Participant Support Costs
Included on this page:
Participant support costs are those costs paid to (or on behalf of)
participants in meetings, conferences, symposia, and workshops, when there is a
category for participant support costs in the award budget. Registration fees,
travel allowances, manuals and supplies, and tuition and stipends may be regarded
as participant support costs in this case.
Participant support costs:
- are currently awarded on National Science Foundation (NSF) and Department
of Education grants.
- are usually allowable on federal grants.
- are budgeted for the full amount under object code 03-34 (registration and
conference fees), whereas the actual participant support cost expenditures post to
object codes 03, 04, 05, or 08, as appropriate.
- are often subject to special sponsor regulations. For example, NSF and the Department of
Education:
- do not allow rebudgeting from the participant support cost
category into other categories without prior approval.
- do not allow the university to apply Facilities & Administrative
(F&A) cost to participant support costs.
- require the university to return any unexpended participant support
costs to them.
- are associated with special programs such as Research Experience
for Undergraduates (REU) and Research Experiences for Teachers
(RET) on National Science Foundation grants. Additional sponsor
regulations:
- do not allow participant support costs budgeted on REU
and RET sub accounts to be spent in other categories.
- cannot offset a deficit in the parent account.
- allow an administrative allowance of 25% of the
participant stipend support only.
- Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP) will request on the Notice to
Establish Account (NEA) a separate
subaccount for NSF budgets with participant support costs. Grant and
Contract Accounting (GCA) will set up the sub budget.
- OSP will request a separate subaccount on the NEA for participant
support costs for other funding agencies when the sponsor requires that
indirect costs be excluded.
- FAS (the university's financial accounting system) automatically applies
F&A costs to participant support cost object codes, even when the sponsor
does not allow it.
- Quarterly, campus departments highlight participant support costs on
copies of the BARS and send them to GCA.
- To remove these unallowable F&A costs from budgets, GCA uses the
information provided quarterly by the campus departments to process JVs
(journal vouchers), and sends copies of the JVs back to the campus
departments.
- The BSR (Budget Status report) then correctly reflects the indirect
cost charges to the grant.
- Look for wording similar to "participant support" or "participant costs
awarded" in your award budget to determine if this issue is applicable to your
grant.
- Check the grant's (or sponsor's) regulations to see if any rules prohibit
the university from applying F&A costs to these charges.
- If a separate sub budget has not been set up and the sponsor does not
allow the university to apply F&A costs to these charges, highlight any
participant support costs on your BARs (Budget Activity Reports) and send
them to GCA on a quarterly basis.
- Participant support costs for REUs on NSF awards are set up by OSP
in REU sub accounts. Departments are not required to send BARs to GCA for
these sub accounts. Quarterly adjustments are processed by GCA.
