The Cost Share F&A Rate will be applied to any of the expenditures used with the cash contribution. So the amount of cash needed is the total amount of the Cost Share Commitment less the F&A Rate. For example, if the Cost Share Commitment is $10,000 and the Cost Share F&A Rate on the Award is 55% then the amount of cash needed is $4,500 ($10,000 – ($10,000 x .55)). So in this example, the outside entity only needs to provide $4,500 to meet a Cost Share Contribution of $10,000.
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Cost Share
The F&A rate of the budget where the Cost Share expenditures were incurred does not determine the Cost Share F&A Rate for the benefiting Sponsored Award. The Cost Share F&A rate should be equal to the UW’s standard negotiated rate unless the Sponsor specifically states otherwise (which is rare). Cost Share F&A does not represent a burden to the department as the calculation only exists in the eFECS Cost Share Summary module to calculate the true value to the UW of the Cost Share Contribution.
It depends on the nature of the resources that the 3rd Party was to provide. If the 3rd Party resource is integral to completion of the scope of work, then you may need to renegotiate with the 3rd Party and/or the Sponsor. If the 3rd Party resource is not integral to the completion of the scope of work, then this would be allowable. As cash cannot be used as a Cost Share Contribution, the cash received from the 3rd Party must be deposited into the department’s gift or discretionary budget and then expended on items or services that provide benefit to the Award. Those expenses must then be “tagged” as Cost Share Contributions for the Award.
At least quarterly, and more frequently if the sponsor requires the cost share match amount to be up-to-date in order to pay award invoices.
Deficits
A grant or contract is in deficit when the total expenditures exceed the amount awarded for the project. Budgets in deficit cannot be closed to status 4.
To resolve a deficit, the department will need an allowable non-federal, non-grant budget to cover the overexpenditure amount. If possible, the department should complete the transfer via the Grant Tracker Deficit Transfer tool. If this option is not available for your budget, please provide the deficit coverage budget via a Grant Tracker request in the Closing topic.
GIM 15 outlines policies and procedures for the transfer of expenditures between budgets.
Deficit transfers and Expense Transfers both pose audit risks to the University of Washington.
- Deficit transfers can indicate that an award may have been mis-managed when overspending occurs.
- Expense transfers can represent an audit risk for the university
- Multiple transfers indicate continuous errors
- Transfers of expenses after 90 days from posting indicate reconciliation issues and potential internal control weaknesses.
A deficit transfer is appropriate when all expenses are allowable, but the total exceeds the amount of the award. E.g. if a budget is $1000 in deficit because travel charges for a conference described in the scope of work turned out to be higher than anticipated, all individual expenditures should remain on the budget, with a lump sum deficit transfer covering the overage.
An expense transfer must be used if an expense posted to the budget is unallowable per the terms of the award agreement. E.g. if an award does not allow travel, all travel charges must be transferred off the budget.
Encumbrances
An encumbrance is a commitment to use funds for a specific purpose. By earmarking funds it helps departments in planning expenditures during the life of a budget. Salary encumbrances are set up automatically upon entry of costing allocations in Workday. Corrections for Salary Encumbrances are handled in the Financial Accounting department.
An encumbrance is a commitment to use funds for a specific purpose. By earmarking funds, it helps departments plan expenditures during the life of a budget. The University uses various encumbrance codes for its financial activity. A list of encumbrance codes can be found at: http://finance.uw.edu/gca/encumbrances-0
Encumbrances and ARIBA Open Balances are charges that are anticipated to be charged to a budget or, in some cases, restricted funds. Note that encumbrances and open balances are for internal planning and monitoring only and will NOT be reflected on invoices or reports to the sponsor. List of encumbrance types and contacts for managing them.
Expenditures
Expenditures displayed on Transaction Summary reports in MyFD (MyFinancial.desktop) come from various sources. Often the source can be identified by the description or reference information in the Transaction Summary. If you need to locate a copy of the source document, here are some resources that may assist you:
- For payroll charges, contact the Integrated Service Center at: ischelp@uw.edu or 206.543.8000.
- For Purchase Orders, contact Procurement Customer Service at: pcshelp@uw.edu or 206.543.4500.
- For questionable ISDs (Internal Sales Document), CTIs (Cost Transfer Invoice), or CTs (Cash Transmittal), review the information in the reference fields for contact information, or use the Originating Area Code found in the Transaction Detail of an expenditure or revenue entry to find out who processed it.
- JVs (Journal Vouchers) can be processed by multiple areas. The characters after the identifier of "JV" denote which area processed the document. To determine which department to contact with JV questions, use the following chart: https://finance.uw.edu/fr/journal-voucher
Fixed Price Surplus
A Fixed Price budget is one that represents an agreement made with a sponsor to perform service at a firm price, without the ability to adjust that price for actual increased costs in performing said service. The firm price is usually based on a per test, or per deliverable, service. The University retains the unexpended balance of fully paid Fixed Price budgets.
