Disbursement of funding

You can see whether your project funding will be disbursed automatically or not in the agreement document for your project (see section 6.4).

Our preferred method of payment is a scheme we call "grant payment on invoice". We will only use other payment methods on new projects in exceptional cases.

On this page, you will find more information about:

• Grant payment on invoice
• Automatic payment

Grant payment on invoice

When you receive a grant from us, you can receive the funds as soon as you have documented that you have the actual costs of the project. You do this by sending us an invoice with specifications of the project's incurred costs and the proportion of these that will be covered by the grant.

You can submit invoices as often as you wish, a minimum of one invoice annually and for multi-year projects at least every tertiary. It is paid on the due date when all formalities have been checked and found in order.

The process for payment of grants by invoice

• When the Project Owner has accounted for costs in the project, you can submit an EHF invoice.
• Along with the invoice, you must attach a specification (see example ofspecification at the bottom of this page) of the project costs for the period.
• Consolidated invoices for multiple projects are not accepted.

Some projects are still on the Non-automatic payment method of payment. It can be e.g. one-year projects and event support. These invoices as agreed in the contract.

Invoices are paid out on the due date or as soon as the invoice is approved.

General information about the content of invoices and follow-up

• Invoices for grants must not have VAT.
• The Project Owner must state the bank account owned by the Project Owner on its grant invoices, as stated in our general terms and conditions for contracts.
• The Project Owner may not send reminders, interest notes, payment requests or debt collection notices for R&D funds.
• We normally disburse received requests for grants on the due date when all formalities have been checked and found to be in order.
• We will take random samples of the specification inserts at regular intervals.
• You can invoice all incurred costs during the period as long as the amount does not exceed the remaining grant for the project. If you send an invoice that exceeds the expected payment for the year, we will process it manually. This may leadto a somewhat longer payment time.

General invoice deadlines

There are no restrictions on how often you can submit an invoice for grants, but the Project Ownerfor projects with Payment of grants by invoice must invoice the Research Council for grants at least every tertiary, approximately in April, August and December.  

The deadline for submitting invoices is 20 January after the calendar year in which the costs were incurred. The invoice date for invoices sent in January for costs that are accounted for by the grant recipient in December is set to 31 December. These invoices must be created within the first 15 working days of January. Otherwise, it is the enterprise itself that bears responsibility for setting the correct date and due date on the invoice in line with the guidelines in the Bookkeeping Regulation or other applicable guidelines for the enterprise. 

User-driven projects that must submit project accounting reports. The deadline for submitting a project accounting report is 20 January after the calendar year in which the costs were incurred.

Also see specification requirements for invoices on the Norwegian page. 

Automatic payment

Still most projects receiving Research Council funding will have an agreement on automatic payment three times a year. 

Agreed progress reports and/or financial reports must be submitted and approved before funding can be disbursed. The payment plan is agreed in the contract with the Research Council. It is important that payments to the project are made in step with the costs recorded in the project accounts.

The final report must be submitted and approved by the Research Council before the last agreed payment can be made.

Automatic payment for the first tertiary 2025

Automatic payment for second tertiary 2025

 Automatic payment for third tertiary 2025

For automatic payment, the Research Council sends an overview of the planned payments by email to the Project Owner. The Project Owner sends feedback to the Research Council as stated in the email.