Nonprofit Cost Allocation Plan Template
Three documents and three sheets that allocate shared costs by a real basis, then reconcile every personnel split against its own activity record.
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Most cost allocation plans stop at two moves: pick a shared cost pool, occupancy or technology, and pick a base that tracks how it gets consumed, square footage or headcount. That is enough for costs that barely move year to year. Personnel costs that split across programmes work differently, because 2 CFR 200.430(g)(1)(vii) treats a budgeted effort percentage as an interim placeholder, not a finished charge, until it is checked against the employee's own activity records. Award terms decide which cost principles apply to a given award.
The regulation names three conditions, not one. The estimating system has to produce a reasonable approximation of actual activity. A significant change in an employee's work has to be entered into the records as soon as it is identified. The organization's internal controls also have to include a periodic after-the-fact review that adjusts every charge to what actually happened. Skipping that third condition is the one that shows up as an audit finding, a federal reviewer's step for turning an estimate into a record.
Meridian Family Services runs two federally funded programmes and splits a programme director's salary 40% Programme A, 35% Programme B, 25% administration in the budget. A six-month review of the director's own activity records shows the actual split was 52% Programme A, a 12-point swing that alone moves $9,840 a year onto that award. Reconciling every multi-programme employee the same way changes the organization's computed indirect rate from 48.82%, built on the original budget figures, to 45.48% once every actual split replaces its estimate.
What is in the pack
Cost Allocation Plan
Which shared costs get pooled, the base each pool uses, and the review cycle that keeps both current.
Methodology Justification
Why each base was chosen over the alternative, with the full personnel reconciliation shown line by line.
Time and Effort Procedure
What counts as an activity record, and the six-month cycle that checks every multi-programme employee against it.
Allocation Basis by Cost Pool
Every shared cost pool's total, its base, and the resulting split across both programmes and administration.
Personnel Allocation
The budgeted and after-the-fact percentage for every multi-programme employee, side by side, with the dollar variance.
Rate Calculation
The indirect rate computed twice, from budget and from actual figures, next to the de minimis alternative.
How it works
- 1
Send the ledger and award terms
The general ledger, every federal award's terms, and whatever activity records exist for staff who split time across more than one programme.
- 2
Build the pools and bases
Occupancy by square footage, shared technology by headcount, and any other shared cost grouped with the base that actually tracks its use.
- 3
Reconcile every personnel split
Budgeted effort checked against the employee's own activity records at least every six months, with the dollar variance stated for every category.
- 4
Calculate the rate from actual figures
The indirect rate built from the reconciled numbers, shown next to what the unreconciled budget would have produced and what the de minimis rate would recover.
Frequently asked questions
Is a budgeted effort percentage ever acceptable on its own?
Only for interim accounting, and only while three conditions hold. The estimating method has to track real activity. A significant change has to get caught and entered right away, someone has to periodically compare the interim charges against the record, and every necessary adjustment has to get made. Drop the last condition and the estimate never becomes anything else.
What counts as an acceptable activity record?
Something the employee produces that reflects what they actually did in the period covered, not a re-statement of the original budget on a later date. A signed periodic activity report or a timesheet that allocates hours by programme both qualify. Retyping the same percentage every six months and calling it a review does not.
Is this the same as the 990's functional expense allocation?
No, and the two operate at different scales. The 990 sorts every expense across the whole organization into three broad categories: program, management and general, and fundraising. This plan allocates specific shared costs, occupancy, technology, personnel, across specific programmes and awards, at a finer grain than the 990 ever asks for.
Will an auditor actually check this?
Yes, if a federal award in scope carries allocated or indirect costs. Single audit fieldwork tests whether charges are supportable, and an unreconciled personnel split, one still resting on the original budget estimate months after the period ended, is one of the more common findings in that area.
What if we have no federally negotiated indirect cost rate?
Then a de minimis rate of up to 15 percent of modified total direct costs is available without negotiating one, requires no justification, and can be used indefinitely once elected. Whether that recovers more or less than a computed rate depends entirely on the size of the actual indirect pool, so the Rate Calculation sheet shows both side by side.
Does this decide whether a specific cost is allowable?
No. That determination sits with the award's own terms and, ultimately, the funding agency. Tracking every award's own restrictions and prior-approval requirements is separate work this plan assumes is already done. What this plan decides is how a cost that benefits more than one programme gets split between them, and on what evidence.
Find out what your indirect rate actually is
Send the general ledger, the award terms, and whatever activity records exist for multi-programme staff. The first thing back is the rate computed from both.
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