WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletters

February 6, 2025

Cannot Change Women Records to Infant/Child or Vice-Versa

Changing Prescreened Participants from Woman to Infant/Child (or vice-versa)
We have had a couple of instances in which staff have had issues linking infants to mom. When the Help Desk researched these issues, they found that the record had initially been prescreened as a woman category and had been changed to an infant or child category, and vice versa. Participant records, once created, cannot be changed from woman to infant/child nor from infant/child to woman.

This is due to “skeleton records” that are added to certain tables when a new participant is prescreened based on the participant’s WIC Category. For instance, a skeleton record is added to CHILD table for infants and children. If a CHILD record doesn’t exist, you cannot link mom and baby (and other issues may occur).

If you prescreen a woman participant when you should have selected infant or child for the WIC Category (or vice-versa), you should complete another prescreen selecting the correct category. Write down the State WIC ID for the incorrect and correct participant records and have your Agency Admin use the Potential Duplicates function to mark the incorrect participant record as a duplicate.

Child Participants Returning as Women
The Help Desk has also received a couple of calls asking if an existing child’s record could be changed to pregnant or postpartum if the child returns to WIC as a woman. Again, existing records should never be changed from an infant/child category to a woman category. If a woman has participated in WIC as a child, a new woman record should be created for her if she returns as pregnant or postpartum.

NOTE: In general, you shouldn’t be able to find records that haven’t been used in more than 6 years because the system should be purging them. However, we continue to have issues with the purge process and because of this, you may be able to find child records for women returning to WIC as an adult.

Questions & Answers

See WINNIE Questions & Answers to view questions that have been previously submitted from local agencies about WINNIE. You can submit your own question using the WINNIE Questions for the State WIC Office form.

Q: When is the first WINNIE update planned to address some of the bugs?

A: The first WINNIE release is tentatively scheduled for mid-to-late April. Testing of Release 3.4, which includes over 60 bug fixes, was completed a couple of weeks ago. Due to some issues found while testing that release, a corrective release has been developed and will be tested in March. Once this corrective release has been tested, we will be able to schedule the release.

A Release Document, detailing the corrections and changes included in the release, will be provided a couple of weeks prior to implementation.

Q: When entering an initial contact, WINNIE does not require you to enter a date for first appt offered. As long as you open the initial contact screen, you can close it. In HuBERT it was required before you could leave the screen. Can that be made as a requirement again?

A: Actually, the Initial Contact functionality is exactly the same in WINNIE and HuBERT. The required fields remained the same: Date, Type, and WIC Category. The First Appointment Offered is not required because you might not know the date of the first available appointment during the Prescreening process.

The only change was to make it easier to add an Initial Contact for multiple Household members when scheduling appointments in WINNIE.

January 9, 2025

Reminder! Continue to Refer to the Transition Guide for New Issues

The WINNIE Transition Guide (PDF) is still a working document. It is where we add new bugs and issues found in WINNIE, and you should continue to reference it for existing system bugs and issues.

We intend to wait to transfer this information to a webpage on the MDH WIC website until the first WINNIE Release is implemented since a number of the bugs/issues currently found in the system (and listed in the document) will be resolved in the release.

To help keep you aware of any new bugs/issues, we will include any added to the Transition Guide since the last WINNIE newsletter in each month’s WINNIE the Scoop.

WINNIE Bugs/Issues

The following have been added to the WINNIE Transition Guide (PDF).

Login

1/8/25 - WINNIE Is Not Requiring Users to Change their Password after 90 Days (URB# 245053)

Issue: WINNIE is not recognizing the Password Expiration security setting of 90 days. Since the password doesn’t expire, users are not being prompted to change their password as required by policy.

What to do: Since all users are required by policy (see MOM Section 9.4 (PDF) – Password Security) to change their password every 90 days, you should change your password sometime before January 31. Information about how to change your password is provided in the Accessing WINNIE 1 Training Module (Table of Contents: Forgot/Change Password).

Mid-Certification Assessment

1/8/25 - Error After Starting MCA Results in Not Being Able to Add a Blood or Nutrition Assessment Contact for Any Participants (URB# 245512)

Issue: If the following error (shown below) displays after clicking the Mid-Certification Assessment button on the Certification Type modal, you will be unable to add a blood record or a Nutrition Assessment contact for the participant you are completing the MCA for and will possibly also be unable to add these types of records for any other participants.

What to do: You will need to contact the Help Desk (1-800-488-8799, press 2, 2) to delete, on the back end, a second MCA record associated with the participant’s current certification, which causes this issue.

Reports

12/18/24 – Staff IDs Associated with Certifier’s Signature Aren’t Displaying Even if Signature was Captured

Issue: For many Infoview reports, we use the record associated with the certifier’s signature to identify the certifier. The name of this field (Createduserid) was different from all other tables (Createuserid) and the field was renamed in WINNIE to make the field name consistent. This name change causes the reports that identify the certifier to no longer display the Staff ID in the output, even if a signature was captured.

What to do: Infoview reports will need to be revised. Submit a Local Agency Reports & Data Request if you are currently using a report that isn’t displaying the Staff ID even if a signature was captured. Enter the exact name of the Infoview report that needs to be revised in the What Information are you trying to collect field and “NA” into the How will this information be used field.

