Academic reports

Progress Reports and Milestone reporting enable the funding body to assess whether satisfactory progress is being achieved and are often required by the funding body prior to Milestone payments being made. These reports are important elements in ensuring accountability and good management of public or private funding for research.

The quality and timeliness of these reports is one of the key elements that can influence future funding. Reports must be consistent with the original application and/or variations previously approved by funding body, and milestone dates and status should be regularly updated in the project's ARIES grant record.

Please do not hesitate to contact Research Funding and Development team or the relevant College Research Office if you have any questions.

Financial reports

The ARC and NHMRC require annual financial reporting as a condition of funding. This is done in the End of Year financial report, generated jointly by the College Research Office, the College Finance Office and Research Accounting.

The deadline for submission of ARC's financial report (known as the End of Year report) is 31 March following each year of calendar funding. The report also contains a Progress Reporting element for those projects that experiences exceptional issues during the reported funding year (Progress Report by Exception). The ARC does not require a separate out-of-cycle Final financial report - the End of Year report will capture any projects that completed during the previous calendar year.

The NHMRC deadline for the Annual Financial Statement must be submitted to NHMRC by 30 April following each calendar year of funding. A final year Financial Statement must be submitted to NHMRC no later than six months after the funding period has been completed, or six months after termination of a grant or one month after the transfer of a grant. Failure to provide the report(s) within agreed timeframes will result in consideration being given to suspending payments to all active grants held by the Administering Institution until the report(s) have been submitted.

Final reports

Final Reports enable the funding body to assess whether the objectives of the project have been achieved and also to gather information that may be useful in internal and/or external performance measurement activities. Reports should be prepared by researchers according to the contractual obligations with the funding body.

Both the ARC and the NHMRC have proformas for final reports available on their electronic grants management systems (RMS for the ARC, Sapphire for the NHMRC). Reports must be consistent with the original applications, progress reports and/or approved Variations of Funding Agreement.

The College Research Office should review and if appropriate, approve the submission of the Final Report by submitting it to the ARC or the NHMRC through the processes outlined above. If the College Research Office requires support, please contact the Research Funding and Development team. Please note that the submitted version of the report must be uploaded to ARIES to satisfy auditing requirements.

ARIES information

Final Report and progress report due dates are entered as Milestones in ARIES as part of the grant acceptance process. Upon completion of each report, a copy of the report is uploaded to ARIES under the 'Documents' tab and a 'yes' is added to the appropriate milestone event on the 'Milestones' tab.

• Final Report dates (and other milestones) must be entered and updated in ARIES as part of ongoing project management, reflecting any changes in the project end date. For example, a carry forward of funds will extend the end date of the Project, and therefore extend the due date of the Final Report, as will any periods of suspension or maternity leave, or the late hiring of fellows.
• ARIES can be used to run periodic milestone reports indicating which milestones, including Final Reports, are due, and to send out reminder emails to researchers for approaching milestones.

Please visit our ARIES page for information on access and training sessions.