RF
Effort Certification and E-Cert
Directions for Accessing E-Cert
Principal Investigators
- Log onto the PI Portal using your OSU Internet user name and password
- Select the “Profile” tab, then E-Cert.
- Confirm that you have read the information about the effort certification process and your responsibilities as a certifier by clicking the Accept button at the bottom of the user Agreement (this is a one-time step).
- Review the effort reports on your list. You will see reports for yourself and any employees whose effort you certify. For each correct report, click the check box to the right, then hit the Submit button at the bottom of the page. The certified reports are removed from your list. If the sponsored project effort on any report is not correct, do not click the check box but contact your department Human Resources Professional to initiate the necessary corrections. Additional information on how to reallocate non-sponsored effort across instruction/ administration/sabbatical, etc., is included at the Help button.
- For additional information on project appointments by month, click the E-Scan button on the Profile tab. This tool will assist you in monitoring project appointments each month.
Individuals who do not have a PI Portal Profile (generally research staff)
but are required to certify their own effort can access E-Cert at https://rf.osu.edu/secure/e-cert.
- Log on using your OSU Internet user name and password.
- Review the Agreement, which provides some information about the effort certification process and your responsibilities as a certifier, and click Accept (this is a one-time step)
- Review and certify your reports as described above.
While the E-Cert system, which was pilot tested by several departments, is straightforward and easy to use, additional information and assistance is available:
- Check the Training & Events section of the web site for a list of information sessions.
- Talk with your department HRP, who, until recently, was responsible for effort certification, and may be an excellent source of information about the process
- Send specific questions to the Research Foundation’s Helpdesk at rfhelpdesk@osu.edu.
Frequently Asked Questions
Whose effort needs to be certified?
- Effort has to be certified for all individuals who, during the subject quarter, receive some portion of their compensation from, or who contribute effort to, a sponsored project.
What effort needs to be certified?
- A key concept is that hours are not certified, effort is.
- 100% effort encompasses the total amount of time spent by a faculty or staff member to perform all of the activities required by his or her job with the University.
- Effort is not based on a 40-hour week.
- Individuals are required to certify 100% of their compensated effort.
- Faculty members must account not only for their sponsored research and training effort (whether sponsor paid or cost shared), but also their instruction effort (including non-sponsored personal research, scholarship, and artistic endeavors as well as classroom teaching) and their service to the University on committees, etc.
- Faculty members with patient care responsibilities must account for the clinical effort that is part of their University appointment.
- Typically, graduate assistants have only 50% appointments. However, that 50% appointment constitutes their entire “job” with the University and therefore represents 100% of their compensated effort. Hence, their effort reports will show 100%.
What is the overall effort certification process?
- In the proposal a specific level of effort is offered, an award is made with the expectation that the offered level of effort will be delivered, and a project is set up in the University accounting system. The PI initiates personnel appointments on the project, and payroll costs are distributed based on these appointments. Effort reports are generated from payroll information, and investigators are asked to certify that the effort reports reasonably represent how effort was actually expended.
How can I certify something as nebulous as “effort”?
- While the effort certification process suggests a high degree of precision, there is an acknowledgement that this is impossible and that the process is based on estimates. The federal regulation states:
“It is recognized that, in an academic setting, teaching, research, service, and administration are often inextricably intermingled. A precise assessment of factors that contribute to costs is not always feasible, nor is it expected. Reliance, therefore, is placed on estimates in which a degree of tolerance is appropriate.”
