Maggie, we do not except purchases -- procurement, not sub-award -- of
goods and services, except "equipment", from F&A.

Your policy is interesting.  It appears to provide a certain amount of
equity in unusual cases where the procurement is necessary, but in a way
incidental to, the research.  Possibly some of the underlying theory is
that this is obtaining use of something that would be "equipment" if you
owned it.   What you need to be sure of is that the category of
procurements excepted from F&A is appropriately handled in developing your
F&A proposal.  I'd suggest written procedures to justify and ensure
consistency, and assigning those procurements a special, unique object code
to assist in the assignment to the right pools.  I would also base the
selection of items to be excluded on purpose, rather than cost level.  So
long as these special purposes are appropriately handled in F&A cost
development, you are not arbitrarily disadvantaging the university in the rate.

You people certainly have some interesting situations most of us do not see!

Chuck

At 08:31 PM 5/4/2004, you wrote:
>My university has provided for the waiver of F&A on amounts over $25,000
>for large, unique procurements (in our case, icebreaker vessel rental or
>ship fuel charges) that entail limited handling and, thus, really don't
>deserve F&A charges against the whole amount. We have a relatively low
>dollar purchase threshhold after which no F&A is collected.
>
>Would some of you be kind enough to let me know if your university also
>has a policy regarding major purchases, and if so, what you have set as
>the threshhold? I'm trying to find out what the median might be, and if
>we're being quite fair.
>
>Many thanks,
>Maggie
>(sunny Fairbanks, AK, and 64 degrees F!)
>
>Maggie Griscavage, CRA
>Director, GCS/UAF
>907-474-6446
>
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Herbert B. Chermside, CRA
Special Asst. to VP-Research
Virginia Commonwealth University
PO BOX 980568
Richmond, VA  23298-0568
Voice:  804-827-6036
Fax     804-828-2051
e-mail xxxxxx@vcu.edu

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