Sponsored Projects and Workday Setup: Frequently Asked Questions

The Office of Sponsored Projects has compiled the following Frequently Asked Questions to assist our research community with award setup questions. We will continue to add to the FAQs, as new items arise.

  • Award Review, negotiation and acceptance:
    When an award is received in OSP, the documentation (notice of award, fully executed contract or grant agreement, etc.) is reviewed by the OSP Award or Contract Manager for sponsor terms and conditions. If further negotiation is required, the OSP Award or Contract Manager will contact the PI and Department Business Office to notify them of the negotiation and delay in processing of the setup. If no negotiation is required, the OSP Award or Contract Manager will process the award for setup.

    Once the award or contract has been reviewed, the expected time for the receipt of an account can vary. In our busiest time of year, volume can impact the process. OSP is committed to staff accordingly to address the additional volume in anticipation of the increased volume. OSP is striving to process setups as quickly as possible.

    At Risk Requests and No Cost Extensions (including protocol renewal and account extensions of clinical trials) are prioritized for setup. The anticipated turnaround for these types of accounts have historically been two to three business days.

  • The At-Risk process:
    Both At-Risk and Pre-Award requests can be made by using one simple form, the At-Risk Account Request Form. Once the form is completed, please forward it, along with any supporting documentation, to your OSP Award or Contract Manager via your assigned GCAT.

    Once it is logged to the Award or Contract Manager, they will review and act on the request accordingly. Note, an Award Budget Setup form is not required for the award setup in Workday Financial.

  • No Cost Extension request process:
    Depending on your award, certain requirements must be met before a no cost extension may be requested. Please refer to the no cost extension portion of our web section for more information.
  • IRES Proposal Tracking Setup process:
    The OSP Coordinator in the IRES Setup team reviews for the completion of any relevant compliance requirements, then enters the award into the IRES Proposal Tracking system and completes the setup in IRES Proposal Tracking.
  • Compliance review process:
    When a sponsored award is received and processed for setup, a compliance review is completed to ensure an account is not set up until all regulatory requirements are met. If there is a requirement that is outstanding, the setup will be placed on a regulatory hold in IRES PT and the Department Business Office are informed of the hold and the required actions to be taken.

Setups can be delayed for any one or more of the following reasons:

  • Expired or Missing Financial Disclosure (COI) for Key Personnel
  • Transactional Review requirement for Key Personnel to be conducted by the COI Office (Conflicts identified by the COI Office can further delay the setup if a Management Plan is required)
  • Pending Protocols for Animal or Human Subjects
  • Incomplete requirements of training by responsible Personnel (this includes Introduction to Sponsored Projects for the Award PI as well as the completion of the Patent Policy Acknowledgement Agreement (PPAA) for all Key Personnel)

When an award is placed on hold for any of the above reasons, the IRES Setup team will send a communication to the Department Business Office indicating the Award is on “hold” and why. IRES users may find information about the status of their award setup or specific hold by opening the IRES record in PT View, navigating to the Activity Log section on the left side of the screen, and reviewing any “Open” activity log items. The activity log will explain the current status of a hold or identify that the hold has been lifted (activity closed).

Once an account is completed by the SPFA Award Setup Analyst in Workday, whomever has the role of Award Analyst or Grant Manager in the Business Office will be notified in their Workday notifications. The notification will include a link to the Workday Award which will then identify the active Grant(s) for charging. The Principal Investigator is not notified of the setup of an Award or Grant by Workday or OSP. Notifications in Workday are only configured to be sent to those with the role of Award Analyst or Grant Manager. It is up to the Business Office to communicate the completion of the setup to the Principal Investigator.

If there are more grant lines required than the ABS (Award Budget Setup) form allows, the DBO should upload an additional form(s) and use the following naming convention: formname-formnumber; for example: ABS form #1 of 2, ABS form #2 of 2.

The department is responsible for uploading the ABS form to the IRES record. Please be sure to name the form “ABS form” or “Award Budget Setup form” so that OSP can easily identify the form when ready for award setup.

The notification that is sent to you from OSP when Award Notices are received are standard emails to inform Business Offices and the PIs that the notice is in our office and being processed for review by your Award or Contract Manager. In this email, the reminder about the ABS form requirement is just that, a reminder. It is not to indicate the form had not already been received by OSP, but rather to remind those that may not have uploaded the form in advance.

No. The PPG Spreadsheet has been discontinued. Completion of the ABS form in its entirety satisfies the information we need for a program project grant and awarded budgets being distributed by the PI for multiple projects to be managed by another PI or project manager.