December 5, 2024

WINNIE Training Refresh and Accounts

We will refresh the WINNIE Training environment quarterly to ensure the database has participants that can be used for training. When refreshed, all existing training accounts will be deleted as part of the refresh process. Any agencies wanting to use WINNIE Training after a scheduled Training refresh, will need to contact the MN Help Desk (1-800-488-8799, press 2, 2 or mnhelpdesk@gainwelltechnologies.com) to have their agency’s training account re-created.

Entering Measurement Referral Information

In WINNIE, staff are able to enter a referral measurement into the Participant Folder on the same date as the certification. After opening the Height/Length & Weight or Blood page while in Certification Mode, WINNIE will then count the measurement record as part of the cert.

Consistent with how HuBERT works, you cannot enter a measurement into the Participant Folder if the participant is not in a current certification period, such as may occur with new participants or participants overdue for recertification. In these instances, the referral measurements can be entered into an alert until the date of the certification.

Risk Factors Assigned During Nutrition Assessments

In WINNIE, any risk factors assigned during a Nutrition Assessment contact will display in the Assigned Risk Factors grid but will not display in the Modify Risk Factors modal where CPA-assigned risk factors can be added and removed. If assigned during a Nutrition Assessment contact, the risk factor can only be deleted or resolved on the date it is added and only by editing the Nutrition Education contact.

Duplicate Records

Before prescreening, always remember to check with the applicant if they or one of their family members have received WIC benefits in MN before, as well as double-check the statewide database for an existing record.

WINNIE will display the Potential Duplicate Applicant/Participant modal if upon saving the Prescreen there is an existing record with the exact same first name, last name, and date of birth. This modal will display the existing record’s address, current agency/clinic, race/ethnicity, and authorized rep’s name for comparison.

If you determine this is the same participant, you should click the Open Existing Participant button. This will delete the prescreen you just created and ensure that a duplicate participant isn’t created.

November 7, 2024

Statewide Rollout Completed This Week

The statewide rollout of WINNIE was completed this week. Thank you to all agencies for the time and effort put into preparing for this transition and helping to make it a successful one!

Logging into Mobile Management

The following information was previously provided in an email on Monday, September 23.

The URL for Mobile Management was updated on Monday, September 23 to: https://mobile.mnwic.net/MobileWeb/index.html.

Your username for both WINNIE and Mobile Management are the same. For more information about logging in or changing your password, please refer to the Mobile Management and Contact Us Overview (PDF).

WINNIE and Infoview

Although WINNIE shares the same database as HuBERT, we have found a couple of bugs and differences in how WINNIE saves data that are having a greater impact on our ad-hoc Infoview reports than expected. Currently, reports that provide the following information are potentially affected:

• Staff IDs
• Determination of new certs versus recerts
• When income records were created
• Information collected in Local Use Questions based on the question’s position (1-6)

We have received, and continue to receive, a large number of Infoview report requests to make revisions and corrections. Although these reports are important and we will be working to get them updated as soon as possible, unless they are directly impacting your ability to provide WIC services or are necessary for another urgent reason, the report revisions/corrections will most likely not be available within the timeframe specified when you submitted your report request.

Timeline for Report Requests by Priority
We have revised the Local Agency Reports & Data Request to reflect the amount of time it may take to complete your request:

• Extremely important and urgent: Report/data will be provided within 20 business days. If needed sooner, enter the date and provide a reason why in the comments.
• Important but not urgent: Report/data will be provided within 45 business days.
• Nice to have: Report/data will be provided within 60 business days.

New Infoview Report Requests
At this time, and until we are able to complete the backlog of Infoview report corrections, we will not be creating any new reports (unless already submitted prior to today, 11/7/24).

Notification of Report Revisions/Corrections
We will send an email when your report request has been completed and the revised version is available. We will also include information in the Weekly Update about which reports have been updated, revised, or corrected.

Future Reference re: Report Issues
We have added these bugs and WINNIE database changes to the Transition Guide (PDF) under Reports

We appreciate your patience as we work to complete all these report changes.

Do Not Void Benefits for Transferred Participants

In general, do not void benefits previously issued to participants that transfer to your agency unless there is an issue with their food prescription. As long at the food benefits are appropriate, you shouldn’t void their benefits just so that you can get the participation count for those benefits. (Training Module Reference: Transfers 1B – Agency-to-Agency)

SWIPe

Just a reminder that SWIPe needs to be open to be able to use signature pads, card readers, and scanners with WINNIE. SWIPe allows our peripheral hardware to communicate with WINNIE and if it isn’t open, an error will display when trying to collect signatures, read card numbers, and/or scan documents.

For easy access, best practice is to pin SWIPe to your taskbar since you will most likely use it every time you work in WINNIE. For information about how to do this, see the Hardware training module (TOC: SWIPe >> Pin to Taskbar).

WINNIE Training

The following training modules are now available on the WINNIE Training page:

• Agency Administration - Maintaining Medical Clinics and Providers
• Agency Administration - Local Use Questions

The Maintaining Referrals, Potential Duplicate Participant, and Customer Service training modules should be available by mid-November.

