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Indirect costs are those costs incurred for the joint benefit of those activities and other activities and programs of the organization. Accounting, payroll, budgeting and purchasing are examples of services which typically benefit several activities and programs, and for which costs may be attributed by means of an indirect cost allocation plan.
"Restricted Indirect Cost Rates" are used with grant programs that restrict expenditures to those that supplement but do not supplant state or local effort. ESEA and IDEA federal programs use the restricted rate.
"Non-Restricted (or Unrestricted) Indirect Cost Rates" apply to federal programs that allow federal funds to supplement and/or supplant local funds. The Child Nutrition Program (school lunch) uses the Non-Restricted rate.
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Certification of 2021/22 Indirect Cost Rates
The US Department of Education Indirect Cost Division provided guidance to NDE when Indirect Cost Rates (ICR) for ESUs calculated for the 2021/22 school year resulted in unreasonably high Restricted and Unrestricted ICRs for 12 of the 17 ESUs. Based on our conversations with USDE, the implementation of the new code structure and new code descriptions for the 2019/20 for ESUs likely contributed to uncertainty in coding.
In order to certify reasonable Restricted ICRs for 2021/22, the USDE Indirect Cost Division provided the following Federal Restricted Rate Citations for the certification of Restricted Indirect Cost Rates:
§76.563 Restricted indirect cost rate—programs covered.
Sections 76.564 through 76.569 apply to agencies of State and local governments that are grantees under programs with a statutory requirement prohibiting the use of Federal funds to supplant non-Federal funds, and to their subgrantees under these programs.
§76.564 Restricted indirect cost rate—formula.
(a) An indirect cost rate for a grant covered by §76.563 or 34 CFR 75.563 is determined by the following formula:
Restricted indirect cost rate = (General management costs + Fixed costs) ÷ (Other expenditures)
(b) General management costs, fixed costs, and other expenditures must be determined under §§76.565 through 76.567.
(c) Under the programs covered by §76.563, a subgrantee of an agency of a State or a local government (as those terms are defined in 2 CFR 200.90 and 200.64, respectively), or a grantee subject to 34 CFR 75.563 that is not a State or local government agency may use—
(1) An indirect cost rate computed under paragraph (a) of this section; or
(2) An indirect cost rate of eight percent unless the Secretary determines that the subgrantee or grantee would have a lower rate under paragraph (a) of this section.
(d) Indirect costs that are unrecovered as a result of these restrictions may not be charged directly, used to satisfy matching or cost-sharing requirements, or charged to another Federal award.
In accordance with the Federal Regulation 76.564, NDE has capped ESU Restricted ICRs at 8% for those ESUs with a rate that exceeded 8%.
NDE is also following recommendations from USDE Indirect Cost Division for the Unrestricted ICRs for ESUs and Districts. These rates were also determined to be excessive and have been capped at the prior year’s average.
- ESU Unrestricted ICRs are capped at 13.41%
- District Unrestricted ICRs are capped at 15.27%
A common question about coding related to Indirect Cost revolves around how to determine whether a cost should be coded as a subaward/subcontract (Object codes 395 and 396) or would be more appropriate coded as a professional service (Object code 320).
A descriptive chart provided by the USDE Indirect Cost Group details the difference
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