Budget Guidance

Salaries are established by the University. The budget should include all personnel, titles, the percentage of time each will devote to the project, the rate of pay, and amount requested from the sponsor to support each person per year (or for the budget period). Time should be expressed as percent of effort or the number of person months intended to be spent on the project. Do not express time as the number of hours. It is expected that in most cases the Principal Investigator will propose some level of activity (1% or more) or the minimum that may be required on proposals where they are listed as the PI. Multiple year budgets should include estimated salary increases. A 4% increase may be projected unless the sponsor specifies salary inflation rates. In no case can funds be requested or used to augment salaries of any faculty or staff beyond University-approved rates.

Faculty are on a 9.5- or 10-month academic year appointment or in some cases faculty may receive compensation based on a 12-month calendar year service period. An appropriate percentage of the academic year or calendar year salary is specified in the budget. A faculty member on a 9.5- or 10-month appointment may elect to devote additional time during the summer to a sponsored project beyond the academic year and may request and receive additional compensation beyond the base academic year salary for this effort. A maximum of 2.5 months of summer effort and salary (calculated at 2.5/9.5 x base salary for the new fiscal year) is possible in those cases in which this is acceptable to the sponsor. For 10-month faculty a maximum of 2 months of summer effort and salary at 2/10 of the base salary for the new fiscal year is possible. A faculty member on a 12-month appointment may not receive additional salary for summer research effort.

Other professional research staff and technicians may be compensated for periods during which their services will benefit the project.

Administrative Personnel and clerical staff should normally be treated as F&A costs; however, direct charging may be appropriate under special circumstances. For more information on direct charging of administrative or clerical costs, see Administrative Cost Designations.

A Graduate Research Assistant may be assigned to research duties with the student's time divided between formal study and research. The Graduate School annually publishes a schedule of stipends for guidance. Tuition remission for graduate research assistants on sponsored projects is to be included in the fringe benefit calculation and requested from the sponsor.

Fringe Benefit Rates include health insurance, FICA, unemployment, workers’ compensation, retirement, terminal leave payout and employee assistance and are calculated on the requested salary amount. Tuition remission is also a UMD fringe benefit, but is not included in the rates and should be budgeted separately. UMD's Fringe Benefit Rates can be found in the F&A Rate Agreement.

Permanent Equipment needs must be itemized and justified. Permanent equipment is defined as an article of nonexpendable tangible personal property used only for research, medical, scientific, or technical activities, which has a useful life of more than one year and an acquisition cost of $5,000 or more per unit. In addition, the Principal Investigator must determine that the equipment requested is not already available within the University. The cost of equipment generally includes needed accessories, installation, and delivery costs. In some cases the sponsor may provide the equipment directly rather than provide acquisition funds, or short-term rental may be preferred.

Supplies and Expendable Equipment items should be identified and justified. Supplies may be charged if they are above and beyond what is incurred during normal operation. Examples of these items include chemicals, glassware, small electronic components, animals and animal care fees, and unusually large quantities of paper supplies or duplication costs as in the preparation and distribution of questionnaires and surveys or other brochures and forms.. Equipment items should be identified and justified. Also browse UMCP Policy for Direct Charging of Costs to Federal Grants, Contracts and Cooperative Agreements.

Travel is an expected practice and an accepted cost in most projects if there is a need for the Principal Investigators to consult with colleagues and disseminate new knowledge through scholarly discourse (i.e. meetings, conferences, symposia, etc.). There must be a correlation between the project and the purpose of the meeting. Such costs may include transportation and room and board. For travel abroad, federal agencies require the use of U.S. flag carriers. Export controls may also apply. For more information, review the International Travel Policies and the Foreign Travel Approval Tools.

If the project requires travel to various locations in order to perform the work, these costs should also be identified. An itinerary may be required if travel is a significant portion of the total cost. Some examples would be travel to various localities to collect samples, to interview respondents, or to make special measurements. Proper identification and justification of planned travel costs is essential to having these costs funded by the sponsor. Refer to the University Travel Policies.

Publication costs including manuscript illustration, costs of reprints, page charges, and technical reports to be incurred in publishing articles resulting from the projects should be included in direct costs. The publication costs of a book or monograph are not generally allowed; special permission should be obtained from the sponsor.

UMCP determines the difference between a subaward and a vendor by following Federal guidelines on the topic. See Subaward Definitions for guidance on whether the outside person or entity who will be working on your project should be classified as a subaward, vendor or consultant.

