Electronic Signature Licitness for Letter of Appreciation to Employee in European Union

How to eSign a document: electronic signature licitness for Letter of Appreciation to Employee in European Union

good morning Welcome to our webinar on lumsum funding in Horizon Europe my name is UL gel and I'm a head of sector in the European commission working on the simplification of our processes for Horizon Europe together with my colleague Andrea kikos I'm going to explain today how lumpsum funding Works in Horizon Europe before we start let me quickly go through the agenda I'm going to start by giving an overview presentation uh covering most of the details of how this new scheme works and that is going to be followed by uh session with three guests who already have quite some experience with lumsum funding now lumsum funding may be new to you but we've been using it since 2018 so quite a few organizations have already subst experience and our guests are going to share this with you in the second part of the webinar then we're going to have a mini short break to let you uh put your questions that you may have after you've listened to the presentation and to the discussion with the guests upvote other questions in slido and then we'll still have in the third part of the webinar plenty of time to answer your questions now I would start straight away with the presentation um as announced as the first part maybe two key principles for that uh to bear in mind lumsum funding of horizon Europe grants works for most aspects and as much as possible like traditional grants so if you have experience with traditional grants in the framework program from Horizon 2020 or from Horizon Europe not using lumsum then switching to lumpsum is not that difficult because only a limited number of aspects new and I'm trying to go and focus on those aspects that are actually different in lumsum funding um I might not be able to cover all the last details in that 30 40 minute presentation but of course a you're going to have uh the possibility to ask questions and I'm going to show you where to find further guidance and information so let's see if I why do we use lumsum funding in the first first place you see three main area uh reasons on this slide and in no particular order uh everybody agrees that we need to reduce the financial error rate in the framework program and we believe that lumps sums are a major tool to achieve this there is very significant simplification potential because the use of actual costs and the reporting of actual cost remains very complex and error prone despite all our efforts in the in the last 10 or more years to simplify that traditional system so actual costs will always have to accommodate all the various different practices in all the countries that participate across Europe and the world so there is a limit as to how simple that can be uh in lumpsum funding we have no reporting of actual costs and we have no reporting of resources and there's no obligation to keep any such um uh documents invoices or time sheets and that is the major source of making it less simple because fewer documents to be kept monitored and checked means fewer errors in the end and of course less Administration especially beneficiaries that have not uh the capacity and have not the experience of long-standing participation in the framework program per benefit from this easier approach and then last but certainly not least we really need to focus more on content over the years I believe we've uh developed overall a culture of focusing far too much on financial management but the framework program is not about spending money it is about um doing research and Innovation and that's where we need to focus on the most uh what I already mentioned uh we have uh um we believe that lumsum funding is really beneficial for small and new beneficiaries and they are in fact the vast majority they represent the vast majority of the participants in Horizon uh Europe and Horizon 2020 the data you see in the graph on the right hand side are from Horizon 2020 we had the same picture already in fp7 the uh two programs uh ago and we expect no different pattern in Horizon Europe in other words there is on the right hand side you see a rather small number of big participants that have more than 100 grants so big universities big research organizations a few big companies and then on the left hand side you see a a massive amount of very small uh smmes newcomers that uh make roughly that only have one Grant in the whole uh framework program and with only one Grant in seven years we cannot expect those small participants to have the experience or to have the administrative structure to deal with actual costs what we need is a system that works the first time you use it and here lumsum have a clear advantage of course uh we know lumsum funding is not brand new but is still relatively new you may now use it for the very first time so uh we know that there are still some uh concerns and we are aware of those uh for example it may take more time to set up a proposal or there might be less flexibility in Grant Management now an act or a higher risk uh in terms of uh Financial certainty we haven't really seen any of those risks materializing but we take this seriously and we try to address this uh with improvements wherever possible uh so of course we also aware that some of this is based on misunderstandings because well when it comes to more work at the proposal level we are at pains to point out that also actual cost grants need a detailed budget planning not only some grants and the only difference is you will see later in more detail that those details need to be shared in lumsum proposal while an actual cost proposal uh you keep them to yourself but you still have to have them um I'm not going to go into more detail here let's go on and see how lumsum funding actually works in practice we've H we we have two lumpsum options the first one is uh type one where the lumsum is fixed in the work program uh so there is no option for the applicant to choose the amount they go for the amount is fixed and only that amount can be awarded currently there is only one example in place that is the ERC proof of concept call they've been using this uh for relatively small grants very successfully since a number of years uh currently there is no other scheme using this but ERC proof of concept is uh for this the this approach is working very well however for the bulk of lumpsum calls we are using type two which which is even more similar we could say to the traditional actual cost proposals because you define your budget yourself you determine the amount that you want to apply for in your proposal so in your proposal you include a detailed budget you justify it it goes through evaluation and then that is the amount that is awarded possibly after some corrections after evaluation when you write lumon proposal again you use more or less the same approach as in any uh other proposal for Horizon Europe that is you have the standard application form there's no special application form for lumsum proposals it is the very same as for all other grants for all other proposals and you present your project the objectives the methodology exactly in the same way as in any other proposal likewise of course you describe the activities and the work packages exactly in the same way we've recently slightly updated the proposal form to give you a little bit more guidance on how to describe these activities again the same for all proposals nothing specific for lump sums however what as I mentioned you need to include and justify the lumpsum budget and for that you have an additional detailed budget table in the lamom proposal this takes the form of an Excel file which you can find in the submission system so uh when you apply for a proposal in the in the topic using lumsum you will find this Excel form to be used you complete it and you upload it later as an Annex to your proposal we'll see that in a little bit more detail now um for this uh budget table what you need to do is you provide cost estimations for each cost category and of course we know