QUESTIONS/ANSWERS NCP EVENT IN HELSINKI

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1 QUESTIONS/ANSWERS NCP EVENT IN HELSINKI RESEARCHER DECLARATION can you confirm that the FP7 'declaration of conformity' is now replaced by the 'researcher declaration' and that IFs no longer require the equivalent of a 'declaration of conformity' since they do not require a 'researcher declaration'? Will SESAM System still be available for generating Researcher declaration? In all our running ITN and RISE Projects I cannot yet see how and where to enter the Researchers. When will these functions become available? What's the content of the researcher declaration? Is the reseacher decalaration comparable with the declaration of conformity? Where can I find the full text? Who has to sign? According to ARTICLE 19 (SUBMISSION OF DELIVERABLES) of the Annotated Model Grant Agreement, each beneficiary must submit to the Agency via the Participant Portal (My Area My Projects tab) a document with information about each recruited researcher ( researcher declaration ) within 20 days after the recruitment of the researcher. The researcher declaration contains personal data (name, date of birth, nationality, gender, family charges, is researcher enrolled in PhD programmes, of researcher, etc.) and data related to the project allowances: start date and end date of recruitment, hosting institution, etc. It is important to give correct and complete information since the data will be automatically inserted in Annex 4 (financial statement), for calculating the living, mobility and family allowance units. (If the researcher declaration is not provided, you will NOT be able to declare personmonths for that researcher). This rule applies for the projects in H2020. For FP7 the beneficiary has to submit the "declaration on conformity" via Sesam. Individual Fellowships (IF) in H2020 are exempted to submit the researcher declaration via the PP.

2 Access to RD is via Participant Portal MP (Manage Project) icon Continous reporting Researchers. AMENDMENTS in H2020 There is no option anymore to ask to evaluate all amendment items individually? No, the request is part of one package. The system will guide with the submission of the request to the services. It is highly recommended to involve the PO during the amendment request How do I generate a start date notification for an Individual Fellowship? Since June 2015 there will be new option on the Participant Portal for direct submission of Notification for the start date for IF. Until this feature is available, the to PO with the attachment is acceptable solution. EXTENTION OF DURATION (ITN) I appologize if the question has been asked already, I am not watching the live stream. Is it possible to ask for a extention of the duration of an ITN project? Thank you for your answer. The general rule is that no extension is granted to an ITN project. However, an extension may be granted for example in case of maternity leave. Similarly to FP7, there is a provision in the H2020 MSC ITN GA, which obliges ITN researchers to inform their employer of any circumstance, which would affect the implementation of the grant agreement. The same obligation rests on the beneficiaries towards the coordinator. Therefore, as in FP7, REA will allow extensions of the employment contract of an ITN researcher equivalent to the period of compulsory parental leave. Also, but only if necessary, REA will permit extensions of the duration of the grant agreement resulting from the extension of an individual employment contract so that the ITN researcher may complete their training in the ITN action. INFORMATION TO BE PROVIDED TO THE FELLOWS is it suffient to "give" the grant Agreement to recruited fellow electronically only by mail? does receipt need to be acknowledged by fellow? The way of providing the fellows with the grant agreement and annex 1 is decided by the consortium. According to ARTICLE 32 (OBLIGATIONS TOWARDS THE RECRUITED RESEARCHER) the beneficiary must inform the researcher about:

3 - the description, conditions, location and the timetable for the implementation of the research training activities under the action and the name of the supervisor; - the rights and obligations of the beneficiary toward the researcher under this Agreement; - the obligation of the researcher to complete and submit at the end of the research training activities the evaluation questionnaire and two years later follow-up questionnaire provided by the Agency; SUPERVISION ARRANGEMENTS in IF Is it posible to have a supervisor for an IF Researcher, who is not fisically in the institution due to a GF (of the supervisor)? How does it work for an IF if there is a change of Supervisor? In principle the Supervisor should be in the same institution of the recruited researcher. In case of change of Supervisor an amendment request has to be submitted. Prior to this PO has to be informed. TEACHING REQUIREMENTS Is it allowed for the MSCA-IF-EF-RI researcher during the research running time to be part-time involved to the teaching course at the hosting University? The teaching course is relevant to the MSCA research topic. Are the researcher costs in this case 100% eligible or should it be deducted proportionally? Teaching can be considered as a complementary research competence within the Marie Curie actions although this activity must not jeopardise the execution of the research projects as set out in the Grant Agreement. Any teaching activity shall not be substantially relevant in terms of time devoted to it and should be preferably mentioned in the proposal. Nevertheless, specific requests received during the project implementation will be examined on an individual basis taking into account the career development of the fellow. Such requests would then be approved by the PO on a case by case's basis. VISA FOR SECONDMENTS IN RISE Does a seconded researcher need a residence permit to come to Finland in RISE, when the salary is paid by her/his home institute? This is checked on a case by case basis with the help of the the NCP or the Euraxess mobility centres.

