SF-425 Federal Financial Report Template
Four documents and three sheets, built so every dollar on the form traces to a voucher and the seven computed lines foot.
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River's SF-425 pack is four documents and three sheets for the Federal Financial Report, built around the fact that only four of the form's fifteen figures exist in a general ledger. Cash received, cash disbursed, funds authorised and the required match can be read off. The other eleven are derived, seven are computed from other lines, and one box quietly changes what four of them mean. Federal Share Calculation builds the expenditure line in five named layers, and the reporting calendar says when it is due.
The two figures nobody computes are the ones that cost money. Line 10f, the federal share of unliquidated obligations, is not a balance in any accounting system, so it gets left at zero or filled with everything anyone has planned to buy. And line 10c is not a bank balance. It is federal receipts less federal disbursements, and the instruction behind that line sets its expectation in business days while the box asks for dollars, so nobody ever divides.
Ashford Bridge Housing Coalition holds one award of $1,450,000 authorised and reports on an accrual basis. Its obligation register comes to $147,500: two subawards partly unspent and one signed purchase order. Left at zero, the form would report $318,912 of unobligated balance instead of $171,412, overstating unspent money by 10.2 percent of the award on the one form an agency reads before taking funding back. Which reports are owed at all comes from the award terms.
What is in the pack
Federal Share Calculation
The expenditure line built in five named layers, each one still visible, so the total can be decomposed rather than just asserted.
Supporting Voucher Index
Every dollar of the expenditure line tied to a source document, footing to the line exactly, with the classes that carry a schedule instead of an invoice named.
Unliquidated Obligation Register
The one figure no accounting system holds, built from commitment documents, with each exclusion as its own row and the rule that excluded it.
Cash on Hand Justification
The balance converted into business days, the remark if it is over three, and the list of reasons that do not survive being checked.
How the SF-425 Cross-Foots
Which lines are inputs and which are derived, what the basis election changes, and what each way of getting line 10f wrong costs in dollars.
Report Preparation Procedure
The order that avoids rework, starting with the subrecipient reports because they gate the expenditure line and have the longest lead time.
Supporting Schedule Notes
Seven notes that answer a reviewer's questions before they are asked, including the indirect base a reviewer will try to reverse out of the amount charged.
How it works
- 1
Send the ledger and the award
Ledger detail rather than a category summary, the executed agreement, the indirect cost rate agreement, and the record of cash draws. Subrecipient reports too, if they have arrived.
- 2
Build the share in layers
Direct disbursements, the accrual bridge, indirect, subrecipients, deductions. Never from the cumulative draw, because the draw is a request and the expenditure line is a measurement.
- 3
Index the vouchers, then the obligations
The index foots to the expenditure line or the difference gets named. The obligation register is built separately, from the commitment documents, and tested against the approved budget.
- 4
Run the identities and write the notes
Seven computed lines checked, cash on hand converted into days, then the notes that travel with the form. Portal tagging rules apply the same way as at submission.
Frequently asked questions
Is this free, and what format are the files?
Yes. The download is four Word documents and three CSV spreadsheets, which open in Word, Pages, Excel, Numbers and Google Sheets with no conversion. Edit with AI opens the same pack as a working space instead, where the sheets recompute and the figures come from your own ledger.
Does this file the report for me?
No. The report goes through whichever system the agency designates, and the authorised certifying official signs it under a false statements warning. This pack produces the figures, the vouchers behind them and the notes that travel with the form, so the person signing can read the numbers back to source documents.
How do I know whether to report on a cash or accrual basis?
The award or your own accounting policy decides, and one basis applies to the whole award. What matters more is that expenditures mean different things on each. An unpaid invoice is an unliquidated obligation on a cash basis and an expenditure on an accrual one, and it belongs on exactly one line.
What actually goes in the unliquidated obligation line?
Commitments the organisation has made and not yet liquidated. Executed subawards net of what the subrecipient has spent, signed purchase orders, work ordered under a contract. Not a budget line, not a quote, not an unsigned contract, and never anything already counted as an expenditure. In the example nine candidates produce three rows.
Why does cash on hand matter if the number is small?
Because the expectation is stated in days rather than dollars. Advance payments have to be timed to actual, immediate cash requirements, and $35,372 is twelve business days at Ashford Bridge's rate. A reason usually exists. It just has to be written down before somebody at the agency does the division.
When is the report due?
Quarterly and semiannual reports are due no later than 30 calendar days after the reporting period, annual reports 90 days, and a recipient's final report 120 days after the period of performance ends. A subrecipient files its final report at 90. What happens once that report is filed is a separate closeout checklist. Those are outer bounds, so awards often set something tighter.
Does this prepare the single audit?
No, and the schedule of expenditures of federal awards is a different artifact with a different unit of account. This pack reports one award for one period. Tracking federal expenditure across every fund and programme so that schedule assembles is separate work, and so is what each agreement obliges you to file.
Find out what your obligation line is actually worth
Send the ledger detail, the award and your rate agreement. The first thing back is the expenditure line in layers and the unobligated balance both ways.
Edit with AI