this cannot be accurate because your cost estimations upfront we expect only to be the best estimate at the time of writing the proposal it is clear that this cannot be as accurate as a cost declared after you've had it expost we say so this is uh this is um the approach that you try and provide the most reasonable and best estimated budget you can so the best approximation of the actual costs expected for that project and then later uh we will check that these are a following the same eligibility rules as any other uh ground in other words the cost that you include in your lumsum proposal they must meet the same eligibility criteria as the cost in any other Grant and of course they must be in line with your normal practices they must be reasonable non- excessive uh and they must be necessary for your activities but they must not they don't need to be accurate to the euro they just need to be reasonable and well estimated and they need to be justified by The Proposal so when you fill these details in in this Excel table the Excel table will automatically calculate the lump sum that comes out of it taking for example into account the 25% flat rate for indirect costs if and uh where and uh if and as applicable for the various cost categories it'll also take into account the funding rates of the various participants in that Grant and out comes the final lumpsum and the breakdown of lumpsum shares per work package and per participant again we'll see a little bit how this what this looks like and of course uh you have more details and instructions directly in that budget table you have also a copy of that in the funding and tenders portal but I urge you don't use that U uh information copy let's say in the funding attenders portal use the copy that comes with your pro with your proposal writing with uh the submission system in the portal for specifically for your topic another thing that you should pay attention when to when writing Al lumsum proposal are the work packages and how you design work packages now given that uh you'll see later work packages are uh lumpsum payments are done by work package so whenever a work package is complete we'll pay the amount pre-agreed for that work package so that means the way you design your work package and you structure the work plan has an influence on the payment schedule whenever a work package is complete and will be uh it can be declared at the end of a reporting period and will then be paid now uh that means if you have work packages that spend the entire life of the project uh you will only be paid for that work at the end of the project if you need to be paid for that work already in between you are free to split that work package into or for example in as many parts as there are reporting periods uh the main example that we normally use is uh project management so project management very often is a work package that uh spans from the very start to the very end of the project and you may want to split that in management project management work packages one for each reporting period in this way you will be able to be paid for each reporting period for your project manager M work however bear in mind when you split work packages the resulting work plan still needs to be effective and still needs to be manageable it still requires that the resulting work packages are major subdivisions of the work plan we don't expect work packages that are uh that are in individual tasks for example or micro work packages so the experts that we are asked to evaluate lumpsum proposals will certainly be briefed that there are to be expected a few more work packages than in standard grants but uh they are also asked to make sure that the work plan still is effective and that the individual work packages still make sense as sizable subdivisions of the of the work now here you see uh a practical example um you have here the one I mentioned project management something on the top uh panel here you see that management work pack spends four years three reporting periods uh a standard project of four years divided into three reporting periods and you may if you like but you're not I should just emphasize there is no obligation of course to do the splitting the splitting is entirely voluntary it's an offer that you can do in order as in this this example to get paid for your management work at the end of each reporting period but if you deem this is not necessary to ensure the cash flow of your project then probably it's better to not do it and to leave uh the work package structure as you would have done it anyway so coming to the evaluation of lumsum proposals again mostly this works in exactly the same way as for any other proposal it will it'll be evaluated against the three standard criteria Excellence impact and implementation the only thing that comes on top is that uh the detailed lumpsum budget table is going to be uh evaluated as part of the implementation criteria which is where the budget and the uh yeah the quality of the implementation of the project is addressed and here the experts I already mentioned the main focus of them is not to look at uh individual Euro amounts and whether something could have been 10 euros more or less but they are asked to make sure that your estimations are reasonable and non-excessive that is the key Criterion uh to make sure that we don't much overpay or that refund much underfunded projects so there's no point in underestimating and in no point in overestimating the costs they should be as close to the expected actual cost for your project as possible and as well Justified as possible which is again true for all projects of course for all proposals that the resources and the costs need to be justified based on the proposal and the type of activities you are proposing so if experts find that certain costs are overestimated they will make concrete recommendations and then uh through the evaluation summary report you will learn that some things need to be modified and these modifications can then be implemented before excuse me before the grant is signed now the good news is that even if there are small corrections to the budget that will not lead to a decreased score so in basically all or almost all cases corrections to the budget will not really affect your chances to be funded because that has no negative impact on the score it'll only uh mean a slightly corrected budget only in case that your budget is really completely flawed there is a lot of information missing or otherwise it cannot be evaluated properly uh that could lead to a decreased score because then uh you really didn't provide uh a functioning a uh a proper proposal for the budget that we can evaluate in such case you indeed can be punished with a decreased score in that case it would lead to a lower chance to be funded of course but I repeat this is rare normally if there's only a few uh several even small things that need to be corrected in the budget you'll have no change in score and no change in your chances to be funded now one thing uh that is uh a key element in the evaluation is the dashboard where we show let's say the normal range of personnel costs this is used as an orientation by the experts what is shown here is the uh is the Personnel costs that were signed in actual cost grants since 2022 uh We've very recently updated these data again so it it shows uh data loaded from April 2024 based on the grants that were signed in Horizon Europe from from 2022 onwards and what you can see is the amount of person months that were funded at a given rate and this data is resolved by country and by organization type now across Europe and Beyond across the whole world because far more countries than just Europe are participating in the framework program we have very large differences in the structure of personnel costs this is why this orientation is necessary for our experts and you can of course when writing your proposal also access this resource and see where your costs are in comparison to the data displayed for your country and your organization type the example given here research organizations in Romania and research organizations