The unexpended balance is transferred to a Fixed Price Surplus budget that has been established by a department in order to receive those unexpended balances from their respective Fixed Price budgets. The Fixed Price Surplus budget may be used to offset deficits in any grant or contract. For further information see Fixed Price Surplus budgets
There is no set limit, but we recommend having three Fixed Price Surplus budgets (if needed) -- one surplus budget to correspond with on-campus fixed price activity, one for off-campus activity, and one for clinical trial surplus or another special rate. For further information, go to Fixed Price Surplus.
Gifts
Gift Processing in University Advancement sets up gift budgets and processes all gifts to the University. Details are available on their website-- http://depts.washington.edu/uwadv/central-resources/gproc/forms/new-funds/
Grant Tracker
Grant Tracker is a website accessing a database containing information on all GCA budgets. It is designed to reduce the amount of time to close budgets, provide information in a timely manner, and decrease the number of requests for information to and from GCA.
Features include:
- View all GCA budgets
- Access parent and sub budget information
- View invoices and reports
- Submit requests and attachments to GCA
- Get up-to-date status on outstanding requests
- View request/attachment history
- Submit Transpasu requests for new sub budgets
- Transfer deficit balances
- Provide up-to-date campus contacts to receive GCA messages
Invoicing
GCA cannot issue invoices on a budget in advance status because we do not yet have a fully executed agreement between UW and the sponsor confirming the terms of the agreement. However, in rare cases we can make an exception if the sponsor themselves request it, e.g. so they can pay the award or a portion thereof in advance or if they need to complete payment during an expiring fiscal period. In these cases, please contact GCA via Grant Tracker or email to gcahelp@uw.edu.
If a sponsor hasn't received the invoice within a week of its issuance, we may not have the correct mailing or email address on file for them. If a sponsor expresses concern over not having received an invoice, please forward their message to gcahelp@uw.edu and we will follow up with them.
When there is a question regarding a payment made to a grant/contract budget, email gcahelp@uw.edu or submit a question using Grant Tracker.
The remittance address for check payments for a grant or contract is:
University of Washington
Grant and Contract Accounting
12455 Collections Drive
Chicago, IL 60693-0001
If a department receives a payment for a grant or contract budget, please send it to the Chicago remittance address. Be sure to write the budget number near the memo line of the check and forward a PDF copy of all supporting documentation to gcacash@uw.edu.
Please ensure that your check is made payable to "University of Washington," and send payments via standard postal mail only. (The lockbox facility is not set up to receive documents from other delivery services, and such payments may be delayed or lost.)
Payment information for invoices issued by GCA is available on the award's Budget Information page on the Grant Tracker website. Any unpaid amount will be listed in the "Open" column in the Financial Information section. The Invoices section lists all invoices issued by amount, with any open amount for each, and the Payments section provides details on individual payments, including which invoices they were applied to and the date payments posted.
Note that grant and contract invoice payments are NOT reflected in MyFinancial.desktop (MyFD). The MyFD Budgeted and Revenue amounts are based on the funding the sponsor has committed to the award, regardless of whether payment has been received yet or not.
Normally GCA (Grant and Contract Accounting) initiates and mails invoices for grants and contracts that require billing.
At times, however, GCA needs department input to complete invoicing:
If a budget is set up for milestone invoicing, GCA relies on the department to inform us that a deliverable has been completed and an invoice can be issued.
Some sponsors require detailed backup that GCA has no access to (e.g. receipts, timesheets, or activity reports). In these cases GCA will prepare the invoice and then route it to the department via Grant Tracker to provide the needed backup and route to the sponsor.
For clinical trial budgets, the department is responsible for invoicing.
Invoices are linked from a budget's Grant Tracker Budget Information page. Click on the invoice number hyperlink to download a PDF copy.
Two caveats:
- If a sponsor has a unique invoice template rather than one of our standard formats, the actual invoice sent to the sponsor will not match our internal invoice as shown on Grant Tracker.
- Grant Tracker updates overnight, so invoices will appear the day after they are issued in our invoicing system.
If the sponsor contacts the department for backup detail on a particular invoice (e.g. receipt copies for travel or equipment expenditures), the department may respond to them directly. Otherwise, please forward the communication to gcahelp@uw.edu.
To ensure checks are applied to sponsored project activity in a timely manner while we are working remotely, please send checks directly to our lockbox:
University of Washington
Grant and Contract Accounting
12455 Collections Drive
Chicago, IL 60693-0001
Be sure to write the budget number near the memo line on the check and forward all supporting documentation to gcacash@uw.edu. We plan to resume normal operations (GCA campus mailbox 354966 or hand delivery) once the University’s recommendation to telework is lifted.
Invoices generated by GCA’s invoicing software are automatically updated to a budget’s Grant Tracker Budget Information page the day after they are created. If you do not see an invoice you are expecting, please send a Grant Tracker question under the Invoicing topic.
Check the budget information page in Grant Tracker. In the Financial Information section, the last three items, Invoice, Receipt and Open, reflect the cumulative amount invoiced, the total payments received from the sponsor, and the amount remaining unpaid. Also, you may check if a specific invoice has been paid by scrolling down to the Invoices section and checking the Open Amount column.