Expenses

Members of the Stanford community are required to act with honesty and integrity and comply with applicable laws at all times when transacting University business. This guide memo clarifies that all forms of bribery and corruption are absolutely prohibited, provides guidance regarding what constitutes bribery and corruption, and requires reporting of actual or suspected incidents of bribery and corruption.

This Guide Memo serves as an introduction to Chapter 5. It covers general policies for the purchase of major and minor construction, equipment, supplies and services by Stanford. The policies in this chapter do not apply to the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (SLAC).

This Guide Memo describes the organization of the Procurement Department and its relationships with other administrative departments, both within and external to Stanford.

This Guide Memo contains policies on use of Purchasing Cards to purchase goods or services made directly by departments. Purchasing Cards are a tool for individuals making purchases on behalf of the University for which Stanford is financially liable. There are two types of Purchasing Cards: an individual Purchasing Card and a Department Purchasing Card. The individual Purchasing Card is issued to a specific person. The Department Purchasing Card is issued to a department and assigned to a custodian. The policies are the same for both types of Purchasing Cards, unless specifically noted.

This Guide Memo contains policies on Blanket Purchase Orders.

This Guide Memo provides an overview of the procurement process. University departments are encouraged to contact Procurement early in the acquisition process. Procurement buyers and Contracts Specialists can help develop technical specifications and provide product descriptions, estimates of cost or price and lists of suppliers.

This Guide Memo describes policies that apply to equipment and real estate leases. Capital and operating lease liabilities utilize the University's debt capacity. All uses of debt must comply with the University's debt policy and require prior approval. The only parties authorized to execute documents that commit Stanford to a lease obligation are: the Director of Procurement and the CFO for equipment leases; the Vice President for Land, Buildings & Real Estate; the Managing Director, Real Estate; and, the Provost for real estate leases. For relevant policies, see section 1 in Administrative Guide Memo 5.1.1: Procurement Policies. Approvals, requisition processes and reporting requirements are included.

This Guide Memo sets out policies and procedures for expense allocations and salary distribution offsets, which are a form of cost transfer.

The University's Oracle Financial system has two core accounting applications: Grants Accounting (GA) and General Ledger (GL). The GA subledger records all detailed expenditure transactions and then summarizes them in the GL. The GA module has five segments: Project (P), Task (T), Award (A), Expenditure types (E) and Organization. A Project (P) is an activity or event with a single purpose. A Task (T) is a further breakdown of the project; every project has at least one task. An Award (A) is a funding source for a particular project or task. Find further information on the University's Chart of Accounts at Stanford's Gateway to Financial Activities.  This Guide Memo describes the various kinds of expenditure accounts or PTAs (the intersection of Project, Task, and Award) within the University's accounting system.

This Guide Memo outlines policy on travel undertaken for University business. It should be used in conjunction with travel procedural information, resources, and forms, which outline the application of this policy and may be found in the Travel section of the Gateway to Financial Activities website (Fingate).