in Germany show uh give you an example how far apart uh Personnel cost structures can go I could probably have found examples that are even further apart than this uh than these two so when you look at this resource uh and when writing your proposal and you find that the cost that you intend to apply for for personnel are above the range shown here which is the range from the 20th to the 80th percentile um then please make sure that in the comments tab of the detailed budget table you explain this effectively then you're in a situation where your costs are among the 20% most expens expensive of your peers in other words you are then among the 20% most expensive research organizations in Romania or the among the 20% most expensive research organizations in Germany if you are if your costs are to the right hand side of the distribution shown here and in this case we would like you to make sure to explain why that is and this will certainly be taken into account by the experts because costs Above This 80 percentile are certainly acceptable and is not that they would be rejected just because they are above the range shown here but we want to learn why this is necessary and you'll find more information on the dashboard landing page on how to deal with that but I can urge you make sure that you uh include that information in case you're really above uh in the comments tab of the detailed budget table uh of course let me add also in case you are below or anywhere inside this distribution uh costs generally need to be justified it's just that we want a specific and explicit extra justification in case you are above this distribution coming to Grant preparation again we follow the standard process and you will have uh a dedicated model Grant agreement for lumpsum grants that is slightly different than the model Grant agreement for actual cost grants but again the vast majority of articles in this model Grant agreement are the same except those articles that that deal with actual costs those don't exist anymore in the lumsum grants uh and financial obligations but we also apply the non-negotiation principle that means in principle we uh we put your Grant together based on the proposal submitted as evaluated but of course there can be some changes obviously we need to adjust the lump sum in case uh the experts told us it is overestimated is clear that we can never really increase the amount that you asked for but it there is the possibility that it is decreased uh I can actually already share that uh most grants that we select in lumsum funding some 90% go through the evaluation without any changes so really the vast majority gets the amount that they ask for roughly 10% have a cut but even in those 10% uh the cuts are generally rather small and in the area of uh 1% or lower so only few exceptions uh we see where cuts are a bit more significant um then uh what we introduce into this grant is the breakdown of lumpsum shares per work package and per partner um this is the financial anex which will then later determine how the grant is paid at the end of each reporting period so that is uh taken from the detailed budget table that you filled in but the detailed the the cost details themselves are not anymore part of the grant agreement so the let's say the philosophy of lumpsum funding is that up to the time that we sign the grant agreement we look at the detailed cost estimations and we may uh yeah we may have to change things based on the evaluation but once the grant is signed we are not going to come back on that lumpsum uh the lumpsum is then deemed to have been agreed um and we will not question it after signing the grant agreement we will then pay this lump suum uh as the grant is executed that also includes of course in case that after Grant signature prices change and this can absolutely happen in both uh directions we might have for example included budget for a piece of equipment piece of equipment might two years later have become cheaper we will not uh return to the grant agreement and change the budget for that reason but in the other case that the equipment has become more expensive after 2 years we will also not get back to the grant agreement and uh you will not change the lumpsum but that situation I must point out is also similar is is the same as in any other Grant because also in actual cost grants the maximum Grant amount is not changed uh in case of inflation or in case of increasing prices or in case uh some costs actually decrease the maximum Grant amount always stays the same and here uh you see uh this um yeah you see this table with the uh budget shares with the lumpsum shares this is uh the breakdown I mentioned a couple of times before you see the beneficiaries of the Grant in the rows and you see the work packages in the columns you see that different beneficiaries participate in different work packages and for each work package each beneficiary has their share in that work package fixed in that table so beneficiary a has a share of €250,000 in work package one beneficiary C has a share of 100,000 in work package one and so on so if work package One is paid in full uh is completed it'll be paid in full 350,000 uh because that is what we have fixed already in at time of signing the grant agreement it's important to note that while this looks maybe strict you have any flexibility to use this budget as you see fit you don't declare any costs the only thing that you need to make sure is that the work package was actually completed and if it's completed you will get the amount uh that was pre-agreed for the work package no further questions asked and also how it is distributed inside the Consortium is entirely your business the commission is not going to learn about it because you're not going to report on any cost aspects the payment schedule is exactly the the same as in an actual cost Grant so we have uh a pre-financing payment the rules for the pre-financing and the way it's calculated and the amount that results is exactly the same as in any other Grant so the usual approach currently is that we have I think 160% uh divided by the number of reporting periods and a maximum of 80% so uh a project with two reporting periods would have a pre-financing of 80% of the total toal amount for the grant uh and that is exactly the same I have to stress again as for any other Grant there is nothing specific for lumsum interim payments again we do a payment at the end of each reporting period so the timing is the same as in any other Grant now what happens here in lamsam Grants is that we look at the work packages that you declared were completed in that reporting period And if agreed by the project officer these work packages will be paid as pre-agreed and then at the end of the grant we pay the balance that means any final work packages that have not been completed so far you declare and at this point you can declare work packages as partially completed as well that is normally of course we expect that you will complete the full Grant and you complete all the work packages but it can be that you didn't manage to uh complete every last work package to the end fully and then you get the possibility to declare a work package complete Meed for example to only 80 or 90% again if that is agreed these amounts will be paid and of course also like in any other Grant we release the amount for the Mutual Insurance mechanism that was kept at the beginning of the grant amendments in work in lsams again can be uh done more or less in the same way the process for amendments has been uh aligned with that in actual cost grants so there is no change no difference in the process really um previously in Horizon 2020 we still had a slightly stricter amendment process for lamsam Grants that's been changed we see that is not necessary you use the same procedure now um and the only thing to bear in mind really is that once a work package has been paid and accepted you cannot amend it anymore because we consider that as a part of the project that is now being completed we don't reopen that work package so to say anymore so it can also not be amended anymore we only look at work packages