Reconciling accounts on a regular basis will help you to manage your sponsored
funds to ensure that expenditures and revenues are within appropriate limits
and guidelines. More information on limits and guidelines can be found on
the appropriate sponsor websites
and in the OMB
A-21 Circular. Regular monitoring of your sponsored accounts helps to:
Ascertain that revenues have been received.
Confirm the availability of project funds as needed.
Ensure that costs are consistent with the project schedule and incurred
between the start and stop dates of the project.
Discover any errors in your budget (for more information on budgeting
and budget reporting, see the Budget
Tool and the Period
Expenses Report), encumbrances, or expenditures whether these are
caused by an end user, a service department, or any other system-generated
problem.
Avoid overspending, which may cause a deficit and limit further spending.
Give your Principal Investigator a high degree of confidence that the
project is in compliance with the sponsor's spending terms and conditions.
Verify that cost transfers
and corrections have been made or are made in a timely manner.
Maintain a clear audit trail for the future.
Do not wait until a problem is brought to your attention or until a project
has terminated before reconciling an account.
The longer an error remains uncorrected, the harder it is to show that allowability
and allocability are in compliance with the University Cost
Transfer Policy.
