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OCGA: Award Setup

Learn about the requirements involved before you can start spending on an Award.

Before you start spending

For successful proposals, principal Investigators (PI), fund managers and departmental business officers, along with contract officers in OCGA and accountants in Sponsored Projects Finance (SPF) all work together to finalize the award document and electronic records before research expenses can be charged to the award.

Here are a few steps that must be completed before a fund and index is set up and activated so you can start spending on your award:

Receiving the notice of award

The Notice of Award is a commitment of an agreement between the sponsor and UC San Diego. If an Notice of Award is not recieved, UC San Diego cannot authorize the research to begin.

A sponsor's grant management or contract office will typically send official communication to the institutional office responsible for contract and grant management, providing the award document, and notifying that office of the award terms and conditions. If award documentation is provided to the PI, departmental staff, or lab staff directly this documentation must be forwarded to the appropriate contract and grant office for institutional review and acceptance.

At UC San Diego, the offices with this role are the Office of Contract and Grant Administration (OCGA) and Scripps Institution of Oceanography Office of Contract and Grant Administration (SIO-OCGA). These offices have UC delegated authority to accept sponsored project awards on behalf of the Regents of the University of California.

Required compliance approvals

Approvals are obtained and recorded from all applicable offices responsible for compliance requirements: 

If such approvals are pending, UC San Diego cannot accept the award until the applicable compliances have been approved.

Negotiation and execution of the award

The terms and conditions of the award require negotiation with the sponsors. Until the negotiations are completed and both parties agree to the terms, the award will not be executed and performance for the research cannot proceed. Only contract and grant offices with delegated authority may negotiate and sign the award document.

See sponsor-specific guidance on these pages:

Get your fund and index

Once all the approvals are officially recorded in the contract and grant system (COEUS), OCGA or SIO-OCGA are able to set up the award record in COEUS and route the award to Sponsored Projects Finance (SPF) to set up the fund and index in IFIS, UC San Diego's financial management system.

Advanced spending requests

In certain circumstances, an advance spending request can be submitted to OCGA or SIO-OCGA for consideration and approval of spending prior to the final execution of the award or receipt of notice of award.

For additional information, please see the Blink page regarding Advance Spending Requests.

For more information contact the Client Experience team at researchadmin@ucsd.edu.