that you are still working on and you will declare in the future um maybe this maybe this point at the bottom here is worth mentioning that you don't really need a uh Grant you don't really need uh a grant agreement Amendment for every aspect you can very well also use the so-called simplified procedure that is you put deviations in the report when you in your technical report there's a specify a specific section for deviations from the work plan when you declare and you explain and you justify deviations from the work plan as it is in the grant agreement and the report is accepted with that the deviation is also accepted and the consequence is legally speaking the same as going through a formal Amendment procedure earlier reporting and payments so that is really something that got a lot easier with lumpsum because well for the reporting the technical part you use the standard template the template is no different it's slightly very slightly simpler because any part of the reporting template that deals with resources and costs has been removed so any part dealing with resources is marked as not applicable for lumpsum Grants but otherwise all the elements of the technical report are the same as for any other Grant in Horizon Europe so then uh the coordinator declares to us which work packages are completed or which haven't been completed and then of course you should make sure that in your technical report it becomes clear why you believe that a work package has been completed this is what the project off is going to check and when the project officer is convinced that indeed you completed a given work package that will trigger the payment right I think that's uh maybe I should mention already here that at the end uh this is uh you get the possibility to declare work packages as partial this is not possible during the project when you go through your project and at an intermediate payment stage you can only declare something as fully complete or you don't declare it we don't take partially completed work packages throughout the project only at the end the idea behind is that we want you to complete all work packages and we want you to take your time and if you haven't managed to complete a work package as maybe planned by the end of the first reporting period take the time to uh the end of the following the subsequent reporting period to complete it and declare it then again uh maybe already here uh lumpsum uh payments are not dependent on a successful outcome that is maybe uh the core DNA of uh lamsam funding what we pay is your effort is your uh carrying out the activities we do not pay and or we do not make payments dependent on a successful outcome so whether you reached certain results or you re reached certain objectives is not the question here when it comes to payment of course this is desirable but this is not what determines whether we pay or not a work package that is solely determined by the question whether you actually did the work as described in the grant agreement so the the payment is calculated in a rather simple way and also we can on this basis automatically generate the financial statement you have declared which work packages are complete then let's say this is accepted uh what happens is uh the system will automatically calculate and generate the financial statements which the coordinator will sign on behalf of the Consortium so here in this example we have um work package one is complete both parts have been completed so we have a payment of €350,000 work package two is still ongoing several parts have not been completed so no payment at that stage work package three is complete so the full amount is paid and again work package four is ongoing work package five has not yet been started so work package four and five are not paid at this stage uh the payment is a simple sum of the pre-agreed shares for work package one and three and the financial statements are going to uh point this out also break down the amounts uh for the beneficiaries involved in the two work packages that are paid at this stage that is beneficiary a b and c so an important part of course in this whole question is what and how do we accept work packages because I said that is the key question have you completed your work package and if yes we'll pay the pre-agreed share so generally speaking of course we expect you to have done the activities as described in the work package but we can also accept them this is not this is sort of not very strict uh but what we can do is we can also accept your work package when all essential tasks have been completed or when you have done equivalent tasks or when you have deviated but your deviations have been Justified and they can be accepted so that is the principle of uh accepting uh a work package if it in has been carried out we don't apply a stricter standard here than we apply to actual cost grants so there is no um yeah there's no intention to expect a higher level or a better performance from lumsum Grants than from actual cost grants there's no basis for that we just have simplified the financial aspects but it's not that lumpsum grants as such are expected and need to perform higher than actual cost grants like in actual cost grants we have these possibilities to um to accept also uh an a delivery of the project that is not exactly as described in the project as long as the deviations make sense have been explained and are in in the sense of uh creating the best value out of the Grant and of course I mentioned before your lumpsum Grant can be amended so whenever you have um uh whenever you see that the technical scientific development of your project requires to change the direction of the project as in any prop Any Grant you can amend it to amend to to adapt to these new circumstances and to allow you to complete the work packages because the work packages that were conceived at the time of proposal writing two or three or four years later may not make much sense anymore and you might need to change this setup in order order to be able to be in a position to complete your work package and then especially in lumpam Grants I suggest that you make use of this possibility to amend the Grant in a way that puts you in a position to complete your work packages in a meaningful way in case that work pages are rejected of course you will have the possibility to reply to the observations of the project officer uh and only after that after you explained why really you believe in fact they are complete will the project officer take a final decision uh if this rejection takes place at an intermediate stage of the project we are not going to make any payment there is uh the work package has not been rejected as such is in a way just postponed we expect you to then improve on that work package and declare it as completed later and then again we are going to check whether completion is satisfactory and if yes then you will be paid for that very work package at at a later stage so a rejection of a work package at intermediate stage is not should not be confused with uh rejection of a payment or something it is just postponing the payment for that work package to the time that you declare it again in an improved form and then at the very end I mentioned already that is the that is the point in time when you may for example uh because you haven't been able for technical reasons or for Force mayure you haven't been able to really complete every work package then you can declare uh one or more work package as partially completed and you should again use the best estimate for the percentage that you declare based on the activities that you have done so if you have completed 90% of the activities you declare 90% this has again nothing to do with the amount of money that you actually spend uh on this project or on this work package you should base your um completion on the share of activities really carried out and this is also the measuring stick that the project officer is going to put on uh when they to use when checking your work packages fully completed or partially completed in practice what we see is that the vast majority of work packages