4 FINANCIAL QUESTIONS FAMILY ALLOWANCE If appears, that all hired ESRs are single, are we allowed to use released money from the budget for e.g administrative costs? Unit costs are fixed amounts that must be multiplied by the number of months the recruited researchers spent on research training activities ("person-months") and they cannot be changed. For IF, family allowance is applied if the researcher has family obligations at the deadline, right? Yes, for IF it is at the call deadline. Cost Category "Research, Training and Networking Costs" for costs; if the PI of the IF project would like to work with a Phd Student, is it possible to pay him/her from this budget item? For Research, Costs; what if money remains at this item, is it going the paid to the fellow at the end of the project? The research, training and networking costs are not meant to pay the salary of the supervisor, but could cover activities foreseen in the Annex 1. In case of funding left you can inform the PO and agree on additional activities to be organised in the project. REPORTING PERIODS AND INTERIM PAYMENTS Can you please clarify about the interim payment when the project have only 1 Reporting period?.. for ALL project with just 1 reporting period, they will be NO interim payment by default?.. When the project has only 1 reporting period there is no interim payment. At the end of the project the payment of the balance will be made. COSTS OF PARTNER ORGANISATIONS Where do partner organisations' costs fall? In Research, training and networking costs? Partner organisations cannot directly claim any costs from the project. Instead, the beneficiaries would need to reimburse the partner organisations for their activities in the research training programme. Usually the costs of the partner organisations are linked to research and training

5 activities, e.g. hosting fellows on secondments, providing additional research and transferable skills training. TIME-SHEETS FOR MANAGEMENT Does the person working for administrative issues of IF projects have to prepare time sheets for management costs? In H2020, all cost categories are unit costs. For the purpose of an EU audit there is no need to keep time sheets. However, please check the internal rule of the institution as well. In addition, beneficiaries should use the management/overhead budget to cover expenses in the project that correspond to this category. Management/overheads is a unit cost for the benefit of the beneficiaries automatically paid to them depending on the number of implemented (i.e. recruited and paid) researcher-months. Each beneficiary is free to decide what management / overheads costs they will spend these units on providing that their own internal accounting rules are respected. You need to ensure that all the management activities as described in Annex I will be duly implemented and that the general resources needed to carry out the project are made available through the overheads. COSTS IN CASE OF SECONDMENTS Secondments can be for up to 10,8 months (30% of 36 months), and the ESR will probably relocate to the country of the host institution for the duration of the secondment. In such cases, must the housing cost also be covered from the research cost budget? You mentioned that A1,2,3 are like salary and secondments cannot be payed from this. Does this mean the traveling to and housing during secondment? How is this for traveling from and to different beneficiaries. Who pays for this? ESR secondments : should housing costs during the secondments be covered from the ESR's mobility allowance, or from the institutional unit cost budget? When on secondment the ITN fellow continues to be paid by the recruiting beneficiary. The country correction coefficient used to calculate the living allowance does not change. The costs of participation in the secondment cannot not be paid by the fellow; the additional costs to the fellow, such as short term accommodation costs and travel costs can be covered by category Research, Training and Network costs. In terms of the research costs, in the financial report cost claim (FormC), the unit cost should always be claimed by the beneficiary paying the fellow but costs can be transferred within the network subject to agreement between the beneficiaries. In the case of long-term secondments (i.e. 1 year), the fellow should not pay double rents and could use the mobility allowance to pay it. So accommodation in this case is covered by the mobility allowance.

6 COSTS IN CASE OF SHORTER DURATION OF THE PROJECT The fact that shortening project duration would also lower B1 costs, does it mean that these costs cannot be spent at higher quantities than the time spent during project duration? e.g. no more than half of money at the mid-term? Unit costs are fixed amounts and they are linked to the number of implemented researcher months. If the project has been shortened but the person months have been implemented as well as the activities described in the Annex 1, the total EU contribution will not change. OTHER INCOMES FOR THE RESERCHER About top-ups. Is it possible for the researcher to work in additional H2020 projects, and have a higher salary top-up from such project? According to art. 32 of the Model Grant Agreement, the researcher cannot receive for activities carried out in the frame of the action, other incomes than those received from the beneficiary (or any other entity referred to in Annex 1). DEDUCTION FROM THE LIVING ALLOWANCE Living allowance to cover salary before deductions : what is meant by 'voluntary deductions' which are mentioned in the presentation? The amount of the living allowance is a gross amount before any taxes including employer's contributions. Consequently, the net salary results from deducting all compulsory social security contributions as well as direct taxes (e.g. income tax) from the gross amount. According to the national and local rules there are mandatory deductions required by law and voluntary deductions not legally required but important and proposed to the fellows (like life insurance, retirement plans, etc.). ADDITIONAL FUNDING can we use additional financing? In our RISE project we travel to South Africa and it is quite expensive. So, is it possible to use additional financing from companies or public sector? Yes, co-financing principle, but be careful of double-funding