Of the funds requested by the network as a whole, a minimum of 60% must be devoted to young researchers, and a maximum of 20% to overhead; the remainder is devoted to networking costs.

Rules concerning young researcher costs:

          (1) These costs concern salaries, relocation costs, and visits to the home community.

          (2) Salaries must correspond to local practices.

          (3) Each young researcher has a right to visit his/her home mathematical community every nine months, with travel financed by the network.

Rules concerning networking costs:

          (1) These costs concern travel and subsistence of network participants between teams and to conferences

          (2) Apart from conferences, network funds cover travel between teams only if they are located in different network countries

          (3) Network funds will not cover travel between members of the same team, even if they are geographically located in different network countries

          (4) Secondment, i.e. hiring a postdoc at team A and sending him/her to work in the geographic location of team B (paid by A) is allowed for periods up to three months

          (5) Network funds cover travel and participation of participants to network conferences, or to any other conference related to network themes, which is located in a country of the European Union which is not the country of the participant's team.

          (6) Network funds may also cover travel and participation of a member in a network conference, or any other conference related to network themes, in the same country as the member's team, if one of the following two conditions is fulfilled: either the conference is attended by every team in the network, or the participant is a Young Researcher associated to the team.

          (7) Network funds may be used to invite external "experts" to network conferences.

          (8) A network participant may use funds to cover travel to a conference related to the network's themes which is located outside of the European Union, but prior approval by the Commission is needed (see below). They will approve such travel for at most three members of the entire network.                                                        Teams must therefore collaborate to decide who will be covered. These members must take an active part in the conference (present lectures).

          (9) Network funds may be used for some travel outside the EU and associated states (visiting to represent the project, etc.), on condition of prior approval by the Commission (see below).

          In order to apply for the approval of the Commission in (8) or (9), you need to

          (i) Acquire a form to fill out from Leila Schneps (leila@math.jussieu.fr)

          (ii) Send this form to Agn\`es Robin, either by e-mail (Agnes.Robin@cec.eu.int) or by post (Agn\`es Robin, European

                Commission, DG Research - F1, SDME 3/9, Rue de la Loi 200, B-1049 Brussels, Belgium.

Rules concerning indirect (overhead) costs:

          (1) These costs concern office supplies, postal charges, telecommunication costs, and administrative personnel

          (2) Attention: in some universities, a signification percentage of the funds is taken by the financial services of the university administration. This counts as indirect costs.

Reporting

The network must provide annual activity reports and cost statements. These will be prepared by the network coordinator with input from each team.

The mid-term review report should be more detailed than the annual report.

The final report should be a consolidated report with statistical information.

Reception of funding

Funds are distributed by the European commission at the following rate:

Advance payment: within 60 days of the receipt of the membership agreement (between 30% and 40% of the total)

Periodic payment: within 60 days from the date of approval of the periodic report and costs statement

Final payment: within 60 days from the date of approval of the final report and costs statement

Very Important Remarks:

(1) Periodic payments are at most equal to expenditure of previous year. In fact, subject to EC approval of the report, the periodic payment consists in reimbursement of entire expenditure of young researcher and networking costs, plus 20% of the combined total (for overhead). If overhead payments during the previous year were higher than 20% of YRC + NC, they will not be covered by the following periodic payment, though if the financial project is adhered to, they will eventually be covered.

(2) The combined periodic payments do not exceed 85% of the total funding. Thus, the remaining 15% or more will (subject to approval of the report by the EC) be paid after the closing date of the network.

(3) It is an immediate and extremely important consequence of the above that some network costs must be paid before the EC funding is received. Thus, these costs must be advanced by the universities. It is indispensable for each team to discuss this fact with the university's office of financial services.