Contracts and Grants Accounting is implementing new guidelines to establish and update processing begin and end dates in the Research Administration System (RAS). A new guide, Understanding Award Processing Dates, clarifies how CGA establishes dates during award setup and under what conditions they will be extended. These changes aim to ensure consistent application across UCSF’s portfolio of awards and to reduce suspense items for award expenditures, including residual transactions from an original posting.
Understanding Processing Dates in RAS
Each project activity period in RAS includes a Processing Begin Date and Processing End Date. These dates determine when financial transactions may be recorded against any established project activity period. Combo/Edit rules are in place in UCSF’s financial systems to prevent posting of financial expenditures outside of the established processing date range. This includes both payroll and non-payroll activity, such as funding entry, salary cost transfers, and benefit cost transfers recorded in UCPath; purchases via BearBuy; and expense reimbursements processed through MyExpense.
What’s Changing: Establishing Processing Begin and End Dates During Award Setup
CGA uses the Budget Start Date to establish the Processing Begin Date. If pre-award spending is approved, an earlier Processing Begin Date may be established by adjusting the Budget Start Date by the number of allowable days identified by the sponsor if explicitly stated in the agreement. Upon request, CGA staff will adjust the Processing Begin Date with appropriate support of approval of pre-award spending.
For federal awards, including federal flow through, CGA establishes the award’s Trail Out Period by populating the Processing End Date field in RAS to limit the posting of expenditures after the budget/period end date.
- When the deliverable due date is 65 days or less after the budget/period end date, the Processing End Date will be set to the eighth business day after the GL close for the month following the Period End Date.
- Where the deliverable due date is 66 days or later than the budget/project end date, the Processing End Date will be set to the eighth business day after the GL close two full months following the Period End Date.
Exceptions may be made based on sponsor expectations and the complexity of the award.
For non-federal awards (e.g., private awards, fixed-price awards), CGA will continue to leave the Processing End Date blank. This allows for greater flexibility in the timing of the trail out period as the award or award period comes to a close.
Review additional guidelines in the new Understanding Award Processing Dates guide. Have a question? Plan to join the September 26 Research Administration Town Hall, or reach out to your CGA Service Team.