October 3, 2024

WINNIE Office Environment

We’ve been receiving questions about the WINNIE Office environment, which will be made available to Local Agencies after statewide roll-out has been completed. The following is some general information.

The WINNIE Office environment replaces the HuBERT Reports environment as our Archive database. It is read-only, linked to Infoview, contains all of WIC’s data, and its primary purpose is auditing and record management. Most data can be found in WINNIE. Only scanned documents, signatures, and benefit details greater than 3 years old are removed from WINNIE Production and archived in the WINNIE Office environment as historical data.

Access to this environment will be provided to each Local Agency coordinator and 1 additional designated staff person if necessary. More information will be provided when statewide rollout is complete.

WINNIE User Tips

The following is a tip, reminder, or lesson learned from the pilot agencies. All tips can also be found on the WINNIE User Tips page.

Duplicate Participants

Before creating any new records, you should always first search for an existing participant record. A couple of tips:

• Always ask if anyone in their family has ever received either formula or foods from MN WIC before.
• Search using just a couple of letters from each name or just the initials and their date of birth.
  • It is possible their existing record has a different last name.
  • Some cultures reverse the month and day when providing their birth date.
• If adding to an existing household, click the Household ID link to display all existing household records.

Potential Duplicate Applicant/Participant Modal
This only displays after completing the Prescreen if the first name, last name, and date of birth are an exact match. It provides the option of continuing to create the new participant record or to use the existing record.

Potential Duplicate Participants (Agency Admin)
The Potential Duplicate Participants function displays under Clinic Actions if you have the WINNIE Agency Admin role. This allows you to compare records associated with specific State WIC IDs or to run a State Defined Comparison, which compares records statewide and lists those with an exact match of the first 3 letters in the first and last names, date of birth, and gender.

However, there is currently a bug (#240307) associated with this whereby the criteria comparing the first 3 letters of the names is case sensitive. Since WINNIE does not force all capitals, allowing you to use sentence case when adding names and addresses, if the names aren’t type in all caps, the system won’t recognize matching records as potential duplicates.

This bug will be fixed in the next Release, 3.4.0, tentatively scheduled for early 2025. At that time, your agency may see an increase in potential duplicate records when the system is fixed and starts matching regardless of case.

If this is concerning, you can use the Caps Lock key to enter an applicant’s name in capitals.

WINNIE Training

“Cheat Sheets” and WINNIE Functionality

At this time, we are not providing “cheat sheets” for most of WINNIE’s functions. However, we’ve created two that address specific scenarios:

• Change Household ID – Direct Shipped Formula
• In Case of Participant Death

Both of these can be found under Change Household ID on the WINNIE Training page.

If, once you have reviewed the training modules, you feel there is another specific scenario that may require a cheat sheet, please use the WINNIE Questions for the State Office form to submit your suggestion.

September 12, 2024

Third Pilot Started at Hennepin

The third phase of the WINNIE Pilot started on Thursday, September 5th in Hennepin. This is an important test because adding Hennepin’s staff doubles the number of concurrent WINNIE users testing WINNIE’s performance.

We heard some feedback from Dakota and St. Paul-Ramsey that opening their Scheduler seemed “a little slower.” CDP, the program developer for WINNIE, indicated that they have already made improvements on the Scheduler performance for the next Release tentatively scheduled for early 2025.

A huge thank you to all the staff at Hennepin! We appreciate all of the effort and time it has taken to prepare for this transition!

The following are some remarks from Hennepin County staff following their first week of using WINNIE:

From the Coordinator
“I felt like rollout went more smoothly than expected especially considering that we experienced firewall issues up until a week before rollout making it difficult to practice in the training environment and were not given permission to download SWIPe by county IT until the day before (despite requesting several months in advance). Staff were resilient and plenty of support was provided by state and supervisors onsite. “

Feedback from Staff

• Overall, Winnie is rather intuitive to navigate, though it takes some time to get used to the new layout and when and where to find/add/save information. It is generally faster and more modernized besides some glitches and delays.
• It is taking a while to get used to the new locations of things, but nice in general.
• Faster.
• So far so good and so far, it’s been going pretty well.
• I also like we can amend alerts and keep original date instead of always have to change it to current date before saving (so we don’t have to keep on adding original dates into the alert).
• Note from the Coordinator: “…we seem to be having more slowness in our county and are working with IT to try and problem solve.”
• It seems like we are having some challenges with connectivity, so I'm not yet sure how efficient WINNIE is compared to HuBERT. I think I need more time to assess WINNIE's efficiency compared to HuBERT.
• I’m still adjusting and it’s a work in progress.
• Much faster when it is working…
• It’s OK. It’ll take some time to get used to it.
• Just have to get used to where all the info is located since it looks very different than HuBERT.
• I’m still getting used to it, but it’s been pretty clunky so far.
• It's going to take me a long time to get used to it. It's very busy on the screen and I find it's not very intuitive as what to click on next.
• It is okay. I have found it hard to navigate even with the training modules. One thing I noticed is although it is modern, easy to read, it is really hard to see what was missed. All the colors blend together.
• Too many details that need to be filled out, without being highlighted as to what is missing, making it harder for the eyes.

