Project Payroll Confirmation & Sponsor Salary Cap

The University of Kentucky utilizes a project-based payroll dollar confirmation process to validate that the payroll expenses are "reasonable in relation to the work performed" for the period reported.  This is completed by displaying in the Employee Compensation Compliance (ECC) interface the payroll dollars within a "project statement" for the specified period and replaces the traditional effort reporting.

Project statements must be pre reviewed and/or confirmed on a quarterly basis. Confirmation is only required on federal and federal flow through funds.  The quarterly review begins the 3^rd Tuesday after the close of the quarter (i.e. Jan – Mar payroll will begin pre-review in April).  Pre-Reviews performed by Primary Department Coordinators should be completed within 21 days of the start of the Pre Review period and prior to the start of the Confirmation period.  Principal Investigators should complete their confirmations within 29 days of the start of the Confirmation period.

At the start of the Pre Review or Confirmation period, the ECC system will automatically generate emails to the Primary Department Coordinator for pre reviews and the Principal Investigator for related confirmations.

All project statements will be in the ‘In Progress’ status until the Pre Review period beings. The statements can be reviewed from the Department Dashboard at any time but no action is required.

New payroll is loaded to statements after every regular payroll run is completed (bi-weekly and monthly).  This update includes any revisions made via CDEM and/or Z4. The project statements are independent of SAP and are unable to create payroll updates; payroll updates are only completed through the previously identified channels.

All sponsored project statements, both federally funded and non-federally funded, must be pre reviewed by the Primary Department Coordinator.

The Principal Investigator must confirm all sponsored projects receiving federal funding, regardless of if that funding is direct or flow-through. 

All payroll expenses for the University of Kentucky are uploaded to the ECC interface and create a “project statement” that can be viewed by business officers and department administrators; these can be utilized as a tool for monthly departmental reconciliations but are not required.

Those designated as the Primary Department Coordinator or Backup Primary Department Coordinator will log into ECC via myUK.  Once in the ECC interface, the user will identify the project statements requiring review (please refer to the Primary Department Coordinator Workflow) and identify the payroll dollars (direct and cost share) that were paid to each employee in the statement.  Depending on the determination made during the review, the statement will be pre reviewed, or transitioned to “revision requested” for additional updates if identified.

The direct charge and cost share percentages that are shown in the statement is the percentage of the total payroll posted for the quarter.  Hovering over the scroll icon to the far right of the payroll of the individual will show the total breakout of all cost centers that payroll was posted to for the quarter.  The responsibility of the Primary Department Coordinator and Principal Investigator is to review the total dollar amount of payroll posted and verify its accuracy.

The payroll % considers both base and non-base pay. The percentage could be different due to several items such as overtime payments, bonus payments, summer research payments, Wethington Awards, etc. 

The percentage seen within the project statement is calculated by taking the payroll dollars displayed in the statement and dividing that by the total payroll dollars received.

If someone is missing on the project statement, you will select the revise payroll checkbox for any person that is on the project statement to place the statement in Revision Requested Status. Once this is completed, work with the persons necessary to initiate the payroll changes in SAP. Please see QRC-Missing person on a Project Statement.

Yes. Although the pre review process is completed, it is possible that retroactive pay adjustments could still occur in current payroll processing and post to the project statements automatically. So, it is very important to remain in communication with the payroll specialist for your area to ensure you are aware of any adjustments that could impact a statement in “Pre Reviewed” status.

The Pending Payroll Tasks tab appears on the homepage for the Primary Department Coordinator any time a request for a revision is made or payroll is loaded to a statement that has had a revision requested.

Pending payroll tasks are created when the project statement is either awaiting “Approval” or “Rejection” for a statement with at least one “Revise Payroll” button selected, or if payroll changes have loaded to a statement in revision requested status. For statements with the revise payroll button selected, the PDC reviews the statement before accepting a change is needed or rejecting and returning the statement to its prior status. 

If the task has been resolved on the Pending Payroll Tasks tab, you will need to contact Research Financial Services to have the statement reopened and returned to the workflow. Please email ecrt.help@uky.edu for any of these requests.

We encourage you to work closely with your Principal Investigators on all payroll adjustments. The system will not notify the Principal Investigator of changes made during pre review. The payroll adjustments will be available to view in the transactions log of the project statement.

