SUPERSEDES: GIM 9 (May 16, 2001)

SUBJECT: Advance Budget Numbers (Advance Notices)

This memorandum is to outline the procedure for the expenditure or commitment of funds against a grant, contract or other agreement prior to the receipt of an executed award document.

1. GENERAL POLICY

   The Principal Investigator of a contract, grant or other agreement may request authorization to spend a limited amount of money during a specified period on an Advance Notice prior to the receipt of an executed award from the funding agency. This need may arise when an award has not been received in the Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP) by the effective date of the award, negotiation or processing of the award is not complete.

   An established procedure is already in place, and will continue to be used, for automatic assignment of non-competing continuations (renewal budget numbers) for National Institutes of Health, Department of Energy and Department of Education grants provided an official University proposal is on file.

   The Department Chair or Dean who signs the advance notice will be responsible for any pre-award costs that are subsequently not allowed by the sponsor as well as any amounts authorized by the advance notice, but not funded by the sponsor.

   Advance notices are requested for eGC1s that have been approved or awarded by OSP.

   In general, advance notices are not allowed when the forthcoming award has outstanding compliance issues that would prohibit spending on a project.

2. PROCEDURE

   • The Principal Investigator or OSP is advised by the sponsor that an award is forthcoming. Provided that an official University proposal is on file, the PI completes the online Advance Budget Number Request form. The form is printed out, signed by the PI and the Chair or Dean of the Department and sent to Grant and Contract Accounting (GCA). The request should:
     1. Explain the need for the Advance Notice, state the proposed advance period, and, with the signature of the Chair or Dean, guarantee all advance funding. An advance budget can be requested for up to the maximum of six months.
     2. A request to supplement or extend the advance budget for an additional three months can be submitted to GCA at the end of the first period.
   • GCA establishes a budget number with a short title denoted by “xxxADVxxx” and informs the Principal Investigator and the administrative contacts as noted on the Advance Notice form and eGC1.
   • The Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP), when appropriate, may indicate on the eGC1 that no advance budget should be established for a project. The issues that would trigger this flag are issues such as:
     1. No IRB or IACUC approval;
     2. Federal or State contracts with no pre-award approval;
     3. An NIH project with a positive SFI/COI disclosure*;
     4. Requests on federally supported projects that are more than 90 days in anticipation of an award; or
     5. Compliance with any sponsor requirements where advance spending is unallowable.
   • OSP may remove flags when the restricting conditions are met.
   • The PI or Department Administrator will monitor advance budget expenditures and notify GCA within 10 working days prior to the expiration of the advance budget if an award has not been received by that time (e.g. to request supplemental advance funding, an advance extension, or termination of the advance budget.) An Advance budget will not exceed 12 months.
   • When OSP receives an award from the sponsor, OSP staff will review the eGC1 to verify that an advance budget has been authorized. A final Notice to Establish Account will then be completed and sent to GCA, referencing the advance budget number.

   *NOTE: Advance Notice requests will not be processed for an NIH project with Significant Financial Conflict of Interest (SFI) (see GIM 10) until a conflict of interest management plan is in place or alternative approval is obtained.

Lynne Chronister
Director, Office of Sponsored Programs

Sue Camber
Associate Vice President, Financial Management

Click here to complete the online Advance Budget Number Request form.

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Modified: September 10, 2008