Training

New Training Documents
We have added three new training documents to the WINNIE Training page:

• WINNIE Important Functionality (PDF)
• WINNIE Training Tasks (WORD)
• WINNIE Training Scenarios (WORD)

A very big “Thank you” to St. Paul-Ramsey who initially identified the concepts and developed these documents to assist with training prior to your WINNIE roll-out.

WINNIE Training Modules
All clinic training modules are now available on the WINNIE Training page. We will be developing modules for Agency Administration functions next.

Windows 11

Windows 11 can be used with WINNIE. Both the Local Agency Hardware Support Agreement form and the Using Locally Owned Computers with WIC (PDF) reference document have been updated to reflect this.

WINNIE User Tips

The following are tips, reminders, questions, and lessons learned from the Hennepin agency staff during their first couple of days using WINNIE. These can also be found on the WINNIE User Tips page.

Adjust Benefits

Adjusting Formula in WINNIE
The Adjusting Formula in WINNIE (PDF) document found on the WINNIE Training page provides this same information for training purposes.

Overview
When adjusting Concentrate or RTU/RTF formulas in Adjust Benefits, WINNIE suggests extra cans. This is not a bug and works similarly to HuBERT, except that in WINNIE you can see the extra cans because all of the calculations occur on one page and aren’t broken into multiple steps.

Although WINNIE will not allow you to issue more than the Food Item Limit for an individual formula (for example, 31 cans of 13 oz concentrate), if the number of calculated ounces left are greater than the number of ounces in one can/container, WINNIE will indicate that these extra cans/containers are available.

Rules of Thumb
There are common sense Rules of Thumb that you should follow when adjusting formula:

Examples

Example #1 – Same Reconstitution with Some Returned/Recovered
Exchanging concentrate for concentrate where some of the original formula (gray row) is returned and/or recovered:

Example #2 – Different Reconstitution with Some Returned/Recovered
Exchanging concentrate for powder where some of the original formula (gray row) is returned and/or recovered:

Example #3 – Different Reconstitution with ALL Returned/Recovered
Exchanging concentrate for RTU/RTF where all of the original formula (gray row) is returned and/or recovered:

TIP! Instead of using Update Future Months, which is more advanced functionality, simply void future months, assess food prescriptions and add as appropriate, then reissue using Issue Benefits.

Benefit Issuance

WINNIE Always Maintains Benefit Cycle
Once a household has a benefit cycle, WINNIE will always maintain that cycle even if all members have been terminated or are no longer eligible and then return to the program.

Logging In

Login Times Can Vary
The amount of time it takes to log into WINNIE can vary from day-to-day and can sometimes take longer. It can be impacted by a few different things, including backend reference changes that are being synced, software upgrades, changes to your agency’s IT firewall settings, and your agency’s VPN.

Participant Folders

More than One User in Same Folder
There is no notification if another person opens the same Participant Folder you are currently working in. In general, having more than one person in the same folder is discouraged since it can result in data-syncing issues.

However, folders are locked if benefits are being issued or adjusted and you try to open the same page (Issue Benefits or Adjust Benefits, respectively) in another member’s folder.

Training Environment

Searching for Participants
The Training Environment is a desensitized database. This means that much of the data is scrambled and both the first and last names are truncated to 3 letters each. WINNIE does exact match searches by default so if searching for specific participants in your agency by their full name, there won’t be any matches, and no records will display. Instead, when searching by name in the Training Environment, type just the first few letters or initials.

Future Approved Change Requests for WINNIE

Any suggested changes to WINNIE must be documented by the State Office and assigned a severity, discussed with (and approved by) the SPIRIT Users Group (SUG), and then prioritized by the SUG for inclusion in a future release.

The following were suggestions provided by our pilots that will be included in a future release.

August 1, 2024

Second Pilot Started at St. Paul-Ramsey

The second phase of the WINNIE Pilot started on Tuesday, July 30th in St. Paul-Ramsey.

Another huge thank you to all the staff and leadership at St. Paul-Ramsey who made their first days of using WINNIE a success! We all appreciate the effort and time it has taken for you to help lead this transition and make it a positive one.

The following are some remarks from St. Paul-Ramsey County staff following their first day of using WINNIE:

From the Coordinator

“Overall, WINNIE rollout has gone smoothly. It helped a lot that we padded schedules to give staff a little extra time. Although there have been a few hiccups, it hasn’t been anything we weren’t able to problem solve our way through and serve families. Most staff say their favorite things are how fast WINNIE is and how easy it is to move from chart to chart.”

Remarks from Staff

• “Way easier than anticipated.”
• “WINNIE is much faster, especially when issuing benefits!”
• “The transition was much smoother than expected.”
• “Getting easier as we continue to work with the program.”
• “If finally happened, LOL!”
• “I like how having only one chart open eliminates the concern of writing a note in the wrong chart.”
• “Although we aren’t able to pull up multiple charts at once, it doesn’t slow down the appt process.”
• “I also like that when doing appointments for multiple family members when you switch from member to member it opens the folder in the same place. If you are doing health history for one child and switch to the other’s chart, you will be in health history.”
• Staff person after adjusting benefits and updating future months: “Well, that was easy!”