Subawards to other entities which provide a substantial programmatic contribution to the project require specific approval of the sponsor. Thus, the proposal must include documentation (i.e., statement of work, budget and justification, and endorsement by Subawardee’s Authorized Official) of the work to be performed. Subawards must adhere to applicable federal program compliance regulations. More information on subawards during the pre-award phase may be found on ORA’s website at Proposal and Subaward Request Resources.

Consultant fees may be paid only to experts outside the University who provide a unique contribution to the project. University of Maryland faculty and State of Maryland employees are not eligible to receive compensation for internal consulting services on sponsored projects. Federal agencies specifically prohibit the payment of consultant fees from Federally-supported projects to persons employed by the Federal government and often set a limit on the daily rate that can be paid to non-Federal government employees. Please refer to the Policy on Professional Commitment of Faculty for further information.

Participant support costs are typically applicable to Federal grants and cooperative agreements only. Participant support costs ( defined in 2 CFR 200.75) means direct costs for items such as stipends or subsistence allowances, travel allowances, and registration fees paid to or on behalf of participants or trainees (but not employees) in connection with conferences or training projects. The Uniform Guidance (2 CRF 200) requires prior approval of the Federal Agency in order to incur Participant Support Costs under federally sponsored awards. Find out more information on Participant Support Costs.

Human subjects (also known as research participants) receive payments or incentives–in the form of cash, checks or non-cash items–for their participation in research projects. Principal Investigators (PIs) and other faculty/staff members who are conducting sponsor funded research or internally funded research are responsible for ensuring that subjects are eligible to receive payments and ensuring that the payment process is appropriate. Find further guidance on Human Subjects Payments and Budgeting.

Animal Care Per Diem Rates are the per diem rates charged by the Department of laboratory Animal Resources (DLAR) for animal care support. The rates as of 11/13/2018 are:

• Mice - $ .80 per cage/day
• Mice Ventalated cage - $1.00 per cage/day
• Peromyscus - $1.00 $1.00 per cage/day
• Rats - $1.20 per cage/day
• Guinea Pigs $1.40 per cage/day

Other direct costs incurred in special circumstances include:

• renovation of space that is necessary in order to carry out the project,
• rental of space in those special cases where this is necessary,
• maintenance of specialized equipment which is necessary to the project,
• communication costs such as long distance telephone costs and postage charges where large volumes of mailing are required,
• special costs such as the purchase or lease of airplanes, boats, or other vehicles, and
• stipends for participants in special training programs are allowable when specified by the sponsor.

Facilities and Administrative (F&A) Costs (previously "Indirect Costs") are calculated based on the project’s Modified Total Direct Cost (MTDC). The MTDC is the total direct costs minus: permanent equipment over $5,000; the portion of subaward costs over $25,000; tuition, scholarships and fellowships; capital expenditures (alterations and renovations); and rental of off-campus facilities. The Campus calculates its F&A cost rates and negotiates these with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, acting as the cognizant audit agency on behalf of all federal agencies.

There are F&A cost rates for instruction, other service type activities, Intergovernmental Personnel Act (IPA), off-campus research and on-campus research. It is the position of the Campus that all proposals requesting support from any sponsor, either government or non-government, must include a request for full F&A cost recovery. However, some sponsors, particularly some foundations, have specific written policies that preclude the use of the Campus' full indirect cost rates. The rate or administrative fee allowed by the sponsor may be used in these cases. Exceptions to this rule may be necessary in a few instances; consult ORA for further information. See the Facilities and Administrative (F&A) Costs page for more information about the application of rates and the cost rate memo.

Cost Sharing or matching may be required in some cases by Federal and other sponsors. This requires that the Campus makes a contribution towards the total costs of a project. The amount of such contribution required may vary from less than 5% to greater than 50% of the total project cost. The Campus' share of such costs may come from several sources:

• other support for the same project, i.e. from non-Federal sources if the project is to be Federally-funded;
• a portion of the faculty member's project time and related fringes for which no support funds are being requested;
• a portion of the Facilities and Administrative (F&A) costs may have to be contributed (special Campus approval is required); and or
• contributed resources from the Department or College.

Cost-sharing should be included only where absolutely required by the sponsor. It is never to be assumed to be a voluntary or gratuitous gesture. Cost-sharing imposes a substantial burden on the Principal Investigator to provide supporting documentation to the Office of Contract and Grant Accounting. For further guidance on cost sharing, consult either the Cost Sharing section of ORA’s website or view the official policy [IV-4.00(A)] in its entirety.