Innovation and Networks Executive Agency (INEA)

Documenting Costs of Personnel

1. Guidelines
Background
This declaration aims to provide assurance on the eligibility of staff costs declared by CEF beneficiaries in their
individual financial statement.
In order to simplify the declaration of costs of beneficiaries, the reimbursement of personnel costs declared as unit
costs (so called 'average personnel costs') is authorised under the CEF programme by Commission Decision
C(2016)478. Therefore, CEF beneficiaries may calculate average personnel costs on the basis of usual cost
accounting practices.
In concrete terms, when declaring direct personnel costs, CEF beneficiaries may have two possibilities:
- declare actual personnel costs or,
- declare average personnel cost(s) based on their usual costs accounting practices and in compliance with the
conditions laid down in Commission Decision C(2016)478.
The number of actual working hours declared for a person must be identifiable and verifiable; they must be
necessary for implementing the action and must be actually used during the action. Evidence regarding the actual
hours worked shall be provided by the participant, through a time recording system for which the following
minimum requirements (section 2.3 of Commission Decision C(2016)478) are set out.
The time recording system should record all working time including absences and may be paper or electronically
based. The time records must be approved by the persons working on the action and their supervisors, at least
monthly. The absence of an adequate time recording system is considered to be a serious and systematic
weakness of internal control.
Furthermore, the Decision provides for the use of unit costs for SME owners who do not receive any salary. The
hourly rate is based on a fixed monthly allowance multiplied by a country correction coefficient as defined in the
Appendix of the Decision. Lastly, the Decision also establishes the basic conditions regarding time recording for
personnel costs that should be respected by all CEF beneficiaries.
For further information, see Articles 10 and II.20.5 of the Grant Agreement as well as annex VII on the Certificate
for Financial Statements.
Please do not send this declaration unless specifically requested by INEA upon the ex-ante controls exercise.
Nevertheless, detailed supporting documentation has to remain availaible on site.

How to complete the template

Please fill in all the cells in worksheet "Declaration". Please send by email the Excel file to your Project Manager
together with a scanned version of the signed declaration, in pdf format, as part of the sampling documentation.

Declaration worksheet
Name and position: This concerns the person who has the power to commit the Beneficiary

Sample worksheet
Start date end end date of incurring the costs: these dates correspond to the sample, not to the period of the
Decision or the reporting period.
Components of costs of personnel: If you are reporting costs per person, please provide the name or a
personnel number of each person involved. Alternatively, if you work with categories of personnel, fill in the name
of the category concerned. Then, specify the hourly rate used and the number of hours charged to the Action.
If you have any additional questions related to this template, please contact your Project Manager.

Guidelines

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Innovation and Networks

Executive Agency

Documenting Costs of Personnel

2. Declaration by the Beneficiary
Action N

201X-XX-XX-XXXX-X

Grant Agreement N

Action Title
Beneficiary
Name
Position
The Beneficiary declares that:
1. The Costs of personnel declared meet the requirement of article II.19.1 of the Grant agreement, and particularly they they are
incurred in connection with the action as described in Annex I and are necessary for its implementation.
2. The Costs of personnel declared only include the following (compliant to national legislation and according to work contract) :
* Pay (Gross salary, overtime, 13th month (or +), bonus , holiday allowance)
* Employers' contribution ( social insurance charges, pension funding, other insurances)
3. If it includes other items, please specify which ones here below.

4. Are the staff members declared included on your payroll?

YES/NO

If not, please provide further information.

5. Please indicate if the declared staff costs are either actual personnel costs or unit costs
6. Do you have a time recording system, as required by Commission Decision C(2016)478?

ACTUAL/ UNIT COSTS

YES/NO

Briefly describe the system used (eg timesheets, electronic registration)

If not, please describe alternative evidence supporting the number of hours declared to the action (in compliance with the "Use of unit
costs" Commission Decision C(2016)478)

7. Please briefly explain how you calculate the costs of staff working for the action in compliance with Article II.19.1 and Commission
Decision C(2016)478.
The personnel costs declared should be:
- based on the beneficiary's usual cost accounting practices
- applied in a consistent manner, based on objective criteria and
- the hourly rate is calculated using actual personnel costs, excluding any ineligible cost or costs included in other budget categories.
- Please list all components included in the calculation of the gross personnel cost.

Example:Hourly rate = Annual gross personnel costs

Annual productive hours
Declared cost = hourly rate x CEF project hours

Date
Signature
2 Declaration

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Innovation and Networks

Executive Agency

Documenting Costs of Personnel

3. Sample
Action N

201X-XX-XX-XXXX-X

Grant Agreement N

Sampling item
Sampling value (in local currency)
Start date of incurring the costs (DD/MM/YYYY)
End date of incurring the costs (DD/MM/YYYY)

1/1/2015
31/06/2015

Component of costs of personnel

Name or identification N of the
person or category of staff

Person / Category of personnel

Mr X or employee id Y or staff category

engineer junior
Senior engineers

Person / Category of personnel

Person / Category of personnel
Person / Category of personnel
Person / Category of personnel
Person / Category of personnel
Person / Category of personnel
Person / Category of personnel
Person / Category of personnel
Person / Category of personnel
Total (should be equal to the sampling value)

N of staff in the category

Hourly rate
50.00

1,720

86,000.00

80.00

100

8,000.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
94,000.00
The total of costs justified
is not the amount of the
sampling

A. Annual personnel cost

B. Annual productive hours
({annual workable hours of the
person } plus {overtime worked}
minus {absences})

3 Sample & Unit cost

Amount charged to the

project

10

"Unit costs"

C. The 'unit cost': A/B (the hourly

rate)
D. The number of actual hours
worked on the action
E. Personnel cost: CxD

Hours
charged to
the project

#DIV/0!

#DIV/0!

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