Challenges or potential requests for changes:

• The Account Balance prints differently, separating food items by First Date to Use, instead of aggregating all the food items for the month regardless of the FDTU like it does in HuBERT.
• Lack of Today button for Breastfeeding Verified Date. It defaults to last date selected like HuBERT but without the Today button, some staff aren’t noticing and are selecting dates from the incorrect month.

Technical Details Available for Agency IT

If you are having difficulties with logging into WINNIE and you are working with your agency IT, a document has been added to FileZilla in the agencygateway >> WINNIE Firewall Requirements folder.

This document, WINNIE Firewall Requirements, provides technical details to IT staff who may need to make changes to Local Agency port or firewall settings for WINNIE users to be able to successfully access WINNIE.

WINNIE Tips

The following are tips, reminders, questions, and lessons learned from the St. Paul-Ramsey agency staff on their first day of using WINNIE. These can also be found on the WINNIE User Tips page.

Account Balance

Account Balance Displays Food Items by First Date to Use (FDTU)
The Account Balance is a real-time snapshot of a household’s aggregated food items. The quantities show the current amount after any purchases have been made.

In WINNIE, the Account Balance shows food items by Redemption Period of FDTU thru Last Date to Use (LDTU). These are the actual dates during which a household can purchase the food items. When benefits are added or adjusted, any food items issued on a different date and having a different First Date to Use (FDTU) will display separately.

Calendars

Creating Calendars Can Take Longer in Month View
When creating calendars, if your agency has a lot of resource schedules, you may find it takes longer to open the Calendar, especially since it opens by default in Month view. This is a work-around to help it open faster:

• In the Clinic Module, select your smallest clinic from the dropdown in the header.
• Return to the Module Launcher and click the Agency Administration button.
• Select Resources Schedules from the sidebar.
• Select Day view (to the right directly above the calendar).
• Select the larger clinic you want to create schedules for.
• Add your schedules/blocks.
• After making your calendar changes, click the Month view to review your changes if desired.

Food Prescription

Modify Food Prescriptions Faster!
When creating food prescription in WINNIE, you can double-click on the row to open the Edit card, you do not have to select the row then click the Edit button. You can also edit and delete more than one food item, so make all of your food prescriptions edits at one time, before clicking the Save button.

WIC Cards

Do Not Automatically Deactivate Card if Reassigning New Card
In WINNIE, deactivating a WIC Card before replacing it will cause the PIN NOT to transfer to the new card. Instead, you can simply replace a new card if their current card is lost, stolen, damaged, or unusable, and only deactivate if someone is in possession of the card that should no longer have access (ex: foster care situation or change in representatives). When replacing, the new card simply overwrites the current card, and the PIN is automatically transferred.

Session Settings

Timeout is 30 Minutes 
A browser session is started every time we log into WINNIE. Our sessions are limited to 30 minutes unless “server calls” occur. A server call is any activity that saves data or changes the page, such as:

• Participant searches
• Opening participant folders
• Selecting different pages (ex: Health Information, Blood, Income, etc.)
• Saving changes

When a server call occurs, the system resets the clock for our session, allowing us to continue using WINNIE without automatically logging us out. Typing information into fields on a page or into a note is not a server call. Data entry must be completed and saved within 30 minutes, otherwise, the session will time-out and the data will not be saved.

SWIPe

• When SWIPE opens it displays a message “waiting for connections.” It will not indicate it has connected until something occurs that requires SWIPe, such as collecting a signature or scanning.
• Ensure before your rollout that only one version of SWIPe is installed. During Pilot, one of the most common issues was having more than one version of SWIPe installed, which caused it not to work correctly.

Logging in

Toggle on Remember Me
As long as you are not sharing your computer with someone else during the day, on the Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) page, you can toggle on “Remember Me” when logging in. Once toggled on, the system “remembers” you for the current date and does not require a new MFA code if you log out or your session ends, and you have to log back in. This “remember me” expires at midnight each night. It is also browser-specific so if you change browsers during the day, for whatever reason, you will need to enter a new MFA code and toggle on Remember Me for that browser.

Scanners

Plug Directly into Laptop
Like signature pads, scanners should also be plugged directly into the laptop and not the docking station.

WINNIE Automatically Performs Two-Sided Scanning
If you scan a document that has information on both sides, WINNIE automatically scans both the front and back when the document is run through the scanner. In some cases, only one side is relevant (such as may occur with Rights & Responsibilities that have English and another language on the other side). WINNIE does not have an option for one-sided scanning. It does scan to PDF, so some staff may be able to delete the second page. In general, this shouldn’t be necessary. However, you do need to be aware in case there is private data that should not be scanned into the system on the backside of a page you are scanning.

July 11, 2024

Pilot Started

The WINNIE Pilot started on Tuesday, July 9th at Dakota County. A huge thank you to all of their staff and leadership who worked very hard at planning, preparing, and training to make their first few days of using WINNIE a success! All of Minnesota WIC appreciates the hard work and effort their staff and leadership have put into helping to make this transition a positive one.

