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Located Inside: Research Policy Handbook

Summary:

Establishes University policy to apply the full relevant indirect cost rate to all externally-sponsored research projects. Presents procedures to apply for a waiver of that rate for specific proposals, and criteria on which waiver decisions are made. (Infrastructure charge rate and process changed in December 2005.)

Related Research Policy Handbook Documents:

3.3    Facilities & Administrative (F&A), i.e., Indirect Cost
          and Fringe Benefit Rates: Definitions and Calculations
3.11  Indirect Cost Waivers on Undergraduate
          Student Salaries Charged to Sponsored Projects

SEE ALSO:   Implementing the revised Infrastructure Charge policy
                       Administrative Guide Memo 37.3,
                            Infrastructure Charge [pdf file]

Authority:

Vice Provost and Dean of Research

Contact Person:

Assistant Dean of Research

Stanford's policy is to apply the University's full relevant indirect cost rate to all externally-sponsored research projects. However, requests for waivers or partial waivers of the indirect costs normally incurred by sponsored projects occasionally are granted by the Office of the Vice Provost and Dean of Research. With the exception of non-profit charitable foundations which limit indirect costs as a matter of policy, very few indirect cost waivers are approved.

Requests for indirect cost waivers are initiated by the relevant principal investigator (PI) and must be approved by the department chair and school dean's office. Requests for waivers then are submitted by the school dean, indicating the dean's rationale for the request, to the Office of the Vice Provost and Dean of Research. (In the School of Medicine, authority to waive indirect cost recovery is delegated to the School Dean.) As a means of determining the costs and benefits of waiver requests, the following factors will be taken into consideration:

• the grounds on which the waiver might be justified to other faculty whose projects carry full overhead;

• the total cost to Stanford;

• the likelihood that an award would be seriously jeopardized without a waiver, and the potential effect of the loss on the faculty member's overall research program;

• the benefit of the waiver to new or junior faculty members or in support of research efforts in new directions which otherwise might not be sufficiently developed to attract typical peer-reviewed awards;

• the effect of a waiver to increase direct costs available for student support.

It should be noted that indirect cost waivers will not be granted in cases where the research is sponsored by a profit-making or foreign organization, where the research involves any requirements on the part of the sponsor with respect to intellectual property, or where granting the waiver might appear to establish a precedent for future projects.

In addition, a waiver of indirect cost recovery does not waive the University's infrastructure charge (eight percent) collected on the expenditure of restricted dollars. (The application of the infrastructure charge and specific exemptions are discussed in Administrative Guide Memo 37.3 [pdf file], and in guidance from the Office of Research Administration.)

While the above discussion of considerations is not exhaustive, it is intended to function as a guide to faculty members in writing requests for full or partial waiver of indirect costs. Questions regarding indirect cost waivers should be directed to the Assistant Dean of Research.