are paid so uh what we see is we have um in the Horizon Europe uh and the Horizon sorry 2020 pilot of which uh a lot of the grants have been completed by now but not all uh we have uh had uh 1,600 work packages in total and 852 of those have by now been paid so they uh they are part of grants that have been completed uh as I said only at the final payment do we know what is the final lumpsum amount that was paid and what we can see is that 99% of those cases were paid as declared this includes also some cases where people declared less than 100% but so 99% of the cases were paid as the beneficiaries as the Consortium asked for and the vast majority of those again is that the full lump sum was paid and only in 1% of the cases did we have a partial rejection because the project officer found that no uh you have not completed the project to the extent that you declared but this is as as you can see a rare event and then at intermediate payment I I don't have really full quantitative data here but we know from experience that rejection of work packages happen at intermediate stage but this again is also rather rare again in the in the order of magnitude of 1% or less so most work packages we see in practice that are declared at intermediate payment are paid and most of them that are declared at the end of the project are paid so the overall level of lump suum paying lump sums is very high 99% plus so we see really no evidence that there is increased Financial Risk for beneficiaries because the lump suum that we agree at the beginning really uh reaches the beneficiaries and yeah to Almost 100% expost controls when your Grant is over your controls uh the grant is of of course subject to expost controls like any other Horizon Europe grants and we can in particular uh review the proper implementation of the action through a technical review for example H but of course uh such grants are have also a lot of other many other non-financial obligations and compliance with those can be reviewed just as well just in the same way as for any other grants this could be IPR or ethics open signs there's quite a few non so-called non-financial obligations which are exactly the same as in any other Grant no different for lumpsum and you can of course uh be reviewed for having uh complied with those but there will be no checks no reviews and no audits on the financial aspects that is the key difference so what effect do you have on keeping records so on the left hand side you need you see the documents that you need to keep and these are all the technical documents in shorts these are the documents that you need to show that the project was properly implemented and in short they are the same as for any other Grant there is no additional document that you need to keep for lumpsum grants that you do not need to keep for actual cost grants nothing in addition it is the documentation that you need to show the grant was actually carried out on the right hand side you see what you don't need anymore and this is uh for example time sheets pay slips your depreciation policy any invoices in other words any document showing that actual costs were incurred because those are not uh those are not submitted and those are not checked anymore uh of course important to bear in mind that whatever internal procedure applies in your organization or whatever is necessary to comply with national and uh laws or laws applying to your organization locally that you still need to comply with this is outside the grant agreement that you sign uh with us so obviously you need to uh keep uh those obligation you need to comply with those obligations outside the grant agreement that you have from national law or from local practices for further information I can really recommend our dedicated lumsum page on the funding and tenders portal in particular our set of video tutorials I think is useful for newcomers we have an overview of how lumsum funding is worked working uh how the detailed budget table should be completed and how the dashboard is working as uh really key elements to understand the whole concept and to see how the budget uh is set up and evaluated and beyond that there is a couple of more formal guidance documents all of which you find here linked on that page on the funding and tenders portal so what's going to happen next well uh we promised we are going to monitor lumpsum funding tightly and this is uh indeed happening we have a follow-up study in the making to the one that we released in 2021 I hope that we can release this before summer uh we are an advanced stage we had a big uh survey among all lumpsum participants at the end of 2023 a lot of data to be analyzed and also a lot of implementation data all of that is going to go into a second more comprehensive lumpsum assessment to be released soon then the expost control strategy the technical reviews that we're going to employ are under preparation uh we expect that a small number of reviews will be needed to make sure that lumpsum grants really are implemented properly uh and more details will be shared soon and generally speaking we are going to continue our stepwise phasing in you know that we had a low amount of lumsum funding at the beginning of horizon 20 uh Horizon Europe based on the pilot also taking into account that many stakeholders asked that we shouldn't be uh that we shouldn't introduce lumpsum funding to too quickly so that at the first years we were still very uh cautious about it and used that time to strongly improve the guidance and the support that we have for lumpsum Grants but then in 23 we stepped up significantly devoting some 10% of the total call Budget to lumsum and now in 2024 we reach nearly 30% of the call Budget for lumsum with a possible further increase in 2025 in fact we believe that it would be good to go to 50% by the end of horizon Europe now that is not yet set in stone but uh the commission intends to further increase step by step the use of uh this instrument lumsum to make funding simpler and more accessible with that I'm at the end of the presentation we now have uh our discussion with our guests and I hand over to my colleague Andrea kikos thank you very much so so we will indeed have a panel discussion with three guest speakers that are involved directly in lamsam projects under Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe so they can really share uh some best uh practices and uh useful uh Lessons Learned uh with us and we are very happy to to welcome today Yana deti professor at the National Technical University of aens she coordinates the lamam project um under Horizon 2020 called tum more Ln OC uh I also welcome Maria cayala a project manager at Arena Consulting in Belgium she has been uh involved in several lamsam projects from shift to rail and Europe's rail joint undertaking among which the project pintat to that ended a couple of years ago and uh last but not least a warm welcome to Helena Dean uh which is the project manager at Western development Commission of public body in Ireland and she coordinates The Horizon Europe lamsam project Spectra um so in the next half hour uh we will have um a conversation on the Practical aspects of lumpsum funding and if you have specific questions to address to our speakers uh please do so please use slido and uh we will then allocate these questions later on to to our speaker they will uh stay with us until uh the end of the webinar um so now I propose to start as usual with some introductory questions and um so I will start uh with you Yana um could you uh introduce yourself and the lamsam project that you are coordinating so when did it start at what stage is it now great thank you very much first of all for invi invite me to present our experience on lamam Project I'm I'm I'm professor at the national Tech University of Athens and I'm coordinating excuse me I'm coordinating tumor Leaf No Leaf note on a chip project which has been started since 3 years now since 1 of May 3 years ago 2020 uh two one sorry and uh the project is about it is a project that involves about 10 partners and um we are the coordinators uh at the iccs and the UA we have