Facilities and Administrative Costs

Executive Summary

Facilities and Administrative (F&A) (also known as indirect or overhead) costs are the general support expenses relating to research and sponsored programs that are incurred for common objectives of the University and therefore cannot be readily identified with a particular sponsored award. This new policy provides that F&A costs will be reimbursed by a federal sponsoring agency at their UNC Charlotte negotiated F&A rate. The University expects all non-federal sponsored programs to be reimbursed for their full costs, both direct and F&A.

I. Introduction

Facilities and Administrative (F&A) (also known as indirect or overhead) costs are the general support expenses relating to research and sponsored programs that are incurred for common objectives of the University and therefore cannot be readily identified with a particular sponsored award. Formulas have been developed to allocate various categories of F&A costs across a series of major higher education functions. The total F&A costs attributable to research and sponsored programs are compared to the direct costs of those activities to derive the percentage of F&A costs to direct costs. This percentage, the F&A cost rate, is then applied to the direct costs of research and creative activity and is the means by which the University is reimbursed for facilities and administrative costs associated with direct cost expenditures. Facilities and administrative costs are real expenses of the University. Examples include utilities, libraries, departmental research administration, and research support and compliance staff in central administration.

II. Policy

Facilities and administrative costs will be reimbursed by a federal sponsoring agency at their UNC Charlotte negotiated F&A rate. These rates can be found on the Research at UNC Charlotte website. The University expects all non-federal sponsored programs to be reimbursed for their full costs, both direct and F&A.

III. Implementation

The Vice Chancellor for Research, or delegate, in consultation with the Provost, is responsible for this policy and its implementation and daily management. The Vice Chancellor for Research (or delegate), in consultation with the Assistant Vice Chancellor for Research and with the Provost, will establish guidelines for the implementation of F&A cost reimbursement and will be the University’s principal point of contact for F&A cost issues. All exceptions to full F&A cost recovery must be submitted to that office for approval.

Related Resources

• Research at UNC Charlotte website
• Guidelines for Charging Facilities and Administrative Costs

Authority

Chancellor

Policy Revisions