Roles and Responsibilities for Effort Reporting

Faculty

  • Individual faculty members, with assistance from departmental FEC coordinators, are the ultimately responsible for accurate completion of Faculty Effort Certification reports and for making necessary adjustments to direct salary charges to grants and cost sharing required to reflect actual effort.

Department FEC Coordinators

  • Assist faculty with the Faculty Effort Certification form and process to ensure accurate reporting of salary charges made directly to grants and cost shared effort performed.

MAA

  • Management Accounting and Analysis (MAA) is responsible for oversight to ensure compliance with federal regulations.

FEC Cycles

FECs are created semi-annually and reflect actual salary distributions and cost shared effort commitments for the FEC  cycle which has just concluded. Also reflected are any salary cap cost share requirements. FECs are generated either on an Academic or Calendar cycle depending on the School or College of the department.

Calendar Cycles: School of Medicine (SOM), Public Health, Dentistry, Pharmacy

  • 1-1 to 6-30
  • 7-1 to 12-31

Academic Cycles: (All Schools or Colleges except those listed above under Calendar Cycle)

  • Autumn/Winter: 9-16 to 3-15
  • Spring/Summer: 3-16 to 9-15

FECs are typically released to campus for review and certification approximately 25 days after a cycle has ended.

Release and Access

eFECS sends an email notification to department personnel who are set up in ASTRA as FEC Coordinators when the FECs are ready for review and certification.

  • FECs should be reviewed and certified by faculty within 60 days from the day they are released to departments. The "Complete By" date is noted on the left side of the FEC beneath the faculty member's name.
  • Departments may access FECs one of three ways:
  • eFECS sends automatic notifications to departments throughout the 60 day review window.

Certification and Suitable Means of Verification

The faculty member whose name appears on the FEC is responsible for certifying the FEC.

In exceptional circumstances when the faculty member is unable to certify the FEC, the Chair, Director* (of an organization or department level program), Division Head or Dean may certify on their behalf provided they have suitable means of verification that the work was performed. In these cases, the department FEC coordinator should always advise the faculty member to log in to review a copy of the certified FEC once he/she has access to the system to ensure it is correct.  

Note: It is not permissible for the Chair, Director, Division Head or Dean to delegate signature authority for FECs. Departmental Administrators are not authorized to certify the FECs.

Suitable means of verification includes participation in or close supervision of the faculty member's activities or a written confirmation from the faculty member, either in an email or memo, that the effort was performed as documented on the FEC.

Separated Employees

Separated employees who no longer have a UW NetID will not have access to eFECS. In these cases, it is expected that another responsible official (see above) who has suitable means of verification that the work was performed, will certify on their behalf. Some faculty retain a UW NetID for a time after separation. These faculty will be able to log in to eFECS and certify their FEC.

When a faculty member separates from the University and no longer has access, the department should send him/her a copy of the FEC to review.

Records Retention

FECs are retained according to guidelines in the University General Records Retention Schedule, UW-GC7, Research and Grant and Contract Records

  • eFECS retains electronic copies of FECs for one year after the end of the sixth fiscal year (3 biennia plus the current fiscal year)
  • Recertified FECs which are done outside of the eFECS system should be copied and the copy retained within the department for one year after the end of the fiscal year per the same General Records Retention Schedule UW-GC7 Research Grant and Contract Records.
  • MAA retains the original recertified FECs for one year after the end of the sixth fiscal year (3 biennia plus the current fiscal year).

* Definitions of faculty roles including Director can be found in the UW Policy Directory: http://www.washington.edu/admin/rules/policies/PO/EOI.html