TRANSPARENCY REVIEW – FULL ECONOMIC COSTS
Notes and further information referred to in the questionnaire
Tips
Based on pilot runs with selected Academic Staff in different departments, we believe the
following tips will help to minimise your overall time spent on this task. Once familiar with
the scheme, you may find that you can use the web site form directly for updating the
information (normally once every three years).
The time allocation schedule (TAS) questionnaire requires you to think in an unfamiliar way
about how you spent your time on various activities and so, before attempting to insert
percentage times on the form, it is best to look firstly at the main groupings of activities
(sections A – D ), and secondly to scan through the examples of activities in the notes to be
clear about which activities should be counted in each section and sub-section.
Think particularly carefully about time spent on Support (S) activities for Teaching (T),
Research (R) and Other (O) – it is easy to confuse those activities which should be counted as
direct T, R or O and those which are supportive to T, R or O. This can often lead to an
underestimate of the percentages reported for S time. The examples given in the Notes will
guide you here and reflect the activity groupings required by the Full Economic Cost project.
Also, don’t underestimate time spent on "Own-funded research".
General
On the TAS form, percentages should be stated to the nearest whole number.
Staff in selected departments are asked to complete 4 “termly” retrospective TAS forms
covering 4 distinct periods during that year and then they will not normally be asked to respond
again until 3 years hence. Over a 3 year cycle all departments will have provided data, as
required under the Full Economic Cost guidance. The 4 TAS periods coincide approximately
with term dates, the exact start and end dates being notified to you on the appropriate TAS
form. The first TAS return will be requested in January covering retrospectively the previous
(first) “term” or period; the second TAS will be requested in April, the third in June and the
final one in October ( covering the Summer Term).
Time data in Sections A – D are requested in percentage. terms, not hours, so that
irrespective of the actual length of your typical working week, which we recognise may well be
longer than the conventional 37.5 hrs, we can correctly apportion the aggregate payroll costs
for each grade of staff to Teaching (T), Research (R), Other (O) and Support (S) activities, as
required under the Full Economic Cost guidelines.
When considering the division of the total time spent on all activities (100%) you should
exclude any time taken for holidays (statutory or other) and time on private work carried out in
personal time (e.g. consultancy done in evenings/weekends/holiday periods)
If your appointment is part time, give percentages in the schedule which add up to 100% of
your time on UCL work. We will adjust the cost allocations to allow for part time work at a
later stage.
If you were appointed during the year in question, again give percentages adding up to 100% of
the actual work period and we will adjust cost allocations later.
If you were on sabbatical for any part of the TAS period but remained on UCL payroll, there is
no need to separately identify this work – it is counted as part of your UCL work albeit of a
non-normal kind or carried out at another place. Please incorporate it into your allocation of
total time for the period, as between T, R, or O activities, according to the nature of the
sabbatical work.
When you return the completed TAS form electronically, the data you have entered in the
boxes arrives in a secure file in TAS Office as a stream of digits, which are later entered into a
database for sorting of aggregate data by grade of staff and department. If possible please use
the electronic method for return of data.
If you return the hard copy TAS form (confidentially) to TAS Office, the forms are checked for
errors/omissions before the percentages are extracted for manual entry into the database. This
database holds the cumulative data received from all staff each year a return is made and is
used to calculate average time percentages for each type of appointment (Professor, Senior
Lecturer, etc) in each department. These averages are needed for subsequent costing work
required by the Full Economic Cost project – data are not linked with individual names.
Note 1
PIN
This is no longer required as the website application has an identifier encoded in the link.
Note 2
PF and NPF
Time on Direct Teaching activities needs to be split between PF and NPF where:
PF = Publicly Funded courses – all award and credit-bearing courses, and taught postgraduate
courses. Include here EU educational programmes such as Erasmus, Tempus. Note that EU
income is regarded as public funding for the purposes of Full Economic Cost project.
NPF = Non-Publicly Funded courses – non credit-bearing courses; short courses/CPD activity
for which fees are charged, including teaching services delivered externally (e.g. teaching
programme on-site in a company); courses held overseas; and any other commercial” teaching”
for external organisations
Note 3
Direct Teaching Activities (whether PF or NPF) include the following:
For all undergraduate and taught Postgraduate courses:
 Preparing materials for lectures, seminars, workshops, tutorials and laboratory classes or
projects; organising fieldwork, or external placements for students
 Delivering lectures, seminars, workshops and tutorials
 Supervising laboratory classes, or student or class projects
 Other contact time with students on educational matters, including counselling, visiting
students on external placements, attendance at fieldwork activities.
 Providing formal courses to other departments or Universities, where these are part of
the department’s normal teaching programme
 Assessment work - setting and marking examination papers, assessing student theses,
essays and project work, external examining for other institutions.

Writing text books and similar publications intended primarily for teaching purposes (In
some disciplines research, done for its own sake, may lead to the writing of a teaching text,
in which case put the research time in section B).
Excluding time spent on supervision or training of research-based postgraduates.
You may not be involved in all of the above activities in a given year and so variations in the
percentages reported in different years may be expected. Also the relative proportions of time
spent on preparing teaching materials when first joining UCL or establishing the first year of a
new course will normally be higher than in subsequent years. This will be reflected in the total
percentage that you derive for A1) and in the ratio of totals A, B, C & D [where A+B+C+D =
100%]
Note 4
Support Activities (Indirect) for Teaching include the following:

Administrative work relevant to Teaching, such as timetabling, exam boards, preparing
course prospectuses, schools liaison, interviewing prospective students, faculty and
departmental committee work related to teaching. Include here any special nondepartmental assignments of a temporary nature, such as service on a UCL committee or
devotion to a Faculty task relevant to T. Where this work benefits R or O as well as T, try to
apportion the time between A3, B3 or C3 as you think is appropriate. Where such
assignments cannot be attributed to T, R, or O, it should be counted under section D –
General management/Committee work.

