HSS's Research Support Services primarily offers pre-award support for researchers; once you've obtained your funding, many Memorial units, including your home department, assist you with using and administering your funds. The HSS Grants Facilitation Officers (GFOs), however, provide guidance and support for revisions to research agreements or funded grants. Regardless, if you're unsure who is best positioned to assist you at any point of the grant or agreement life-cycle, a GFO can point you in the right direction.

Accessing your Funds

Notification of award

If you receive notice that you have been awarded a grant, the first thing to do is celebrate! Congratulations!

Next, contact your Department Head and admin staff, and then the GFO who handled your application. The GFO will update HSS's records and also contact Research Initiatives and Services (RIS) so that they unit can change the status of the ROMEO Researcher Portal (RP) file associated with your award to "Active".

You may need to submit an "Agreement Event" against your RP file in order to forward the official Notice of Award and any associated documents to RIS. Submitting these documents allows RIS to begin the process of account opening. 

Lastly, add your project to HSS's Research Showcase!

Setting up a Research Account or Fund

Once you've been awarded a grant, agreement, award, etc., account opening can only occur after RIS have received details of the award. Details of how to inform RIS of your award can be found in the How Do I...? section.

Spending your Funds

If you have any questions about processing expenses or hiring research assistants or other personnel, seek support from your departmental admin.

If you require assistance assessing eligibility of specific expenses, you can work with your departmental admin and/or Financial and Administrative Services.

Monitoring Finances

Ask your department admin if you'd like to see deposits, withdrawals, and totals for your account. You can also ask your department to submit a request on your behalf for access to FAST so you can view financial reports for your Banner accounts. In order to access FAST, you'll also need a Banner user account.

Making changes and updates

It's possible to amend and update your research funding proposal after it's been awarded, or an agreement has been signed. We've outlined common scenarios and processes in the How do I...? section and in our FAQs. If you need something more precise, please get in touch with a GFO.

If you need to seek approval to use funding in a manner that wasn't part of the original funding proposal budget, HSS GFOs can assist. Note, for Tri-Agency funding, you no longer need to submit a Grant Amendment Form request for changes to expenses and categories from the original proposal; consult the FAQs for more information.