When a UW Principal Investigator (PI) sees a need or opportunity to use a subcontract on an upcoming sponsored program, he/she contacts the proposed subcontractor and requests a formal proposal.
The subcontractor then submits a proposal directly to the UW PI including a budget, budget justification, scope of work, and letter of commitment signed by an authorized representative of the subcontractor institution. If the originating sponsor (prime sponsor to UW) has instituted a published policy that caps the F&A rate it will award, the University will in turn flow down that cap to the subrecipient. A subrecipient may not request an F&A rate that exceeds this cap in its budget to the University.
The PI then incorporates this into his/her proposal. Each outgoing subcontract anticipated in a UW budget will have UW F&A charged on the first $25,000 of the subcontract for the competing segment, when the base type is Modified Total Direct Costs (MTDC).
When preparing a budget to a sponsor in which the originating (prime) sponsor imposes an F&A cap, calculate the UW budget using the cap, and include the F&A cap policy in the eGC1, for reviewers’ reference. If no cap is imposed by the prime sponsor, the UW budget must include F&A at the full negotiated rate applicable to the project.
In all cases, an F&A cap will be allowed only when it meets the stated exceptions in GIM 13. If the lower F&A rate does not meet these exceptions, an F&A waiver request is required.
Questions on the application of F&A rates during the life of a sponsored project? Contact the Office of Sponsored Programs, (206) 543-4043 or osp@uw.edu.