The following are some remarks from Dakota County staff following their first day of using WINNIE:

From the Coordinator

• “Initially staff were nervous because it’s very different with a live person in front of you while trying to navigate something new. But as the day went on, they got more used to WINNIE and more settled with the flow and things that weren’t intuitive yet. By the end of the day, they were so much more comfortable…”
• “We scheduled two 15-minute breaks, one before lunch and one at the end of the day, for catch-up or just give them some wiggle room…I think that really helped.”

Positive/Surprising Remarks from Staff

Topic: not being able to have more than one chart open at a time

• “WINNIE is so much faster that clicking back and forth isn’t that big of a deal and it is easy to do, even with infant dyad appointments, etc.”
• “Transitioning from participant to participant in the same household keeps you on the same screen – making it easy to update items in multiple charts at the same time (whereas in HuBERT you would have to close, wait for the new chart to open and it defaults to the Demographics page).”

Topic: Appointments

• “Dragging appointments to adjust vs having to delete multiple appointments and go into multiple charts to move things around. Key tip: don’t forget what time they were originally scheduled at if just moving it to a new column, so it isn’t accidentally scheduled at a different time.”
• “One click to edit appointments creates greater efficiencies when scheduling or making edits.”

Topic: General

• “Issuing benefits is a lot faster than HuBERT, so is capturing signatures.”
• “Uploading documents was easy and fast.”

Challenges or potential requests for changes:

• Remember when adjusting benefits, staff need to remove items first before trying to add new item (many were doing it opposite with HuBERT).
• Would be nice if there were an option to reschedule an appointment from the appointment page (currently can only view or delete). A change request has been added and will be prioritized by the SPIRIT Users Group.
• Is there any way to get Saturday and Sunday removed from the scheduler? Or for each agency to define business hours and days? A change request has been added and will be prioritized by the SPIRIT Users Group.
• Is there a way to add a “today” option to the drop-down calendars for the parts that require you to select a day? Or default to today’s date? This is a current change request and will be prioritized by the SPIRIT Users Group.

WINNIE Tips

The following are tips, reminders, questions, and lessons learned that our Pilot agency staff had on their first day of using WINNIE. These can also be found on the new WINNIE User Tips page.

Benefit Issuance

Cannot Issue Benefits to Infant Before First Birthday
In WINNIE, a food package based on an age category change cannot be issued until the date of that birthday. The birthday must be on or after the Printed First Date to Use (PFDTU) to receive the food package. This is most impactful for infants turning one year old. They will no longer be able to receive the child food package unless the PFDTU of the benefit set is on or after their first birthday.

Certification Mode

Bloodwork Requirement
In Certification Mode, a red box shows next to the Bloodwork requirement for all participants. For most participants, you will need to select the “CPA Determined not due for bloodwork” option when not completing the requirement. However, for infants less than 9 months old for whom Bloodwork is never required you will be able to complete the cert without opening the Bloodwork page.

Switching Folders
In Certification Mode, you are still able to switch to another household member’s folder. When you select them from the Participant Menu, WINNIE will automatically close Certification Mode and open the other member’s Participant Folder. You can switch back to the member who was being certified and select Resume Certification to open Certification Mode again.

Do Not Have to Save Auto-Generated Food Prescription
In Certification Mode you do not have to save the auto-generated Food Prescription. You are required to open the Food Prescription page since that initiates the creation of the food prescription, but once the page has been opened the system will create the food packages for any age category changes occurring during the next certification period, the Save button will be disabled unless any changes are made to the default food package, and you will receive the checkmark.

Where is...?

Where is the Household ID?
In WINNIE, the Household ID no longer displays at the top of each page of the Participant Folder. It can only be found in the following places:

• Demographics page at the top of the Household Demographics panel on the left.
• Manage eWIC Account page to the right of the Primary Cardholder.
• Participant Menu, which can be opened on every page. The Household ID is found at the bottom next to “Other Household Members”. However, if there is only one member in the household, the Household ID does not display in the Participant Menu.
• Appointment Details modal. If appointments are scheduled for individuals, the Household ID (and all other appointment information) is found by single-clicking on the scheduled appointment. For Household appointments, the Household ID displays on the scheduled appointment.

Where is Add Member? (Updated 7/16/24)
We can add a member from both the Participant Search page and from within the Participant Folder. There is an Add Member icon on the participant card in Participant Search, as well as the first option in the Participant Menu in the Participant Folder. Two notes: 1. We can Add a Member to a participant who still belongs to Statewide in WINNIE. 2. If there is only one member, such as a postpartum woman, and you need to add the infant, you should do so before starting Certification Mode for mom. Once the certification has been started, Add Member is disabled, so you can’t prescreen the baby and you won’t be able to link mom and baby during mom’s cert. You can only link once the baby has been prescreened.

Screen Real Estate

Zoom Settings
WINNIE uses a lot more screen real-estate and requires a lot more scrolling when at 100%. You may want to change your browser zoom to 67% or 75% for ideal viewing of the different WINNIE pages. To change your zoom, once in WINNIE, click the ellipses icon (3, either horizontal or vertical, dots in the top right of the browser window) to open the Settings menu. Click the minus in the zoom section to decrease the size of the page content.

