Financial statement for a grant

A financial statement answers one question from the donor: how much did you spend on the project in the reporting period, and can those costs be accepted. In EU grants it is part of the periodic report alongside the technical part, and there is no payment without it.

Who submits, when and where

Each beneficiary fills in an individual financial statement on the Funding & Tenders Portal, signs it and passes it to the coordinator. The coordinator collects the partners' statements and submits the whole periodic report as one package. The Horizon Europe Model Grant Agreement allows 60 days after the end of the reporting period, and the periods themselves are set in the Data Sheet of your agreement.

The statement is signed by a person holding the financial signatory role: the FSIGN is nominated in the organisation by the LEAR and is then assigned to a specific project as PFSIGN. Sort the roles out early, because the submit button is unavailable without an assigned signatory. If a participant misses the deadline, its costs for that period are treated as zero, but they can be declared in the next one.

What is inside

• Costs by budget category: personnel, subcontracting, purchases (travel, equipment, other goods and services), other categories and indirect costs. What may be included is explained in the article on eligible costs.
• Explanation of the use of resources: who worked and how much, what was bought and why. It must match the figures in the statement and the technical part.
• Certificate on the financial statements, if the threshold is reached. It has its own article: CFS.

The consolidated statement for the consortium is generated by the system. The Commission advises declaring all eligible costs even when they exceed the budget: the grant is capped at the maximum amount anyway, and the margin helps if some costs are rejected.

Converting hryvnia into euros

The statement is drawn up in euros. A beneficiary keeping its accounts in another currency converts costs at the average of the daily exchange rates published in the C series of the Official Journal of the EU (the ECB rates) over the whole reporting period. If no daily rate exists for the currency, the average of the Commission's monthly accounting rates (InforEuro) over the same period is used. The ECB does not publish a reference rate for the hryvnia, so the second rule is the one that applies to Ukrainian organisations. The rate on the date of each payment or the National Bank of Ukraine rate is not used here.

After submission and common mistakes

The granting authority either accepts the report or sends it back for changes. The payment should reach the coordinator within 90 days of receipt of the report, but that deadline is suspended while questions and corrections are pending. Interim payments together with pre-financing are capped at 90% of the maximum grant amount, and the rest is paid as part of the final payment. A mistake in a statement already submitted is fixed by an adjustment in the next period.

Common mistakes that get a report sent back:

• Days worked in the statement do not match the time records.
• Costs paid outside the reporting period are declared, or VAT that the organisation can recover.
• The rate on the payment date is used instead of the period average.
• The explanation of the use of resources contradicts the technical report.

How other donors do it

The logic is the same everywhere: costs against the approved budget plus supporting documents. What differs is the volume of evidence. In EU grants source documents are not submitted but kept for checks. Many donors and Ukrainian state funds require a register or copies of source documents with the report, and the Ukrainian Cultural Foundation also requires an independent auditor's report.