Technical University of vov we have bio Academy of Athens arus Alps Ros Technical University of vien elesis for asion and amires with amires we are working together on the management and administrative aspects so the leaf node the tumor Leaf node on a CH project is a project that aims to develop a tumor and leaf node platform on a chip for the monitor of 3D models and microfluidic chips will be which will connect the H the the cancer lung cancer patients with appropriate uh therapy therapy so this is at a very high level description and the partners of this Consortium overall our uh experience so far is is very very positive from the lamb sham project initially we were a bit concerned about the new scheme to be honest and we will try to figure out what which are the difference we were a bit concerned about the fact that uh the technical the the completion of the work packages should be completed and this we couldn't understand I mean what is the how is this Quantified at the end and uh that was a a reason of concern but I mean after 3 years we see that um it is much more flexible with less Administration and with with good communication with the project officer which we are happy to have it is everything is quite I mean um you know we can change things uh because that was our concern the beginning so this is as a first uh impression and uh please if you have any other questions I'm happy to respond some more specific questions uh a bit later on so uh now I will turn to Maria uh with a similar question so could you introduce yourself and the lamp projects that uh you are involved in so uh at what stage are day now you're muted Maria sorry hello everyone um again my name is Maria kova I'm a research and development financial manager working for Ina uh Consulting uh so I've been involved in uh EU funded projects uh in the past 13 years so I started so there were fp7 projects then Horizon 2020 and now Horizon uh Europe projects I started being involved in Lamson projects uh since 2018 so I had the opportunity to participate in The Proposal preparation Grant agreement preparation and then the project management of several uh of several projects uh in fact I'm supporting the coordinator on all the administrative and uh Financial uh aspects I'm particularly working with shift to rail joint undertaking and now uh Europe's rail uh joint undertaking so the project I'll talk about is uh pint 2 so it was for the development of Concepts towards the next generation of uh traction systems and the management of um wheel uh additions uh the project started in September 2018 and it's now completed so it lasted for 30 30 months there were nine partners and uh six Affiliated um entities uh so the project is completed and it was um fully fully paid so maybe for more practical questions uh will can be answered uh later on so thank you very much perfect thank you Maria and um I will also um turn to to Helena and ask you to introduce yourself and the lamam project that you are coordinating under Horizon Europe so uh when did it start what type of project is it thank you very much so my name is Helena Dean uh I'm from the Western development um commissioner Regional development agency in the west of Ireland and I represent the project spect uh which is stimulating performance in Creative territories and Regional actors a project that was funded um under Horizon Europe uh European interconnected ecosystems um so it was uh and it is uh the first lamsam uh uh project that we have taken part in and what was particularly nice about it um it it was uh or it is a a project um that is two years in duration and that was kind of typical for this uh call that the projects were um about uh two years in duration uh smaller type Partnerships connecting different ecosystems in Europe so in our case um a sort of moderate Innovation ecosystems working with stronger ecosystems learning transferring um uh good practices transferring knowledge and methodologies in order to create a model diverse inclusive Innovation ecosystem um because the uh west of Ireland is considered a a moderate um innovator at this stage and we are the only region in Ireland uh scored at this level um we're working with Bulgaria who are an emerging innovator region and our strong innovator regions that we are learning from and transferring from are based in uh Germany and Denmark more specifically Berlin and um Copenhagen ecosystem um and and for us this has been um a very positive experience so far um I'm very happy to speak later on to the questions about the proposal preparation we are um have started on the 1st December of um uh um not the previous year and we are due to finish this year um at the end of um November and so now now we will go indeed to the more specific questions on proposal writing and Grant Management and I will um start with you Helena since you have maybe the most recent experience with that um so compared to other proposal that uh you may have submitted uh what kind of differences did you notice in um in proposal writing so what would you advise someone considering to apply for a lumpsum topic um there is more emphasis I suppose on forward planning and um I I would call it it's shortterm pain for long-term gain um because we really found although there is a little bit more preparation needed a little bit more focus on thinking through uh the actual delivery uh um process and also the detail of the delivery and kind of thinking a little bit more about the flow of activities making sure uh that when you're building uh uh tasks than your activities that you get the interdependency just right that it has a logical sequence um and and so on um and um it's as has been said before it's maybe not always possible to accurately predict every single thing but it was still useful to kind of think maybe more about the potential risks in this scenario um more as a said more carefully think about the detail and and while that results maybe a little bit more effort during the proposal preparation stage really um it bears fruit I find during the implementation we find obviously during our uh project meetings focuses really very firmly on delivery um and uh we are able to focus more on the um ideation more on on uh uh sorry the implementation act um activities and the conversation is less about Administration and financial uh issues which is uh creating uh in our experience like a very uh good Dynamic among the partners and we feel we're achieving very good results as uh based on that okay thank you and you also a bit anticipated my second question which is that um do you consider that the internal management uh of the project is different or very much different compared to other uh projects that um you might have been involved in yes certainly and I think there is you know certain efficiency obviously on the organizational level but also on the um Consortium level in terms of uh you know uh daytoday uh Administration and as I said the whole emphasis shifts uh uh towards uh more towards uh delivery uh design of activities uh developing Partnerships collaboration linkages also uh with with external partners and and and so on and I can say you know obviously on behalf of our financial department uh they they're very happy with with with um Al lumsum project because there's also obviously a learning curve for the internal staff who have to always kind of learn um with every different type of European program there there's always differences in terms of uh Administration and uh it's it's definitely uh timesaver and makes even you know organizational internal activities more efficient in addition to the Consortium Dynamics so for us a very very welcome uh change uh so we are very grateful for the lumpsum project thank you very much Helen also for your feedback and for sharing your experience and now I'm also curious about um uh your experience Yana so my first question is uh what was your approach to selecting uh the partners in your Consortium did your lamsam ground require a different Consortium agreement than other grants yes uh the the approach to to build a Consortium was quite similar I would say how however when we as we are