A Financial Review Checklist: Supporting Best Practices in Financial Management

Institutions of higher education that receive federally funded grants and cooperative agreements should have internal controls and trained personnel to fulfill various roles and responsibilities in order to comply with the Uniform Guidance as incorporated by each federal grant-making agency, along with the award terms and conditions. Research administrators are an important part of maintaining internal controls because they monitor and review expenditures, retain proper documentation, take action on any administrative requirements, and communicate directly with the principal investigator to resolve any issues. These responsibilities are all necessary to ensure that the awards are properly managed and protected against audit risk. The greater objective is to ensure accountability in the use of taxpayer dollars to stakeholders like the federal government and general public. The goal of this project is to develop a resource that would increase the efficacy and efficiency of research administrators performing financial management duties. The result was the creation of a sponsored projects financial review checklist that provides guidance and suggests best practices to handling common financial management issues and high risk audit items. The literature review provided many sources such as institutional closeout checklists that reflected common financial management issues, and audit reports from the federal inspector general that highlighted compliance areas that continue to be audit risks for institutions of higher education. The information was implemented into the checklist, so research administrators could use it as guidance to perform a consistent and thorough financial review