The Statements Awaiting Confirmation tab lists all project statements that are ready for confirmation. Only Principal Investigators will have project statements listed even though this tab appears on everyone’s home page.

Yes, when the Principal Investigator (PI) selects revise payroll for a specific employee, they have the option of adjusting the percentage for that employee.  This cannot be completed without selecting the revise payroll button for the employee.  Once selected, the statement will return to the dashboard of the PDC as a pending payroll task, and they will follow the previously described processing steps to move the statement forward.  More detailed training materials can be found in the User Guide and QRC sections above.

An individual’s posted payroll may show $0 on a project statement.  This can occur if the individual was erroneously added to the project and later removed.  For audit purposes, the system will not remove this person from the statement completely and will show the $0.  The Principal Investigator will still need to confirm that the $0 of payroll is accurate and that the individual should not be posted to the grant.

There will be times when a Principal Investigator is unable to complete the confirmation of project statements for the period.  If the PI is off campus, but has internet access, they can access the project statements by logging into myUK and navigating to their statements as they normally do.  If the PI is not available and cannot complete their review and confirmation, a designee can be assigned to the statement for the period being reviewed. To complete a designee request, please email Research Financial Services at ecrt.help@uky.edu with the name of the person who will be the designee and how long they will be in this role.  For all other inquiries related to a PI being unavailable, please contact ecrt.help@uky.edu.

If the PI has left the University, please contact ecrt.help@uky.edu and notify the Project Payroll team.  They will be able to assist your department in the appropriate steps to review and finalize outstanding project statements.

No.  The salary cap amounts are legislatively-mandated annually, with active awards being subject to the cap in effect at the time. 

Salary amounts over the cap are considered unallowable expenses and as such, cannot be direct-charged to the sponsor and are not considered cost share; however, they must remain tied to the project and the cost share fund is used to tie the expenses to the project.

Typically benefit expenses are excluded from the salary cap calculation.  Benefit expense amounts are allocated based on the distribution of the salary of the personnel.

No.  The salary cap applies to anyone charging the impacted grant, regardless of FTE.

No.  The salary cap is a restriction on the amount that can be direct-charged to the sponsor.  If not direct-charging, then no salary cap applies.

Yes.  All salary direct charged, regardless of type, is subject to the salary cap requirements.

Compliance with salary cap requirements is the responsibility of the department.  However, a quarterly review of all individuals whose salaries are over the cap and who are direct-charging an impacted grant is performed by RFS.  Notification is sent to campus to initiate corrections timely to coincide with the earliest retroactive payroll dates.  A final review is performed at the close-out of the grant to ensure compliance.   

The DHHS salary cap is a rate of pay limitation that is legislatively-mandated by the Federal government, specifically limiting the maximum amount of salary an individual can charge to a DHHS award.

Due to the large volume of Federal dollars received by the University via grant awards, our compliance with the salary cap restrictions is mandatory to demonstrate diligent oversight of the use of these funds.

Please refer to the DHHS Salary Cap section above that has templates to assist with the calculation of the necessary salary cap adjustments. 

Cost-reimbursement grants, contracts and cooperative agreement awards are subject to the salary cap.

DHHS grants are denoted in SAP on the Reference tab in GMGrantD with a CFDA Number 93.XXX series. 

The DOJ salary cap is a rate of pay limitation that is legislatively-mandated by the Federal government, specifically limiting the maximum amount of salary an individual can charge to a DOJ award with an award amount greater than $250,000.  This includes sub-awards with smaller award amounts if the Prime award is greater than $250,000.

Due to the large volume of Federal dollars received by the University via grant awards, our compliance with the salary cap restrictions is mandatory to demonstrate diligent oversight of the use of these funds.

DOJ Salary cap is calculated as 110% of the current DHHS Salary Cap.  Here is a link to the DHHS Salary Cap:  https://grants.nih.gov/grants/policy/salcap_summary.htm.

Please use the DOJ Salary Cap Template linked above to calculate. 

Cost-reimbursement grants, contracts and cooperative agreement awards are subject to the salary cap.

DOJ grants are denoted in SAP on the Reference tab in GMGrantD with a CFDA Number 16.XXX series.