running the project and we are in the implementation phase uh we understand more and more that is quite crucial to have a kind of um to know the partners and to know that they would be reliable and uh they will deliver because there is this kind of um dependency of of one of of all Partners who are involved in the same work package so we we should I mean for the for the next proposals we are doing we we are very much careful that we know that you know we can rely on the partners and that each work package will be completed successfully because otherwise that will will be will have consequences to other partners as well at least this is our understanding so it is somehow more critical I I believe to to select the partners um about the Consortium agreement now there is a new version of desca for lamsam and we're working on this model yes it is a bit different because it has some kind of uh um more emphasis on the work package leaders for instance because work packages are really more important than the previous in the other cons in the other framewor projects in the pre in the typical I mean uh framework uh projects we are running um so these two things I mean these two difference I think are quite are quite different I see thank you and uh now uh regarding U the Grant Management um aspect uh would you say that the report for your project became easier thanks to the use of lamam funding so what is your experience yeah with de yeah we are really grateful to that absolutely and also you know I will say something that is really I mean depends from country to country but for instance I mean in Greece we have very I mean the administration is quite difficult is I mean we have a lot of Bureau I mean the bureaucracy is very is really an issue here and that is really relaxing a lot our work and our documents that we have to select to provide to our justification and to Auditors uh that was a lot of of work in the previous in the other uh framework projects I mean and other projects now we have really I mean um more less administrative work to do and this is uh really great I would say the only concern I have I would like to mention is but I mean listening the pre the introductory presentation I think that is more clear now is about all these uh rules about the timing of the completion of the work package that was in the beginning was quite I mean scary uh that we thought that if the work package is not fully completed and has been finished as planned in the grant agreement that there's no way back so we cannot revise and we cannot uh complete the work package technically but now I see that there is this option which is also great okay thank you very much all positive all positive comments from my side I mean it's really great great experience thank you thank you for sharing uh your experience and uh now I will turn uh to Maria for the last um round of questions um did any of your uh lamsam projects required any uh technical amendments and uh if yes what was the main reason and did it work as as expected uh yes so uh for Pinter two projects we had two amendments and also so for other projects we see that uh we need at least one Amendment during uh the project uh lifetime uh the most common modification that we had to implement is to reschedule some task or work packages or some deliverables which means in order to ensure that Partners have a bit more time to complete uh the work packages in order to avoid at the end of the project to declare some work packages partially um partially completed uh for this reason most of the projects are usually extended uh from my experience it's usually uh from three up to 8 months uh extension and uh Partners manage to complete the work and complete um all the work packages what is important to know it was also previously mentioned that if a work package is completed it cannot be amended uh anymore so if you want if you need more time what is important is to have a of course good communication with the project officer and also to inform about any uh deviations and of course if you need uh more time to complete so then uh the work packages needs to be um Extended um a bit uh another common modification is uh to update the budget per work package or some shifts uh among um uh beneficiaries but then for this kind of uh changes uh we really need to technically justify uh the modification in some cases when something cannot be done uh by one beneficiary and someone else is doing the work then of course we need to do this uh shift um among beneficiaries and modify the lumsum shares um uh ingly a lesson learned is uh don't prepare an amendment or start an amendment close to the end of the reporting period because if we don't have have the amendment approved which may take a certain time so the reporting session will not be open consequently the reporting will be delayed and uh the intering payment so if you do an amendment please anticipate in advance so in not in order not to um to have a delay in uh the reporting and uh as I mentioned the uh interim uh payments again keep the project officer informed if you face any difficulty so you can really discuss and to see uh the steps that you need to to do in order to make sure that everything is um is going smoothly thank you these are some very good points to to make and uh one last question um as one of your lamsam projects already ended so it was completed um did you receive the full lamsam in the end or was there a partial payment and also generally what would you advice other lamsam um coordinators regarding the management of their Grant yes uh so the project was uh fully completed as I already mentioned it was extended uh by three months in order to make sure the work packages are completed so everything was 100% completed and it was um was uh fully uh fully paid what I I would advise and we found it very uh really uh let's say uh positive is since the proposal preparation so we organized some kind of informative sessions uh to Partners informing about all the lon principles what they are expected the payments based on work packages uh completed Etc because sometimes Partners they they're not so familiar with with this new approach so in order to make sure that everyone is aware and what should be expected during the project um uh lifetime it's really important of course you put more time to do this but it's really uh very beneficial for for everyone and the Consortium to avoid any issues during uh the project the project um uh Lifetime and another thing is really during also the proposal phase uh to clearly Define the project structure you know to organize it in a way that for example if you want to have some uh interim payments to uh some work packages needs to be completed before for the reporting period ends in order to assure this um uh this cash flow so my main advice is really to put more effort in The Proposal phase to explain everything to the whole Consortium to so they are clearly aware of what is expected on how the lumsum approach Works in order to avoid any problems during the uh project Lifetime and to do much more amendments or to avoid any uh ult situation uh when the when the project starts okay thank you very much Maria it's really useful and thanks to all again for for the discussion and for accepting our invitation uh to join us to the webinar um I would like to remind our audience once again that we will look at the questions uh soon and also I encourage you to uh also uh ask uh your questions for the speakers if you would like to know more about their experience so please do so in slido also abot the question that it's more uh most interesting for you or put your own so please check also the questions that are in there um we should have 5 minutes break um and um yes we will then afterwards start the the Q&A session welcome back back uh after this short Comfort break uh and thank you for your questions that we received through slido we are now going to go through these questions also with the help of our guests of course um and try to answer them one by one uh starting with the first should equipment depreciation cost be split between the work packages in which the equipment