What other special rules govern the classification of costs as administrative costs or programmatic activity costs?
20 C.F.R. § 641.859
in effectEffective: 2024-07-01(a) Recipients and sub-recipients must comply with the special rules for classifying costs as administrative costs or programmatic activity costs set forth in paragraphs (b) through (e) of this section.
(b)(1) Costs of awards by recipients and program operators that are solely for the performance of their own administrative functions are classified as administrative costs.
(2) Costs incurred by recipients and program operators for administrative functions listed in § 641.856(b) are classified as administrative costs.
(3) Costs incurred by vendors and sub-recipients performing the administrative functions of recipients and program operators are classified as administrative costs. (See 29 CFR 99.210 for a discussion of factors differentiating sub-recipients from vendors.)
(4) Except as provided in paragraph (b)(3) of this section, all costs incurred by all vendors, and only those sub-recipients below program operators, are classified as programmatic activity costs. (See 29 CFR 99.210 for a discussion of factors differentiating sub-recipients from vendors.)
(c) Personnel and related non-personnel costs of staff who perform both administrative functions specified in § 641.856(b) and programmatic services or activities must be allocated as administrative or programmatic activity costs to the benefiting cost objectives/categories based on documented distributions of actual time worked or other equitable cost allocation methods.
(d) The allocable share of indirect or overhead costs charged to the SCSEP grant are to be allocated to the administrative and programmatic activity cost categories in the same proportion as the costs in the overhead or indirect cost pool are classified as programmatic activity or administrative costs.
(e) Costs of the following information systems including the purchase, systems development and operating (e.g., data entry) costs are charged to the programmatic activity cost category:
(1) Tracking or monitoring of participant and performance information;
(2) Employment statistics information, including job listing information, job skills information, and demand occupation information; and
(3) Local area performance information.
Source: eCFRURL: https://www.ecfr.gov/api/versioner/v1/full/2024-07-01/title-20.xmlFetched: 7/26/2026