The primary purpose of the Message Center is to provide employers with a centralized location for information pertaining to reports and payments submitted to OPERS via ECS. Not only will the Message Center be the principal source of reporting and payment information, it also allows registered employers to send messages to OPERS. In many ways, the Message Center functions like an email account by allowing employers to view, create, send and delete messages.

However, unlike a personal email account, the Message Center is employer-specific and not user-specific. In other words, all messages may be viewed, responded to or deleted by any individual ECS user within a registered organization.

Security

The messages you are able to view depends upon your user roles. For example, only users with the Online Forms role will be able to view messages for forms submission. If you have more than one user role, you'll be able to view messages for each role.

It's important to note that, unlike a personal e-mail account, the Message Center is employer-specific and role-specific, but not user-specific. In other words, anyone with the same user role will be able to view the same messages.

Viewing Messages

To view your messages, first access the Message Center by clicking the Message Center button.

The Inbox page will appear. Messages are displayed, sorted by category, by the ECS functions for which your employer entity is registered.

Click the plus sign next to a category to display the messages.

A category will only appear if your organization has a message relating to that category.

Your inbox contains both New Messages and Total Messages. The New Message column indicates the total number of messages yet to be viewed, or read, by an ECS user within your organization. The number in the Total Messages column represents both read and unread messages.

The status of each message will be displayed. A message that has not been opened will have a status of New. If a message has been viewed, but not replied to, the status will be opened. If a message has been responded to, the status will be replied. Envelope icons on the side of the screen also indicate the status.

A red exclamation point indicates a message of high importance that requires your immediate attention.

To view each messages content, click the message subject link. The message details page will appear, so that you can read the message.