University of Tasmania, Australia

Consider very carefully what is required when putting together a budget request for a funding application. There are 2 general areas in a budget:

1. Direct costs which are directly attributable to a research project
2. Indirect costs which institutions incur in supporting research, but which cannot be directly attributed to individual research projects.

If there is no set format for the application, consider grouping your costs under 3 headings:

1. Direct Labour costs
2. • These are personnel costs (including relief from teaching) which include salary on-costs (salary on-costs covers superannuation, payroll tax, workers compensation, etc.)
3. Direct Operating costs (i.e. non-labour project costs), such as:
   • Travel
   • Consumables
   • Equipment hire (including Central Science Laboratory costings)
   • Other
4. Indirect costs
   • For Category 1 Australian Competitive Grants (ACG) there are no charges for Indirect costs. For grants that do not appear on the ACG Register, Indirect Costs are applicable. Please refer to the Indirect Cost policy.
   • Please refer to the Australian Competitive Grant Register (ACGR) to confirm if the Funding Body is exempt from Indirect Cost charges

ORS have costing tools available to assist researchers in calculating project costs.(Tools updated: November 2011, summary of updates are noted in the tools and please enable Macros).

Other items to note:-

Costing of casual staff for a project:

Finance and Business Services provide a worksheet for computing the salary and salary on-costs (e.g. payroll tax, superannuation, etc) for casual staff who are paid on an hourly or term basis. If the salary is to cover more than one year, don’t forget to increase the level of the appointment as the staff member advances through the next pay step.

• Access the Finance and Business Services Salary Costing Worksheet and only use the Casual Costing Calculator found on the bottom half of the page.

Justifying costs:

Generally you need to convince a group of your peers (i.e. the funding body) that each item of the budget is necessary. In your budget justification, include such details as:

• what pay level is required and why that level is needed,
• how the presence of an Research Assistant will enable the project to progress
• what the Chief Investigator will do, what other staff members will do, the use of equipment, consultants, etc..

Other documents you may need to refer to:

• Access UTAS pay rates and allowances
• List of suggested direct non-labour operating costs (35.0KB) to consider.