Administrative, legal and strategic project organisation

You have been awarded an EU grant ? Congratulations ! But that is just the beginning. Now you need to start thinking about how you will efficiently set up your project to ensure its administration is in accordance with the grant requirements, allows an efficient and effective financial reporting that can be submitted on time to the EU.

All grant beneficiaries use already an accounting system. It is important that you set up the project administration properly before the start and ensure that the project expenditure is identifiable at all times and properly supported with the evidence that the eligibility criteria require. You also will want to compile the interim and final financial report in the format that the EC requires in an efficient manner : this requires a very specific set up and link to your daily accounting system. This will save you an enormous amount of time and frustration.

In most EU funded projects, the EU grant is awarded to one beneficiary that is the lead coordinator of the project while other entities are involved as co-beneficiaries, partners or participants. In a few cases, these entities will have the same and direct responsibility towards the EU as contracting authority. In many cases however the lead coordinator/beneficiary is responsible for the total project expenditure towards the EU, also in case of an audit. Cooperation with partners having a different culture, located in another country, etc is never easy. That will require to formalize the relations between all project partners in a partnership agreement in order to ensure that the lead coordinator limits its financial risks and ensures that all contractual conditions are drilled down to and enforceable from its partners.

In some EU programmes of a longer term it may be needed to consider also the structure of the project as a whole and evaluate the legal links between all parties involved to ensure an efficient project implementation.

We can advise you on the legal, contractual and strategic management of your project. We know from experience which deficiencies a poor administration shows, we can help you in setting up a proper project administration.