Re: Personal membership costs charged to contract/grants Morgan, Jennifer 18 Nov 1999 14:53 EST
For those of you who are NIH-Centric, here is what the NIH Grants Policy Statement has to say about dues and memberships: "Dues or Membership Fees: Allowable as an F&A cost for organizational membership in business, professional, or technical organizations or societies. Payment of dues or membership fees for an individual's membership in a professional or technical organization is allowable as a fringe benefit or an employee development cost, if paid according to an established institutional policy consistently applied regardless of the source of funds." My interpretation of this policy is that if an employee's dues and memberships are consistently paid as a fringe benefit, regardless of whether they are paid from grant funds, then they can be included as a fringe benefit. This would have to be an institutional policy... and I would take that to mean a published institutional policy. Otherwise, they cannot be paid as a direct cost. They can be paid as an indirect cost and used as a part of the indirect cost calculation. Jennifer Morgan, M.H.A. Director, Office of Grants and Contracts Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Health Systems 3811 O'Hara Street, Pittsburgh PA 15213 Voice: 412-624-0743 Fax: 412-624-0714 > -----Original Message----- > From: Deanne Hoenscheid [mailto:xxxxxx@LEHIGH.EDU] > Sent: Thursday, November 18, 1999 12:00 PM > To: xxxxxx@hrinet.org > Subject: Re: Personal membership costs charged to contract/grants > > > Valerie, > > I do not charge personal memberships to contracts/grants > (except in the > instance that you mentioned when it does not specifically state the > individual membership cost). Although the OMB Circular does not > specifically state what not to charge, I have read in other documents > where it specifically states this. For example, when I > previously worked > for the Commonwealth of PA, we dealt with the Dept. of Justice quite a > bit. They had their own summary manual of unallowable charges (their > interpretation of OMB) and it stated No Personal Memberships > specifically. For this reason, I've followed this rule for other > agencies. > > I, too, would be interested in hearing how others handle this. > > > > * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * > Deanne L. Hoenscheid Phone: (610)758-3863 > Materials Research Center Fax: (610)758-3526 > Lehigh University E-mail: xxxxxx@lehigh.edu > 462 Whitaker Laboratory > 5 E. Packer Avenue > Bethlehem, PA 18015 > * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * > > > ====================================================================== > Instructions on how to use the RESADM-L Mailing List, including > subscription information and a web-searchable archive, are available > via our web site at http://www.hrinet.org (click on "Listserv Lists") > ====================================================================== > ====================================================================== Instructions on how to use the RESADM-L Mailing List, including subscription information and a web-searchable archive, are available via our web site at http://www.hrinet.org (click on "Listserv Lists") ======================================================================