master Yields for additional states and crops that will be insurable for Master Yield. An update was done to the Internal ICE table to include the updated regulatory changes for the 2020 RY Master Yields to add the following states and crops for insurability under Master Yields:

Companion Policy: An issue was reported on Skip Row Cotton where the companion policy was not using the correct Skip Row calculations, resulting in P11-9271 errors. The work around was to recalculate the APH and Premium in the Additional Functions menu to clear the errors. With this ticket, the Skip Row calculations were corrected when companion detail lines are created to prevent future errors.

Additionally, APH recalculation is needed when Skip Row factor is changed on the premium line. Until now, APH recalculation was not part of the companion-syncing logic; therefore, the Premium Line calculation was incorrect. With this ticket, APH recalculation will now occur as part of companion syncing if Skip Row factor is also changed during syncing.

WFRP: As part of the 2020 RY WFRP changes, RMA has implemented a new Revenue Exclusion (RX) Option. The RX option will allow growers to exclude the year with the lowest Allowable Revenue (or Indexed Allowable Revenue amount if using indexing procedures) in their five-year tax history. An RX Average Revenue and Indexed RX Average Revenue are then calculated using the remaining four years of history. The RX Avg Revenue is then used in the "higher of" determination for Average Allowable Revenue and Indexed RX Avg Revenue is used in the "higher of" determination for Indexed Average Revenue.

To account for the new Revenue Exclusion Option, the following changes have been implemented:

WFRP: Prior to the 2020 RY, the WFRP policy included a $1 million cap on Animal/Animal Product Commodities. If this limit was exceeded when the Intended Farm Operation Report was completed, the grower was ineligible for a WFRP policy. If this limit was not exceeded at the time of the Intended Farm Operation Report but was exceeded at the time of the Revised Farm Operation Report, then expected revenue from Animal/Animal Product Commodities was capped at $1 million.

Beginning in the 2020 RY, the WFRP policy has been revised to limit expected revenue from Animal/Animal Product Commodities at $2 million rather than the previous $1 million. In addition, the policy now allows for this limit to be exceeded at the time of the Intended Farm Operation Report without disqualifying the grower from obtaining a WFRP policy. Instead, the grower can obtain a WFRP policy; however, expected revenue (intended and/or revised) for Animal/Animal Product Commodities will be capped at the $2 million limit.

To account for these updates to the 2020 WFRP Policy, the following System changes were made:

NOTE: The cap previously only applied if the Revised Report checkbox was selected on at least one commodity on the policy.

WFRP: With TFS #109530 in the 8.045 release, the Crop Option field was added to the coverage page for WFRP policies. This was necessary to allow election of the new RS, RX, and RC options. During testing of this functionality, a bug was identified where the System was removing any selected crop options on save if a validation error or warning was received. With this ticket, the Crop Options field logic was updated to correct this issue.

WFRP: RMA issued a number of changes to the 2020 WFRP policy. Requirements were initially put together based on a “Summary of Changes” document issued by RMA. RMA has since issued a draft 2020 WFRP Handbook that included some major differences from the Summary of Changes document. Given this, some changes are needed to the 2020 WFRP functionality that has already been implemented in the 8.045 and 8.050 Releases with the following tickets:

The necessary changes to the Indexed Average Revenue calculation, Approved Expenses Calculation, Revenue Cup, and Revenue Substitution have been implemented with this ticket.

MCEU: An issue was reported that P11-119332 Errors were being received (MCEU needing Primary/Secondary county flags set). The error was due to the System incorrectly applying the MC unit structure when the coverage was not eligible for it. The scenario that caused the error was that the Primary County policy had planted acres on both Irrigated and Non-Irrigated units but the Secondary County policy only had planted acres on Non-Irrigated detail lines. Since there were not any planted Irrigated acres, there was no Irrigated Key Association for the Primary County to associate with. A change was added with this ticket that adjusts the MCEU qualifications so that the System will now require both the Primary County and Secondary County coverages to have both Irrigated and Non-Irrigated planted acres in order to get MC with EP for both coverages.

NOTE: To correct the affected policies, users will need to open the Manage Unit Structure from the Additional Functions dropdown and uncheck the Unit Structure Verified checkbox and re-save both Primary and Secondary County coverages. When the Unit Structure Verified checkbox is selected, the Mark Complete process will skip updating the unit structure for the detail line.

SCO: An issue was reported where SCO child lines were erroring out at RMA for P11-7187 and 7188 premium errors. After research was completed, it was found that the SCO was being calculated with the CAT price % for the Expected Commodity value, but per the M13 P11_11 exhibit for Plans 31, 32, and 33, it should be using the underlying liability/coverage level, which would be the parent line liability/coverage level.

A change was done within the premium calculator to now always get the liability from the parent line rather than calculating it when the MPCI Coverage is CAT for Plans 01, 02, 03, and Plan 90. Prior to the change, when the liability was being recalculated for the SCO premium line, it was using the projected price rather than the CAT price.

Perennials: A bug was reported with how age was being calculated on HI Tropical Trees. Age was being determined by using the Crop Year instead of by using the Current Year. The calculation logic to determine age was updated to now use Current Year instead of Crop Year for HI Tropical Trees (Plan 40).

Perennials: A "Sorry..." error was being triggered on the PAW on a newly-added detail line on a coverage that had no prior detail lines for HI Tropical Trees. A fix was implemented in order for the System to correctly find the current Reinsurance Year which is needed for the correct display of the PAW page, and upon save, the user will no longer receive a "Sorry..." error.

Perennials: During the processing of Perennial crops through the Fast Edit PR grid, a user is able to key production (and have APH updated), update PAW questions (and apply answers and sign dates to the PAW), and apply PR sign dates to the System. A final step in the Save & Exit of the Fast Edit PR grid is the mark complete process. Previously, workflow required that agents go back to the legacy Signature Maintenance page and add an AR sign date. Because the PR and AR sign dates are the same for Perennial crops (as shown in the actuarial documents) and processing for the prior year's production and the current year's acreage is done on the same form (e.g., Perennial Combo Form), it makes sense to have both the PR and AR dates updated with the date entered in the grid. An enhancement was implemented within Signature Maintenance for Fast Edit PR so that when a Perennial crop is present on the policy, an indicating message will appear stating "Perennial crop sign dates will apply to both the PR and AR". This change will save a step for the processor and not having to return to the legacy Signature Maintenance page to add the AR sign date.

Margin Protection: It has been internally discovered that on policies with Plan 16 (MP) and Plan 17 (MP-HPO) coverages, when editing and saving related MPCI coverages, premium was being reduced to $0.00. It was determined that Mark Complete was the process that rebuilt the premium after the related coverages were edited. In addition, when editing and saving MP/MP-HPO coverages, Admin Fee were being reduced to $0.00. Additional logic has been implemented at save of the coverage to rebuild premium and admin fees for MP/MP-HPO coverages before Mark Complete takes place. With this ticket, two fixes were implemented:

An ICE 9999 update was made available by the RMA and has been implemented in the System. The following table has been updated for 9999: