Employees’ Manual
Title 23,
Chapter I
Revised October 7, 2022
Random Moment Sample
System (RMS)
Title 23: Financial Management Table of Contents
Chapter I: Random Moment Sample System
Revised October 7, 2022 Page 1
Page
Iowa Department of Health and Human Services Employees’ Manual
Overview ............................................................................................................................................... 1
Legal Basis .......................................................................................................................................................................... 1
Frequency of Sampling ........................................................................................................................ 1
Sampling Roles ..................................................................................................................................... 2
RMS System Administrator ........................................................................................................................................... 2
RMS Sample Administrator ........................................................................................................................................... 2
IM RMS Sample Validator ............................................................................................................................................... 2
RMS Sample Recipient .................................................................................................................................................... 2
Random Moment Observation ............................................................................................................ 3
Random Moment Employee Response ....................................................................................................................... 3
Random Moment Data Usage ....................................................................................................................................... 3
Title 23: Financial Management Page 1
Iowa Department of Health and Human Services Employees’ Manual
Chapter I: Random Moment Sample System Overview
Revised October 7, 2022 Legal Basis
Overview
The state and federal government share the cost burden for administering public assistance programs. The
Department of Health and Human Services (Department) collects information through a Random Moment
Sample (RMS) system to determine how to appropriately claim federal funding for administration of programs
and services.
Through the RMS system, a sample of the Department’s field operations employees are selected. These
employees identify which program(s) or service(s) and what kind of activity they are working on at the
randomly chosen moment.
The information collected through the RMS system then provides a basis for claiming federal funding. The
results from the sampling process are used to claim the federal share of administrative costs for each
program.
Legal Basis
2 CFR 200 Section E establishes cost principles and standards for state and local governments for
determination of the administrative costs applicable to grants, contracts, and other agreements with
state and local governments.
Randomly sampling workers to identify which programs/services and activities they are working on is
one of the federally approved methods for identifying worker effort. This is the method of identifying
worker effort selected by the Department and subsequently approved by the Department’s federal
partners via the Department’s Public Assistance Cost Allocation Plan (PACAP).
Frequency of Sampling
Two separate schedules of 2,700 samples each are created for the social worker group and for the income
maintenance worker group prior to the start of each quarter from the most recent Workday (payroll)
report. Each field employee within the two sample populations receives an average of three survey questions
every quarter as determined by the sampling schedules.
Title 23: Financial Management Page 2
Iowa Department of Health and Human Services Employees’ Manual
Chapter I: Random Moment Sample System Sampling Roles
Revised October 7, 2022 RMS System Administrator
Sampling Roles
RMS System Administrator
The RMS system administrator in the Division of Fiscal Management is responsible for:
▪ Creating quarterly samples in a timely manner
▪ Responding to RMS Sample Administrator questions
▪ Identifying and investigating anomalous quarterly results
▪ Adding and deleting administrative users
▪ Coordinating with the Division of Information Technology (DoIT) to resolve system issues and
install updates
RMS Sample Administrator
The RMS sample administrator in the Division of Field Operations is responsible for:
▪ Responding to questions from sample validators and sample takers
▪ Ensuring all samples are answered within two business days
▪ Investigating and resolving validation and invalid combination errors.
IM RMS Sample Validator
Each service area shall appoint at least two RMS validators. The primary responsibilities of the RMS
validator include the following:
▪ Acting as the contact for questions from sample recipients.
▪ Personally interviewing employees for 10 percent of the moments randomly chosen for
observation to ensure sampling accuracy, electronic form completion, and quality control
RMS Sample Recipient
Each designated Field employee will receive random samples to answer throughout each quarter. The
primary responsibilities of the RMS sample recipient include the following:
▪ Appropriately responding to samples within 2 business days
▪ Resolving any discrepancies that give rise to combination errors
▪ Alerting RMS sample administrator to missing or incorrect program or activities in the survey
response selections
Title 23: Financial Management Page 3
Iowa Department of Health and Human Services Employees’ Manual
Chapter I: Random Moment Sample System Random Moment Observation
Revised October 7, 2022 Random Moment Employee Response
Random Moment Observation
The RMS software automatically e-mails each sampled worker based on the initial random moment sample
schedule generated before the beginning of the quarter. The e-mail includes:
▪ The sample moment date and time
▪ Instructions on accessing and completing the observation form on the intranet
▪ Contact information for questions or concerns
Random Moment Employee Response
The sampled worker then completes the email response form with the following information that
corresponds with time the email was generated by the RMS system:
▪ The program from the email form drop-down list
▪ The activity from the email form drop-down list
▪ The case number (if applicable)
▪ Other pertinent comments if necessary
The sample response training and definitions of programs and activities used in the sample can be
found on the fiscal management - administration SharePoint site.
Random Moment Data Usage
Data collected from responses to the sample moments form the basis of the federal funds claimed by
the Department to support field operations. The mix of federal funding claimed by the Department
each quarter will change based on the responses given by the RMS sample recipients