will be used now I would advise you to put the equipment cost for a piece for any given piece into the work package where it will be used the most and you can then of course in the description in the work plan also mentioned that it will also be used elsewhere as well but uh the cost since your breakdown of costs is uh by work package I would not split the cost for one piece of equipment across various work packages but put it in one in your detailed budget table in the explanation you can always and also if you think that's important uh if it's really split 50/50 or something you can make a comment in the comments tab of the detailed budget table explaining that the equipment is used in various work packages next question what does happen if one partner does not complete its tasks in the work package and another one does now maybe I can start on this but then I think our guests should come in on this one it's a very practical question question generally speaking if your work package isn't complete because one partner hasn't done its work well you cannot comp you cannot declare it as complete um in that would mean in the middle of the project you would not declare that work package because it's not been completed at the end of the uh project you could comp you could declare this work package as partially complete and then it is uh now for financial consequences a of what the evidence is and what the agreement inside the Consortium is if there is no doubt that indeed the missing activities can be assigned are due to a single partner uh then indeed the reduction that will come because of this incomplete incompletion can be also assigned to that partner who's at fault but if that cannot be established if we don't know and you in a way also don't agree uh which partner is actually responsible for the incompleteness then the reduction uh will be the incomplete uh work package will lead to a reduction that is proportionally applied to everybody participating in that given work package so in your situation you uh you describe a situation where it is perfectly clear which partner is not doing the work and which Partners have done the work in which which case the partners that have done the work but only at the end of the project I must emphasize again uh you can complete this inm uh you can declare it partially and the partners that have done the work can in then that case be paid completely there is also uh an example like that in the lumpsum guidance in the detailed lumpsum guide that you will find on the funding and tenders portal on the dedicated lumsum page that I mentioned in my presentation in this detailed guide uh which is let's say the legally binding this is also uh yeah replacing the annotated Grant agreement for lumsum aspects there you find an example that describes exactly that situation but I emphasize again depends all on whether it can really be established Beyond doubt which partner is responsible maybe we have uh one of our guests that would like to come in because after all the uh the question what happens if one of the partn doesn't work as expected that is a general problem a general issue that can happen in in many grants and of course not only in lumsum Grants not sure if any of our guests would like to come in on this question yes I I raised the hand it is uh Maria so we had this situation in one uh project so the two partners already anticipated to this to the coordinator and the project officer asked us to to do an amendment which means that the beneficiary not doing the work released uh the funding and the one who did the work um took the money so this was done via Amendment then it was more complicated when this is not C clearly announce so it should be internal discussion and to check with the coordinator uh how to how to manage this but to be clear uh for everyone the best solution is to do it via an amendment so then everyone is paid for for for the work done thank you yes very good aspect if you can resolve effectively through an amendment this situation before it comes to the final payment that is certainly the best situation and so what I mentioned as an example that is given in the guidance I mentioned that is really the case that at the end of the project something has not been complete and therefore you don't get the complete payment and the question arises how is this reduction distributed between the partners involved in the work package concerned but if it can be of course uh clarified if it can be resolved by amending and redistributing the tasks before the end of the work such that the work package is finally completed overall and therefore the full amount is paid of course I fully agree that's the best solution to a problem like this next question maybe Andre would you like to take that one yes so in personal cost for research organization ations are um 5 5.1 ,000 which corresponds to the 18th percentile uh however our real cost exceed uh 6.5 th000 how can we convince evaluators we use real costs uh well I think the best way to do it is to make use of the any common step of the Exel uh detailed budget table uh where you can uh include as much as uh as as much information as you want so you should really uh explain the situation and uh evaluators expert evaluators will will also look at that and will take this into consideration when assessing uh the budget when assessing the personal costs maybe let me add you can uh of course make sure that uh that you explain where and for which Personnel you need which cost so the cost that you put in the detailed budget table are resolved d by staff category so you may well have a situation where uh highly qualified staff is above the 80th percentile but less qualified staff or more junior staff in your project is below this 80th percentile so it's it would be in a way also more unusual if everybody working in the project or every staff category working in the project is above the 80th percentile um so especially if you need senior staff it is clear that this is very likely going to be above the 8S percentile of this would not be unusual at all but then you just need to make sure that you explain why and how much you need the senior staff in other words it would be unusual that a project is run only by let's say senior professors normally there would also be some other staff involved which would balance the average that you in the end apply for but when you can make clear and to explain why senior staff is needed then this high cost for the senior staff will also so be accepted next question uh next question is budget transfers between work package and or Partners only require an amendment if we want these details in the grant agreement but otherwise we can shift money as we prefer yes I think here the the clear answer is yes that is fully correct the the grant agreement determines how we are going to pay but you can certainly view it like that if you deliver the work packages if you complete the activities and you compl complete this grant as we have seen is actually the case in the vast majority of lumsum projects that were completed so far uh you will get the full lump suum and then how you distribute that lump suum and the payments that we make inside the Consortium is entirely up to the Consortium and to the agreements that you take inside the consort we are not aware as the funer is not aware because you're not going to report on financial aspects at all so therefore uh you may uh you may uh indeed use the money in any way you see fit as long as you carry out the project as described now the adjusting and I think here me may may also hear our uh one or other of our guests again adjusting the work uh sorry adjusting the grant agreement to the reality of the project may still be in your interest uh in order to yeah in order to manage the project in order to have agreement among all the partners of a Consortium um but if you um but legally speaking you not required to amend it just because you have some shifts inside the project especially if they these shifts are small maybe you don't need this amendment but if you maybe have bigger shifts between work packages and partners maybe you ha