Contract Award

1. Faculty makes contact with funding agency.

2. Faculty obtains the Request for Proposal (RFP) or description of scope of required services.

3. Faculty contacts Marysol Murcia, Proposal Administrator with the Office of Research (OOR) Administrator (882-1126; mmurcia@mail.ucf.edu) and provides preliminary budget and proposal guidelines.

4. Faculty puts together a proposal containing, at a minimum, a statement of work and a detailed budget. The budget should be reviewed by the CECS Director of Budget and Administration (Ms. Kerry Gajewski). The OOR approval form is completed with all signatures and forwarded with the proposal to the Proposal Administrator in OOR. If appropriate, a Multidisciplinary Research Participation Form (MDRP) should be completed

5. OOR analyzes the budget. The budget should include a statement of work; commitment letter and budget for all subcontractors; equipment quotes; travel cost breakdown; and detailed description of expense budget (particularly for cost reimbursable contracts). Overhead negotiation/commitment should not be done by the PI, although the PI must be aware of overhead issues.

6. The Proposal Administrator then commits UCF to the funding agency to complete the work and forwards the proposal. Note that if the proposal is received by OOR within 48 hrs of the deadline, the Principal Investigator (PI) will be responsible for delivery of the proposal to the funding agency.

7. Occasionally faculty may want to develop a teaming agreement with industry as part of a proposal development. This is generally a two-page document identifying the lead on the proposal, duties of each team member, and intellectual property agreements. OOR can help in developing this document and is required to execute the agreement.

8. The funding agency will then send either a letter of intent to fund research, a contract document, or a purchase order with attached terms and agreements.

9. Andrea Adkins (823-0138; aadkins@mail.ucf.edu) the assigned OOR Contract Manager will then review the document. Legal clauses may need to be changed or negotiated. Examples of potential issues include indemnification, warrantees, insurance limitations, and intellectual property rights. Law and/or policies have been established in all these areas and can be accessed at the OOR web site. Any questions should be directed to OOR.

10. Within 10 working days OOR should have an executed, renegotiated contract.

Post Award

1. Four days following contract execution, an account number should be established on the Northwest CICS screen and accessible to faculty on Polaris.

2. OOR will mail a congratulatory letter with a list of deliverables. If the list is incorrect, contact OOR. The PI is responsible for delivering all products to the funding agency with a transmittal letter. A copy must be provided to OOR. If the deliverable is a lengthy report, a title page, abstract, and table of contents will suffice. The report can be delivered to OOR electronically but the transmittal letter must be faxed or mailed.

3. OOR has established a procedure for ensuring that requirements for contract deliverables are met:

a.   Thirty days before the deliverable due date the PI will receive a reminder.

b.   If OOR does not receive a copy of the deliverable ten days after the due date, a notice is sent to the PI with a copy to the Dean for Research.

c.   Fourteen days later, the PI receives a courtesy call from the OOR Grants Specialist.

   a letter is sent to the PI’s Chair with a copy to the Dean for Research

   a letter is sent by the Director of OOR to the Dean with a copy to the Dean for Research

f. Seven days later a letter is sent by the Director of OOR to the Vice President for Research and the Provost.

4. If appropriate, an UCF Patent Disclosure Form should be completed and submitted to the VP for Research.

Closeout Procedure

1. Administrative Closeout:

a. All deliverables specified in the contractual document must be completed.

b. Intellectual property issues must be resolved.

c. Equipment must be transferred back to the funding agency or to another UCF or federal account.

2. Financial Closeout:

a. Bill Roach, Fiscal Administrator, is notified to close out the account.

b. Categories must be spent out with invoices processed prior to closing date.

c. All encumbrances must be cleared.

d. Unspent money in a cost reimbursable account will not be invoiced.

e. If the contract is fixed price, no more than 20% of the original contract budget can be transferred to a balance account unless otherwise specified in the contract.

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