CFO 4 Your Biz works with various non-profits and we have experience in grant invoicing. There are many steps involved in obtaining a grant and collaboration is needed from many people to complete. Invoicing and billing for grant work is just a small portion of the whole process.
When you apply for a grant you will need a DUNS number for your organization and if you apply for Federal funds you will need to create a SAM.gov account as well. These are a few of the items you will need when you apply for grants and each grant will have a different set of requirements.
Once you have been awarded the grant you may need to sign a contract, which lays out the terms, amounts, and time period which the work will be completed. For other grants you may just receive a letter stating you have been awarded the grant and have minimal information you need to submit to receive the money.
For larger grants and grants that deal with Federal funds, hiring a grants manager or an accounting person with grant knowledge would be extremely helpful. The next step is to track the grant progress and bill for completed projects, which could be invoiced monthly, quarterly or as frequently as the contract states. Making sure you hit deadlines and submit items in a timely manner are where the grants manager & accounting personnel come in handy. You would be surprised how much time it takes to gather all of the documentation needed to submit with the invoice and making sure it is complete and accurate.
Once the invoice has been submitted the grantor may have questions or process the invoice as is and then you wait for the money to be received. This process starts over again with submitting another invoice until all the work has been completed or the term of the contract has ended. Once the grant is over there may be closing reports that have to be submitted and you will want to make sure that you have received all of the money you submitted for the grant. Then you start the grant process over again in searching for a new one.
Please note there are many other steps involved and each grant is different from one another, but a single person would not be able to handle such a project on their own. This is why CFO 4 Your Biz is an excellent provider of helping you invoice for such work, as we have experience and knowledge in handling such activities.