How Can I Determine the Financial Status of My Project?
Faculty can access HPU’s Clarity program to review the current financial expenditures of a project. Account data is updated every evening and reflects the previous day’s close of business figures. If you do not have access your project account, please contact RASP for set-up. System access requires your HPU username and password.
How Do I Request a Re-Budget?
In most instances, a re-budget (the transfer of costs between of budget lines) requires a sponsor’s approval. If you feel that a re-budget is necessary, please contact the RASP Director before starting the process. RASP will coordinate the re-budget process and obtain the necessary sponsor approval.
How Do I Request a Project Extension?
If you would like to request a no-cost extension, please contact the Office of Research Administration and Sponsored Programs ninety (90) days before the project end date. If you would like to request an extension that incorporates supplemental funding, please contact RASP at the earliest possible time to discuss the best way to move forward.
How Do I Request the Issuance of a Subaward?
If you have project with an approved subaward, please contact RASP for its issuance and be prepared to provide a budget, scope of work, and contact information for the subsite. If you require a subaward on your project and it not currently approved, please contact RASP for assistance in seeking sponsor approval for the activity.
Who Approves a Subawardee’s Invoice?
The Principal Investigator is the only individual that can fully attest to the necessity for any subawardee or project charge. Principal Investigators should review each subaward invoice for four factors that determine whether a cost is allowable.
- Reasonable: Reflects the actions that a prudent person would have taken under the circumstances at the time the cost was incurred.
- Allocable: That the charges for the good or service are assignable to the project in accordance with the relative benefit received.
- Treated Consistently: That all costs incurred are consistently treated the same throughout the project (estimating, accumulating, and reporting of costs) and in accordance with federal regulations.
- Allowable: That all costs conform to any limitation as provided for in the award by the sponsor or limitation set forth in the request for proposal or funding announcement.
What is Effort Reporting and How Does it Impact my Project?
Effort reporting is a process wherein HPU confirms that the faculty salary paid on a project is reasonable and directly correlates to the amount of faculty effort expended on a project. Each salaried project member shall certify or have their effort certified. The Principal Investigator must certify his or her effort and can certify the efforts of other salaried personnel on the project. There are three effort reporting periods each year which are the spring, summer, and fall. These periods reflect the HPU academic calendar. After the end of each reporting period, RASP will provide a reporting form to the Principal Investigator and all additional grant supported personnel. The Principal Investigator is responsible for ensuring that all sponsored program personnel certify their effort. If over the project period the effort expended is significantly different than proposed, meaning lesser or greater than five percent, corrections will be made to the effort records. Time cards will suffice for those project members that are paid on an hourly basis.
Can I Transfer Costs From One Grant to Another?
Costs are not allowed to be transferred between grants if the intent is remedy budget overruns, avoid restrictions, or for other reasons of convenience. All transfer charges must be adjusted within ninety (90) days and provide a justification for the transfer. All charges over ninety (90) days are subject to the approval of the Director of Research Administration and Sponsored Programs.
What Happens if I Have a Budget Overrun?
Expenditures in excess of officially funded award amounts are unallowable. In the event an error is made and over-expenditures occur, the over-expenditures must be moved off the project prior to the project end date. All over-expenditures are the responsibility of the Principal Investigator and the department.
How Do I Document Cost Share on a Project?
Cost sharing is generally discouraged and should never be included in an application without express approval from the Director of RASP. If permitted, all cost sharing must be documented, consist of the same types of charges that are allowable on the project, and occur during the project period of performance. Salary and fringe costs will be documented through the HPU effort reporting process. Unless specifically approved by both federal agencies, federal funds may not used as cost share toward another federal project. Subcontractor and third party cost sharing must be documented on the entity’s invoice or its official letterhead with an authorized signature at the level and category budgeted in its proposal to HPU. Facilities and Administrative (F&A) costs may be calculated and claimed as cost share, if not prohibited by the sponsor, on F&A-bearing direct costs that are allowable and documented as cost sharing (effort, supplies, current services, etc.).
What Happens if I need a Payroll Distribution Change?
Payroll Redistributions are special journal vouchers used to adjust all payroll charges (salaries and benefits) made in previous periods. These redistributions are only authorized for the correction of an error in a previous period, changes in an effort report, or for a retroactive personnel action. Redistributions submitted over ninety (90) days past the payroll action must be submitted detailed in a letter to and approved by the RASP Director. The letter must be from Principal Investigator’s Dean detailing the why the change is necessary, what the impact of the change will be, and what the adjustment was not prepared less than ninety (90) days.
Who Should I Contact if I Believe that I have Created an Invention Under a Project?
If you feel that you created something unique with commercial application or value please contact the RASP Director at your earliest convenience. Remember that the sponsoring entity may have rights to that creation. Please be cautious in presenting this information or releasing it to the public, as public disclosure may inhibit the intellectual protection process.
Do you have questions? Email RASP at [email protected] or call 841-9313 for assistance.