The University of Florida cannot provide at no cost or low cost the facilities and services for which it requires full reimbursement from the Federal government. Some other organizations will pay no indirect costs to an institution. The University of Florida can accept funds from these organizations as long as their policy information stipulating such is provided to the Division of Sponsored Research at the time a proposal or application is submitted and the University agrees to cost sharing, usually mandatory in the case of Federal agencies, or voluntary in the case of private organizations. In this way the University is in compliance with its own policy to charge the full indirect cost rate to all sponsors. These must be specifically identifiable with the project, well documented, and are subject to audit in the same way as are all funded categories.
Most cost sharing is accomplished through the participation of personnel related to the project.
Several faculty have long standing research awards with sponsors that were negotiated initially with a lower indirect cost rate than the standard rate. Also, it will be expected that over a reasonable time period, these rates will be increased and brought in line with the prevailing indirect cost rates. This applies to all awards. The standard University of Florida indirect cost distribution percentages will hold for those awards accompanied by full indirect cost reimbursement.