Colleagues,

Today you will see the following article appear in the RNO.  Please feel free to take advantage of the new process immediately.   We expect to release the rest of the updated process sometime in November (including the new and improved waiver request form with its ability to auto-calculate waived amounts).   

 Pamela

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 Effective immediately, the signature of a Dean (or Dean’s designee) on a Proposal Routing Form will constitute approval for any reductions in F&A that may be included in a proposal with direct costs of $50,000 per year or less.    This means that F&A waiver request forms no longer need to be completed for these types of projects.   If any single year of a project is valued at more than $50,000, the regular F&A waiver request form should still be completed. 

This change in process is being implemented to reduce administrative burden on principal investigators and their departments, but is not intended to convey any fundamental change about which projects should receive a waiver.  It is still the position of the University that full indirect costs* should be requested on all sponsored projects, absent unusual and compelling circumstances that might warrant an exception. Unit heads and deans or their designees will continue to make the determination, following a request and dialogue with their investigators, about whether or not a specific project warrants a reduced rate. 

Additional process improvements in this area (including a new and improved F&A waiver request form and a list of non-profit sponsors with pre-approved rates) are currently being finalized and will be released in the near future.

*Indirect cost rates and approved exceptions for various types of projects can be found at: http://www.policy.umn.edu/groups/ppd/documents/rates/f_and_a_rates.cfm

Posted 10/24/08