How to review and certify Effort

1. Log in to the Effort Reporting System (ERS) using a valid UC Davis login ID and Kerberos passphrase. For Principal Investigators, the default login page contains a list of reports needing certification.
2. Click on the Employee Name of the first report. For each report, follow steps 3-8.
3. Are all federal and federal flow-through (FFT) projects for which the employee had committed effort shown on the report?
   • Yes: continue
   • No: click the Add Additional Sponsored Project button then enter an account number to find and add the missing project.
4. For each federal and FFT project, does the payroll charged (column A) fairly represent (within +/-5%) the percentage of time spent working on the project (where salary was charged to the sponsor) during this period? If you wish to review the individual pay transactions charged to each account, click the 'View Payroll Details' button.
   • Yes: make sure the effort (column B) matches the payroll charged (column A) and that column B totals 100%
   • No: adjust the effort (column B) to the percentage that should be charged and adjust other projects as needed to bring the column B total to 100%, then enter a comment to explain why changes are needed and click the Save button. ALSO notify your payroll processor to make payroll cost transfers; if effort is changed, cost transfers are required.
5. For each federal and FFT project, does the cost share recorded (column C) fairly represent the percentage of time spent working on the project (where salary was not charged to the sponsor) during this period?
   • Yes: continue
   • No: adjust the effort (column D) to the percentage that should be cost shared and notify your cost share administrator to correct the cost share system. Also adjust the offset on the non-sponsored activities line so that column D totals 0%, then click the Save button.
6. Make sure column B totals 100% and column D totals 0%.
7. Make sure there are no negative values in column F.
8. Click Certify Effort Report, then in the certification statement window, click Confirm. The system will automatically advance to the next report requiring certification.
   • If the Certify Effort Report button is gray, click on the Edit Report tab just below the name block at the top of the report.

Special Cases

• If the employee worked for two or more PIs and the employee does not have sufficient knowledge to self-certify, check the report option ‘Report requires multiple certifications’ which allows each PI to certify only his/her own project line(s). Click the Save button to add checkboxes on each federal/FFT project line.
• If there is cost-sharing between two sponsored projects (the project providing the support must be non-federal), check the report option ‘Report allows for Cost Sharing Offset Against Other Sponsored Projects’ which creates a new row under Other Sponsored Projects that can be used to offset the federal cost sharing.