Procedure Library

Establish Companion Projects or F&A Distribution

Purpose

Address key steps for establishing companion projects on a sponsored project (grant or other award) or splitting overhead between departments.

Applicability

Principal Investigators (PIs) and departmental administrators intending to distribute project funds and/or overhead across college or departmental lines.

For additional information, please review the information on Companion Project Set-Up.

Instructions

1. In cases where projects involve the collaboration of two or more investigators, all contributing significant effort, those investigators should choose to establish companion projects. Follow the step outlined here. Companion projects can be established pre- or post-award.
   • NOTE: If a preliminary project is created, it is best if the companion projects are created at that same time. Due to a system complication, the University is unable to establish companion projects during the new award setup IF it is also clearing a prelim. Therefore, if the companion projects weren't already created at the preliminary stage, this becomes a two step process:
     1. The main preliminary project will first need to be cleared using the New Award Setup transaction in eAward.
     2. Secondly, a rebudget request will need to be processed using the Awad Modification transaction in eAward, selecting the 'Request Companion Projects' option and complete, and attach the Companion Projects Re-budget Worksheet.
2. In cases where projects do not involve significant collaboration, do not involve companion projects, or the investigators have chosen to only allocate indirect costs to the respective administrative department, the PI and/or admin would help complete the Intercollegial/Departmental Agreement on the Distribution of F&A Costs (doc).
   1. Once completed, the Agreement on the Distribution of F&A Costs form should be attached in eProposal for consideration during the Document Summary Sheet (DSS) approvals stage.
   2. If this step is completed post-award, the form will need to be sent to OSP.
      1. OSP will need to approve and route the form to Ethan Hacker in the Budget Office where the F&A distribution is completed.
      2. The F&A split occurs once a year and each college dean manages and controls their own returned F&A. Questions about returned F&A should be directed to your dean's office.
3. Once a companion project is set-up, you may encounter problems viewing the financial information in Management Reports. To prevent limitations, use General Accounting's Security Authorization form to allow viewing access for all responsible parties.

Related Policies and Procedures

• Research Handbook > Award Acceptance > Companion Project Set-Up
• Forms > Companion Projects Request Form (NOW IN EAWARD)
• Forms > Companion Projects Re-budget Worksheet (xls)
• Forms > Intercollegial/Departmental Agreement on the Distribution of F&A Costs (doc)