Task Bar Placement
The navigation sidebar on the left of each page in the Participant Folder is very long. If you are having trouble seeing the Begin Certification option at the bottom of the sidebar, you can collapse any of the sections of the sidebar OR you can try moving your taskbar from the bottom of your screen to the right. To do this, click on your taskbar and make sure there isn’t a checkmark next to “Lock all taskbars”. If there is a checkmark, click it to de-select it. Then simply click and drag your taskbar to the right edge of your monitor to position it vertically on the right. To make sure it doesn’t move, right-click and select “Lock all taskbars” to lock it to its new position.

Vertical Scroll Bars
You do not always have to mouse over to vertical scroll bars to use them if your mouse has a scroll button between the left and right click buttons. If you have this button and click on the page, you can use the mouse button to scroll up and down instead of mousing over to the scroll bar. (NOTE: the scroll button has two states: multiple lines or one screen at a time. “Multiple lines” is the default and is slower while the second makes the mouse much faster. You can toggle between the states by pressing the button.)

Scheduler

Open Scheduler Icon Not Displaying on Participant Card
When you click the Household ID link on the participant card on the Search page, WINNIE automatically selects Statewide and searches the Statewide database for all members of the household. While Statewide is selected, you cannot open the Scheduler and the Open Scheduler icon no longer displays on the participant card. If you only want all members of the household that belong to your Agency (and not those in Agency 88), you can simply click the Agency button and click the Search button (or press the Enter key). Once no longer searching Statewide, the Open Scheduler icon re-displays on the participant card.

Changed Clinic View is Retained
This is a reminder that when viewing other clinic schedules on the Scheduler page, if you change the Clinic at the top of the page, WINNIE will retain the newly selected clinic when you go back to the Participant Search page.

Edit Resources to Find More Quickly in Lists/Dropdown
One of the staff at the Pilot agency told us she edited her resources so that it was easier to select them from lists or dropdowns using hot keys. In HuBERT, all of her resources started with their position followed by their name (ex: RD-Carly). In WINNIE, she edited them so that the resources started with their name then position (ex: Carly-RD). This way, she can just type the first letter (ex: C) to quickly filter and select the resource (ex: Carly) when scheduling or creating her calendar.

Clinic Schedule for Staff
You can generate the clinic schedule for a single resource on both the Scheduler page (opens in Participant Folder) and the Clinic Schedule page (accessed from the Participant Search page). Click the “Generate Clinic Schedule” button then click the x on the far right of the dropdown to remove all resources scheduled for that date that are default populated. Click the dropdown or use hot keys to select the desired resource then click the OK button. The “Appointment Listing for ” will open in another browser tab and you can switch between that browser tab and the WINNIE browser tab (or you can print the Appointment Listing if preferred).

Signature Pad

Plug Directly into Computer
In general, we have found that the signature pad works best when plugged directly into the computer, as opposed to when plugged into the docking station (or port replicator).

Buttons Reversed on Signature Pad
When signing the signature pad, the Cancel and OK buttons have been reversed. The OK button being on the right in WINNIE may be more intuitive for users.

WINNIE

HuBERT

SWIPe
When a new version of SWIPe is installed, you (or your IT) will need to make sure the previous version is no longer installed. This will minimize any potential issues with the signature pad.

Use the Enter Key for Navigation Shortcuts

The Enter key on the keyboard can be used for many navigational shortcuts.

• Alerts modal – once you’ve reviewed the alert and if you don’t need to delete any of them, you can simply press the Enter key to close the Alerts modal.
• Demographics page – after any change on the Demographics page, you can press the Enter key to automatically save the change (as long as there aren’t any required fields that must be completed).
• Capture Signature for Card modal – you can press the Enter key to automatically select the correct button (either the “Capture Electronic signature” button when the modal first opens or the “Save Signature” button once the participant has signed the signature pad).
• Income page – after entering an Adjunctive Eligibility income, you must click the Update button. However, you can also simply press the Enter key and the Update button will be automatically selected by the system. The Pilot staff also found that you can click anywhere inside the Adjunctive Eligibility card and that will also automatically select the Update button.

Training

Training Database
The Training Database is not yet available, but more information will be provided during the July Local Agency conference call.

Training Modules
The training modules were designed to train staff for the WINNIE roll-out but unlike for our eWIC roll-out, we’ve only completed one set that can be used to train all staff, current and new. For current staff, they may be more comprehensive than desired. You can use the training modules however best fits your training needs.

For some Pilot staff that found the training modules to be “daunting”, they were encouraged by their coordinator to “play around” in WINNIE and see what questions they needed answered to be able to use it with confidence. When they had a question that needed answering, they went back to that topic in the training modules.

We are continuing to develop training modules. Change Household ID is the last clinic module left to complete and will be available soon. After that, we will begin working on the Agency Administration training modules (referrals, maintaining providers, potential duplicate participants, and local use questions).

Reference Documents Available
Per requests from local agencies, we’ve added a couple of documents to assist with training.

1. WINNIE Training Module Checklist (WORD) – lists all modules by topic and their duration and can be used to keep track of the modules or information in modules that you’ve completed.

