Research Project Lifecycle

ePA-005 form must accompany every proposal

• Summarizes administrative, budget, and compliance information for department chairs, center directors, and deans
• Appropriate signatures on the form are the Office of Sponsored Programs’ authorization to submit proposal to sponsor

Sponsor issues award notice to OSU

• SPO reviews contract/award terms and conditions and negotiates if needed
• These are some of the most common terms that may require negotiation with the sponsor: 
  • Publication restrictions  - Reviewed to ensure that you will be able to publish the results of your research
  • Intellectual property – IP language should be in accordance with university policy- the preference is to retain ownership of IP
  • Indemnification/hold harmless – This language is very problematic. When asked to agree to indemnify another party, essentially an unknown future financial liability is being taken on- this is something we are unable to do per state law.
  • Limited by state law in the ability to accept Governing law provisions from any entity other than Ohio
    • Additionally, we’ll review
      • Payment terms to ensure they aren’t too administratively burdensome
      • Report/deliverables requirements to ensure sponsor expectations are reasonable
      • Termination provisions to ensure that costs/obligations of the university are protected

Business or Industry Sponsor

• Proposal process typically more informal
• Contact your SPO early
• Standard agreement templates available
• Additional time may be needed to work through common industry issues:
  • Conflict of interest
  • Intellectual property

OSP Office of Grants and Contracts

• Signs/accepts award on behalf of the institution
  • PIs are not authorized to sign agreements for the University
• Ensures PI has obtained appropriate research compliance approvals (protocols, COI, RCR, export control)
• Obtains investigator signature acknowledging that s/he has read and understands the agreement
• Preliminary projects can be established if appropriate

Booking Expenses

• Personnel Appointments- Work with departmental/ college HRP (Human Resources Professional) to initiate
• Non-Personnel Expenses
  • Purchase Orders- electronic requisitions (eRequest)
  • Travel Requests (eTravel)
  • Reimbursements are processed by eRequest in the Financials System
  • Human Subjects payments
  • Subawards and consultant agreements

OSP reviews expenditures to ensure:

• Availability of funds
• Allowability of expenses; per 2 CFR* 200 and/or sponsor guidelines
• Allocability of expenses; readily and specifically assignable to the project
• Reasonableness; pass the “prudent person” test
• Consistency; treating like costs across projects similarly
• Expenditures are within project dates

​Collecting Money from the Sponsor

• Office of Sponsored Programs bills sponsors and follows up on late payments
• Usual reasons for non-payment
  • Deliverables, e.g., technical report
  • Failure to meet cost-share requirements
  • Sponsor insolvency
• Clinical trials billed by department/college

Prior to project end (90-120 days)

• Terminate or move personnel appointments to a department account or another project in consult with human resource professional
• Appointments still on project when it ends will go to department/college clearing fund
• Resolve non-personnel commitments
• Remind subawardees to submit invoices within 60 days of project-end date
• Ensure all costs have been recorded
   

Project Closeout

Office of Sponsored Programs

• Submits final invoice and fiscal, patent, property reports
• Transfers project overruns and/or disallowed costs to the PI’s department
• Transfers residual funds to appropriate department (applies to fixed-price agreements)

Principal Investigator

• Prepares and submits final technical report and any other required deliverables
• Retains all research-related records (e.g., lab notebooks, data analyses, manuscripts) as required by sponsor
   

Additional information

• Costs will continue to post to the project for up to 60 days after the end date e.g., final month’s payroll, payments for orders placed close to the end date, etc. During this time, the PI and department can also make any cost transfers necessary to correct errors or reduce over expenditures.
• For cost reimbursable projects, 60 days after the end date, the project will be closed to further activity and OSP Fiscal Services will prepare the final invoice to the sponsor, as well as any required fiscal and administrative reports (e.g., patent and property reports).
• Within 30 days after the final invoice is submitted, OSP Fiscal Services will transfer any project over-expenditures to the appropriate organizations using fund 017000. The project that generated the overrun will be referenced in the line description of the transfer.
• For fixed price projects, 60 days after the end date, the project will be closed to further activity and OSP Fiscal Services will inform OGC of remaining balance. If the remaining balance is <25% of the total award amount, that balance (minus F&A that would otherwise have been collected by the University) will be transferred to the appropriate organizations using fund 047000. The project that generated the residual will be referenced in the line description of the transfer. If the balance is >25% of the award amount the SPO will work with the PI to ensure that all project costs have been posted. Any balance >25% must be justified and approved before it can be returned to a department.
• Costs that continue to post against a closed project (e.g., UNITS charges that have not been redirected) will be transferred monthly to the appropriate organizations.