Submission of research grant applications not exceeding £20k (and with no associated staff costs)
To: Heads of Divisions, Heads of Departments and Chairmen of Faculty Boards, Divisional Secretaries, Departmental Administrators and Faculty Board Secretaries, Research Facilitators
Since March 2006, research grant applications seeking less than £10k, where the funder is not being asked to meet staff costs, have not been required to be submitted via Research Services for institutional review and approval prior to onward submission to the research funder.
This change to procedures reflected the fact that grant applications asking for relatively small amounts of non-staff funding (typically small-scale travel, equipment or conference grant applications) tend to involve straightforward budgets and rarely require input at the review stage by Research Services' grants advisors. As well as streamlining processes around such grant applications for researchers and departmental colleagues, this change has also allowed Research Services' advisors to focus their efforts where help is often needed most: that is, on medium- to large-scale grants as well as activities associated with the timely acceptance and set-up of new awards.
Together with the Research Grants Review and Improvement Consultation Group of Divisional and Departmental representatives, Research Services has reviewed the operation over the past three years of this approach to low-value (and potentially 'low-risk') applications. It has been found to work well: no adverse or unexpected consequences have been reported and this streamlining of procedures seems to have been well-received. However, it has been noted that an increasing number of small-scale travel or equipment grants are now seeking in excess of £10k and often up to £15-20k.
With the support of the Research Grants Review and Improvement Consultation Group, Research Services advises that from 1 August 2009:
- research grant applications not exceeding £20k with no associated staff costs are not required to be submitted to Research Services for institutional review and approval
- Research Services will review such applications at the request of the Department
- a corresponding Resolve OG does not need to be submitted to Research Services at application stage
- where the application needs to be submitted via an 'institutional account' on a funder's electronic application system, Research Services will submit such applications without any review (unless review is requested by the Department)
- as before, all awards (regardless of value) must be submitted to Research Services for institutional acceptance and for passing set-up instructions to Research Accounts so that an award can be opened on the Oracle Grants Module: a Resolve OG form will be required from Departments for any awards where the corresponding application did not need to be submitted via Research Services
Please contact your local Research Services' Divisional Team should you have any queries in relation to this change.
From: Dr Glenn Swafford, Director, Research Services
06 July 2009
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