2. Reference for browser settings based on your preferred default browser – “how to”: set your default browser, ensure your login isn’t saved, clear your browse cache, bookmark the WINNIE login page, set your zoom preference, allow pop-ups in WINNIE, ensure downloads are deleted daily, and open the Develop Console, which may be helpful when working with the MN Help Desk.

• Browser Settings for Microsoft Edge (PDF)
• Browser Settings for Google Chrome (PDF)

June 6, 2024

All content has been deleted since no longer timely or relevant.

May 2, 2024

All content has been deleted since no longer timely or relevant.

October 5, 2023

All content has been deleted since no longer timely or relevant.

June 15, 2023 - Updated 11/1/2023

All content has been deleted since no longer timely or relevant.

October 27, 2022

All content has been deleted since no longer timely or relevant.

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #22 (PDF) - 9/29/22
Contents: Phase 1 of UAT; Prepare for WINNIE by Cleaning Up Incomplete Certs & MCAs Questions & Answers

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #21 (PDF) - 7/21/22
Contents: Efforts in Preparation for Phase 1 of UAT; Questions & Answers; Adjust Benefits Overview #3 Module (HTML5/7 minutes); Adjust Benefits Overview #3 Script (PDF)

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #20 (PDF) - 6/16/22
Contents: WINNIE Information on MDH WIC Website; Information Provided in Previous WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletters

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #19 (PDF) - 5/26/22
Contents: Adjust Benefits Overview #2 Module (HTML5/16 minutes); Adjust Benefits Overview #2 Script (PDF)

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #18 (PDF) - 4/27/22
Contents: WINNIE (and HuBERT) Information Coming to Your Inbox on Thursdays Starting in May 2022!; Questions & Answers; Adjust Benefits Overview #1 Module (HTML5/18 minutes); Adjust Benefits Overview #1 Script (PDF)

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #17 (PDF) - 3/16/22
Contents: Timeline for Phase 1 of UAT; Benefit Issuance Overview #2 Module (HTML5/10 minutes); Benefit Issuance Overview #2 Script (PDF)

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #16 (PDF) - 2/16/22
Contents: Timeline is Being Revised; Questions & Answers; Benefit Issuance Overview #1 Module (HTML5/7 minutes); Benefit Issuance Overview #1 Script (PDF)

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #15 (PDF) - 1/19/22
Contents: Requirements Validation Testing (RVT) for Cycle 7 Extended Two Weeks; Questions & Answers; Overview of Usernames, Password Requirements, Logging into WINNIE, Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA), Locations Modal, Module Launcher, Permissions and Roles

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #14 (PDF) - 12/15/21
Contents: Requirements Validation Testing (RVT) for Cycle 7 Began December 1, 2021; WINNIE and End-of-Month (EOM) Reports; Questions & Answers

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #13 (PDF) - 11/17/21
Contents: Requirements Validation Testing (RVT) for Cycle 7 Begins December 1, 2021; Overview of Risk Factors; Overview of Certification History

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #12 (PDF) - 10/20/21
Contents: Overview of Food Prescription & Changing the Infant's BF Amount; Overview of Food Prescription & Food Package III

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #11 (PDF) - 9/15/21
Contents: Overview of Food Prescription & the Participant Folder; Overview of Food Prescription & Certifications

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #10 (PDF) - 8/18/21
Contents: Overview of In State Transfers; Overview of Out-of-State Transfers or VOCs

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #9 (PDF) - 7/21/21
Overview of Manage Alerts

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #8 (PDF) - 6/16/21
Contents: Schedule for SPIRIT Web Project - Still Being Developed; Overview of Manage Notes

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #7 (PDF) - 5/19/21
Contents: Revised Tentative Schedule for SPIRIT Web Project; Questions & Answers; Overview of Beginning Certifications and Mid-Certification Assessments (MCAs)

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #6 (PDF) - 4/21/21
Contents: Development Is Behind; Schedule Will Be Revised; Questions & Answers; Overview of WINNIE Demographics ; Overview of WINNIE Navigation in the Participant Folder

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #5 (PDF) - 3/17/21
Contents: WINNIE Questions Form Now Available; Statewide Roll-out Tentative Draft Now Available; WINNIE Overview ; Overview of WINNIE Navigation; Overview of WINNIE Screens (in General); Overview of WINNIE Participant Search

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #4 (PDF) - 2/17/21
Contents: Project Status: Cycle 7 RVT, UAT, Hardware Assessment, Readiness Guide

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #3 (PDF) - 1/20/21
Contents: ACTION ITEM! Minnesota WIC Clinic Locations Form; SPIRIT Web Project & Enhancements: Overview, Local Agency Enhancement Suggestions.

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #2 (PDF) - 12/16/20
Contents: WINNIE and Reports: Assessment of Local Agency Reporting Needs, Report Requirements table

WINNIE the Scoop! Newsletter #1 (PDF) - 11/18/20
Contents: SPIRIT Web Re-Engineering Project: Overview; Project Status: Development, Requirements Validation Testing (RVT), User Acceptance Testing (UAT); Overview Training, Pilot, Statewide Roll-out, Timeline