Final Technical Report Policy

Background

Award agreement terms and conditions usually contain language requiring that grant/contract recipients provide a final progress or technical report as a condition of receiving support.  Technical reports allow sponsors to determine whether funds were spent in accordance with the proposed scope of work (SOW).

Under requirements of audits such as the previous OMB Circular A-133 audit or the current 2 CFR 200 audit, auditors verify that technical reports are done.  Typically, they require that the institution maintain evidence that technical reports were 1) completed and 2) submitted to the sponsor at the close of a project.  Evidence might be the copy of the final technical report, a copy of the letter (or e-mail) of transmittal, or a facsimile of the first page of the report.  Certainly, in cases where final reports are voluminous, it is not necessary for the institution to physically maintain copies in the grant or contract award files.  The rationale here is that the Principal Investigator (PI) will maintain a complete copy of the full technical report in his/her possession, should there be reason for an auditor to request to review the entire document.

Final Report Evidence

The Sponsored Projects Pre-Award Office will manage and accept two (2) forms of evidence that final technical reports were submitted to sponsors:

  1. SPA award files will contain 1) a copy of the letter (or e-mail) transmitting the final technical report to the sponsor and 2) a copy of the front page of the report.
  2. Another form of technical report compliance is electronic capture. For example, NSF maintains electronic FastLane records of all submitted final technical reports by UGA PIs. In the case of NSF and NIH, no hard copies are created through the e-submission process.  Auditors will verify in FastLane and NIH’s eRA Commons that the final report has been submitted.

Adopted:  December 14, 2007