A salary cap is the maximum annual UMB salary for full-time effort that can be charged to a sponsor’s award.
Applicability
- Applies to grants, cooperative agreements, and contracts funded by .
- The cap is set by federal law and applies to new awards, competing awards, and non-competing awards according to their project or budget start dates.
Current Salary Cap
- Executive Level II of the Federal Executive Pay scale.
- Effective Jan. 1, 2025: $225,700 annual direct salary.
Budgeting Considerations
- Detailed budgets: Use Institutional Base Salary (IBS) to calculate salary; the agency will adjust salaries subject to the current cap. Annual inflation increases should be applied normally.
- Modular budgets: Estimate costs using the current salary cap to ensure modules are reasonable and allowable.
Tracking Over-Cap Salaries
- Projects exceeding the cap require a companion project for tracking during award setup.
- Contact SPAC for assistance with over-cap salary tracking and setup.