Grant accounting
- Hours this one requirement costs you
- 3.666666666666667
- Letters you will write yourself
- 4
- Hours drafting
- 2.3333333333333335
Where these sheets touch federal rules they cite the Uniform Guidance at 2 CFR part 200 rather than paraphrasing it: 200.414 sets the de minimis indirect rate at up to 15% of modified total direct costs for a recipient with no negotiated rate, and 200.334 requires award records to be kept for three years from the date the final financial report is submitted. Every other number in the sheets is one you type in, because your partners, your sections and your hours are not ours to guess.
Grant accounting is where a nonprofit's finance team and its grant office stop speaking the same language. The office thinks in applications and awards; the ledger thinks in restricted and unrestricted funds, in cost centres and in what an auditor will ask for. This page is about the join: what the finance side actually needs from the grant side, which fields matter when an award spans two fiscal years, and what the Uniform Guidance expects to still exist three years after the final report.
Open the Letter of support example Free to use. No account, no card, no trial clock.
Record what was asked and what was granted
They are rarely the same number, and the difference is the first thing a programme manager asks about. Keeping both on the award, rather than overwriting the ask with the grant, is what lets you see your real hit rate and your real average award.
Split the award across the periods it covers
An award that lands in October and runs eighteen months touches two fiscal years and often two budgets. The grant record should carry the period of performance so the finance team can recognise it correctly rather than reconstructing it from the agreement.
Keep the paperwork where the auditor will look for it
The Uniform Guidance requires award records to be retained for three years from the date the final financial report is submitted. Filing the agreement, the budget, the reports and the correspondence against the award as you go is the difference between an audit and an archaeology project.
What a grants manager asks before using the Grant accounting
Does Nofovo replace our accounting system?
No. Your accounting system keeps the ledger and produces the statements; Nofovo keeps the grant side, the funder, the application, the award and its reports, and exports the figures so the two agree.
How long do we have to keep grant records?
For federal awards, three years from the date you submit the final financial report, under 2 CFR 200.334. Some awards and some states are longer; your award terms govern.
Where does this show up on the Form 990?
Grant income appears in the revenue statement and significant programmes in the narrative. That is your accountant's work, not this product's, but the award record is where the figures they will ask for live.
Ask Grant accounting about your own grant calendar
Tell us how many applications you run a year and how you track them now, and we will tell you plainly whether Nofovo fits.