1. Effort Reporting and Matching
on your effort report
Stacy
Presented by Contract and Grant Administration
Meghan Cartwright and Stacy Salisbury

2. Topics to Cover Effort Reporting Overview Matching Questions
Where to find effort reports
How effort reports are populated
Navigating within an Effort Report
Who certifies Effort Reports
Corrections and Recertification Requests
Matching
Types of Match
How to track it
Questions
Meghan

3. What is Effort Reporting?
An effort report (ER) is a receipt auditors use to document the amount of effort performed on a restricted grant.
ERs are required for individuals with salary charged or committed cost share on Federal or State of MI accounts.
Students & On call/Temps do not require ERs.
If an agency requires salary/cost share documentation an effort report may be used.
Meghan

4. The story behind the percent
I just use my pay percent….right!?!
The story behind the percent
Populated based off budget or justification
CGA Awards enters at beginning of award, PI and admin are notified in the award set-up
Can also be viewed during the life of the project in Account Explorer under the effort tab.
Tracks federal and state projects individually
Remainder generally lumped together.
Report must total 100%
If 100% on Sponsored – no writing proposals, committees, teaching, etc. for professors.
Activities covered under your MSU Institutional Base Salary (AY, AN, or Summer pay) are included.
Meghan

5. Where to find effort reports: CGA Portal
- Award Management – Portal (faculty)
Effort Reporting Tools – Search Effort By…. (effort administrators)
Person, Bookkeeping Unit, Home Unit
Meghan

6. Viewing My Effort Detail
Meghan

7. Effort Reporting Keys
Effort %s are based on your total professional effort to MSU - NOT a standard 40 hr work week
The person certifying the ER MUST be comfortable that percentages listed in the “% Effort Worked” column are accurate for each 6-month reporting period
If a federal project is not listed on the ER – click on “add Effort on a Sponsored Project not listed above” button to add the Account number and % of effort worked. If the account number is not assigned yet, add a note at the bottom of the ER indicating the IP number and % effort worked.
ERs must be completed in a timely manner – maximum of 180 days
The % Effort Worked column should total 100% regardless of percent employment or percent of the period worked. If a person only worked two weeks of a semester, % effort worked should still total 100% (based on the distribution of those two weeks). Rounding is your friend here!
Because MSU doesn’t keep time records for faculty, only the employee, or PI, can defend or contradict the percentages reported in % Effort Worked column of the ER
Meghan

8. Who can certify? Principal Investigators (PI's): certify their own
Other Senior Personnel: certify their own
Graduate Students: Should be certified by the PI, Co-PI, or Faculty Advisor.
If a grad student is on multiple accounts the PI’s need to communicate regarding the effort met on their accounts and have one PI certify on behalf of the grad student.
In those rare circumstances when the above guidelines cannot be met, a dean or chair may certify the ER, if they have suitable means of verification that the work was performed as indicated by the percentages reported.
Assign a delegate instructions
Person to Person Delegates
Meghan

9. I need to recertify my effort
If you have passed the 14 allowable day period or the period has closed and you need to recertify follow these steps:
to request to have the effort report opened for recertification.
In this include:
A detailed description of the activities performed on the sponsored project & how they benefited the project.
How the error occurred
Confirmation that individual who certified effort has reviewed the Effort Report Instructions & FAQs
We will review and consider opening the effort report based on the information provided.
Meghan

10. And….. Why?
Uniform Guidance 2 CFR Part 200 (applies to all federal grants and cooperative agreement)
§ Revision of budget and program plans
(c)(1)…recipients must request prior approvals from Federal awarding agencies for ….
(ii) Change in a key person specified in the application or the Federal award.
(iii) The disengagement from the project for more than three months, or a 25 percent reduction in time devoted to the project, by the approved project director or PI.
Stacy

11. And….. Why? Continued
Columbia U. Agrees to $9.02 Million False Claims Settlement
Columbia University…received millions of dollars in federal grants and…was required… to use a suitable means of verifying that the employees had actually performed the work charged to a particular grant.
Instead of taking the appropriate steps to determine whether the reports were accurate, the principal investigators would certify large batches of the reports, without making any inquiry into whether the allocation of work among the grants was accurate.
…charged federal grants for time spent on activities that are not chargeable to any federal grants, such as competitive grant proposal writing.
Stacy

12. Other useful notes
Salary is, by far, the largest project expense and effort reports are the receipt
Bi-weekly pay can cross effort periods
Effort includes pay AND mandatory or voluntary uncommitted cost share
Percentages populated on the report are hyperlinked to the details
Effort reports can be recertified within 14 calendar days
If AY Employee receives 3 months of summer pay on sponsored projects, no vacation may be taken during that time period.
Effort Reporting Overview & FAQ’s
Stacy

13. Who you may be contacted by
Stacy

14. Matching/Cost Share Matching/Cost Share
Portion of project costs not reimbursed by the funding sponsor
Types:
Mandatory
Required by the sponsor as a condition of the award.
Voluntary Committed
Committed by PI in the proposal budget or budget justification but not required by sponsor in the request for proposal.
Once committed, now required
Voluntary Uncommitted
Effort in excess of what is committed and budgeted for in a sponsored agreement.
Matching/Cost Share
NOTE: both mandatory and voluntary committed are reported to sponsor

15. Matching/Cost Share
Matching/Cost Share

16. Matching/Cost Share Matching/Cost Share
What types of expenses should be used?
Easiest to document salaries
MSU’s effort reporting system
All other expenses (hourly employees, supplies, etc.) documented by providing operating statements highlighted and certified by the PI to CGA (all backup documentation to be retained by department)
Important things to note
Must meet same allowability tests as direct costs
Must be verifiable – even volunteers
Cannot cost share federal expenses to other federally sponsored projects
Unrecovered indirect costs may be included only with the prior approval of the federal awarding agency.
Matching/Cost Share

17. Matching/Cost Share Matching/Cost Share
GO TO AE and navigate to report
Expected is not included in reports

18. Questions?

19. Useful links CGA’s Website: https://www.cga.msu.edu/Default.aspx
Effort Reporting FAQ’s:
Effort Reporting Instructions for Admins:
Summer Pay link:

20. Effort Graphic

21. Effort Reporting Graphic

22. Effort Reporting Graphic

23. Effort Reporting Graphic

24. Effort

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