Email spfa.awardsetup1@yale.edu for any corrections to existing Awards/Grants or to add additional grant lines outside of a Sponsor issued amendment.

In Workday, subawards are setup and managed as part of the overall Award in the form of a unique Award Line and Grant.

If the award is new:

  • The Department Business Office should utilize the ABS (Award Budget Setup) form to identify each subaward as a separate Grant including the name of the Subrecipient and the funding amount to the Subrecipient.
  • The SPFA Award setup analyst will set up the new award and grant lines for the subawards based on the information on the ABS form. In general, if subaward information is not included on the ABS form and should have been, grant lines for anticipated subawards will not be set up by the SPFA award setup team.
  • If the award is new but subaward information was not included on the ABS form, nor the Sponsor’s award notice, or if the subaward is after the fact, grant lines for subawards will be set up by the OSP Subaward Manager when the subaward is processed. At this time, a new ABS form is not required for the creation of a grant after the fact.
  • The inclusion of a grant line for the subaward is for the financial setup and is separate from subaward negotiations. However, please be aware that without a grant number, the subaward document is incomplete and cannot be submitted to the subrecipient for signature.

Converted outgoing subawards (prior to Workday):

  • Were converted with a Grant number that begins with “GK”.
  • Newly created Grants for outgoing subawards will begin with “GR”
  • New Grants created in Workday will include the name beginning with “SubK and the Subrecipient name followed by the Grant name identified in the Workday ABS form (i.e. “SubK – Columbia…).

As part of the Subaward setup process, a Supplier Contract must be created for each subaward grant line. The Supplier Contract is the mechanism used to pay subaward invoices. The total dollar amount of the Supplier Contract will be equal to the funding amount(s) obligated on the Subaward Agreement(s).

Your OSP Subaward Manager on the Subaward Team begins their process once the Workday Award is established.

The Award Budget Setup (ABS) form is required for new award setups, and for those setups requiring more than one grant line in Workday. The ABS form can be found on the OSP forms page.

If the subrecipient is not set up as a Supplier in Workday, the SPFA Post Award Analyst would be unable to complete the grant line. In the Spend Categories/Hierarchies field in the setup, the SPFA Post Award Analyst must select Subaward Expense (SC217). This designation triggers a notification to OSP to Create Subrecipient so that a Grant line for the Subrecipient can be created. At that time, the SPFA Post Award Analyst would contact the department business office to create the Supplier Request.

The department business office must Create a Supplier Request in Workday for subrecipients just as they do for all other suppliers. This is a business office task whether it is for a procurement or a subrecipient.

There is a significant amount of work that is done in OSP before a subaward agreement can be created, so the effort of setting up the supplier in Workday undertaken by the department business office is done in parallel with the preliminary work OSP is doing to process the subaward.

If the department business office is uncertain as to whether the subrecipient is set up as a supplier in Workday, they would need to query Workday by running the “Find Subrecipients” report.

Orphaned grants were used to support the General Ledger conversion for closed awards with four years of financial charges prior to 6/30/17. If an award was not closed in the Oracle legacy system, it converted to an award and a grant with all associated charges. There was no intention for new charges to be allowed on closed Oracle Awards.

If there is a Grant that is currently not attached to an Award and you believe it should be, please contact osp.financial@yale.edu and provide the Grant number as well as the Award number it should be linked to. OSP will review your request with the conversion team and get back to you with any questions. Once the appropriate action is identified, we will either link the Grant as you have requested or contact you to discuss why we are unable to do so.

Contact Information for Award setup in IRES and Workday Financials:

Financial Support Center (FSC): For questions about financial inquiries, transactions, and reporting, including: accounting, budgeting, Chart of Accounts (COA), expenses, Express Shipping, financial roles, grants costing, purchasing and accounts payable, suppliers, and other Workday Finance questions. Please be aware that the FSC will escalate and route any specific grant questions they are unable to answer to the OSP. Learn more about the FSC.

FSC Hours: Monday - Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Call: 203-432-5394
Email: askfinance@yale.edu
Submit an Inquiry 

IRES PT setups: For inquiries or to provide information regarding a compliance requirement that is holding up the setup of an award in IRES PT, contact ires.awards@yale.edu.

Sponsored Projects Financial Administration: For questions regarding the setup of an Award or Grant in Workday, please follow the guidance above in each FAQ as it relates to a specific step in the setup process. If you are uncertain who to contact, send your inquiry to spfa.awardsetup1@yale.edu.

IRES PD or PT System issues: To report issues related to the performance of IRES Proposal Development of IRES Proposal Tracking, contact ires@yale.edu.