June 1998

Reporting Rating of Record Data to OPM

The old way of reporting rating of record data using only the summary level does not provide adequate information. Now that agencies can use anywhere from two to five levels for ratings of record, merely reporting that an employee was rate as Fully Successful or equivalent is not meaningful. Was the employee Fully Successful in an appraisal program that summarizes performance at two levels (i.e., pass/fail) or was the employee Fully Successful in a three-, four-, or five-level program? The summary level of Fully Successful represents a different range of performance in each one of those programs. As a result, the reporting requirements for reporting performance-related data were changed as of October 1, 1996.

• Changes in Reporting Requirements
• Status of Fiscal Year 1997 Data
• For More Information

Changes in Reporting Requirements. Agencies are required to submit rating of record data to the Office of Personnel Management's Central Personnel Date File (CPDF). In the past, this data included only the summary level. Now, agencies are required to submit three pieces of performance-related data to the CPDF: the summary level, the pattern, and the date of the appraisal period.

The summary level is reported in that data element called "rating of record (level)" using the following codes:

The pattern refers to the number of summary levels used by the appraisal program under which the rating of record was assigned. It is reported in the data element called "rating of record (pattern)" using the following codes:

The date of the appraisal period is reported in the data element called "rating of record (period)." The date submitted to the CPDF is the ending date of the appraisal period for which the rating of record (level) was issued.

Status of Fiscal Year 1997 Data. When changes are made to large systems such as the CPDF with many different agencies inputting their own data, the changes are implemented at different rates. As a result, CPDF fiscal year 1997 rating of record data contain some inconsistent data such as incompatible level and pattern and incomplete data such as unspecified period. Fiscal year 1998 data should be free of most of these data problems.

For More Information. For more information on collection and processing of Central Personnel Data File data, you may look up the operating manual, at http://www.opm.gov/feddata.