Academic exchanges involving block time in other institutions, for example
relating to development of teaching materials or skills, potential collaboration on
syllabus content or student exchanges.

Scholarly work (e.g. keeping up to date in your field or exploring new areas with some
potential benefit to teaching)

Advancement of personal knowledge and skills related to teaching, e.g. through training
courses, professional development courses
Note 5
Own-funded Research
We need to identify separately the percentage time spent on research, whether identified as a
specific project or not, where there is no external sponsor. In some departments this forms a
high proportion of the total time spent on research. The resources for this work essentially
derive from use of paid time and UCL/departmental equipment, consumables and other
resources. Where relatively small amounts of external support are involved (e.g. a few hundred
pounds) compared with the total costs of the research, count it as own-funded section B1.
Own-research includes any speculative research, for example to investigate novel ideas or to
assess their potential before preparing a grant or contract bid to a sponsor. It includes the time
you spent training and supervising Postgraduate students whose projects were NOT within
externally-funded programmes (see Note 5a below for the corollary).
By its nature some own-research work may simply abort and does not lead to publications or
external project bids. However, own-research is an important academic activity.
In a year when you are very active on funded projects there is generally less time available for
“Own research” out of the total time allocated to research, and vice versa when there is little or
no externally funded work. Figures entered in subsequent TAS forms may reflect these yearon-year variations, although the total percentage time reported for research (B) may not
necessarily change overall relative to teaching time section A.
Research time spent on collaborative work with another UCL department or another
university off-site should be built into the percentage. for either own-funded work or
externally sponsored work, as appropriate. It counts as direct research activity whose
costs are attributable to your department.
Note 5a Training/supervising postgraduate students
This includes solely the time spent supervising and training Postgraduate students whose
research falls within an externally funded programme (see Note 5 above for postgraduates
whose projects are NOT within externally-funded programmes).
In B3 indicate all other research time, including time you spent on management of funded
research projects, supervision and training of recruited Research staff (RA’s, RF’s,
Technicians), and production of research reports required under the terms of the grant or
contract. Also include time spent preparing papers for publication in Journals, conference
proceedings, etc. These are all classed as direct activities, not support activities.
Note 6
Research funded by external agencies
This is research where an external sponsor is associated with the work, whether
paying in part or in full for the costs of the project. Also included here are Clinical Trials
contracts for Phases I & II work (NHS definitions). This activity should be split into the
following five categories :
OST Research Councils
UK Charities
Other Government Departments (UK)
European Union (EU Government, EC)
Industry (including EU non Government, Overseas)
Although UCL has to further apportion the time costs for research by type of sponsor (Publicly
Funded/Non-publicly funded), this will be determined using other information – staff are not
asked to provide the breakdown on this schedule beyond the five categories above.
Note 7
Support Activities (Indirect) for Research
Activities in support of research, such as:


Drafting proposals for bids to external bodies; negotiating resulting contracts
Scholarly work and Advancement of personal knowledge and skills in relation to
research, e.g. keeping up with the literature, acquiring new technical skills, attendance at
professional conferences, block time in other institutions on research exchange schemes



Advisory work for Government departments or committees if unpaid and where it
enhances or potentially benefits your research work [Note: paid Advisory work should be
included in section C)]
Exceptional time spent in a given year on procurement of special research equipment, such
as liaison with suppliers over specifications for custom made items, installation and
commissioning of the equipment.
Administrative work including departmental or UCL committee work, Faculty tasks, etc.,
where relevant to Research. (Note General management or committee work not specifically
supporting T, R, or O should be counted under section D of the form).
Note 8
Other Activities
Include here any activities which are neither T nor R but which are carried out in UCL time and
have an identifiable income stream. For example:

Consultancy includes both Private contracts if done in UCL time and institute contracts
administered by CRO or the department;
 Technology Transfer work, if remunerated, such as Directorships of start-up companies,
and/or consultancy contracts for the companies. (If such work is not remunerated, the time
spent should be included in support activities)
 Other services rendered including:
 Work undertaken in UCL time and paid for by non-academic departments or units (such as
residences, or catering)
 Advisory work for government departments or committees, if remunerated. This includes
time on services to Research Council committees. Time on unpaid work of this type should
be allocated to Support for T, R or O, or a combination of these where appropriate.
 Commissioned professional work (e.g. editing a Journal for remuneration).
and for Medical/Dentistry departments only:
 Phase III Clinical Trials (Note: To reflect NHS conventions, only Phase III counts as Other
services rendered C1. Phases I & II Clinical Trials are to be counted under section B
Research.
Exclude from section C time spent on private consultancy (or any other private work) which is
done in private time
Note 9
Clinical Services (Medical and Dental departments only)
If you are involved in providing these services to the NHS, normally under “knock-for-knock”
arrangements based on the number of hours provided, please estimate the time commitment as
a percentage. of your total time on the activities covered by this TAS form.
Please do not include time spent “on call” when estimating the figure for this category.
Note 10 Support Activities for Other includes time spent on:


Drafting bids and negotiating contracts for O activities.
Unpaid Technology Transfer work (e.g. supporting patent applications, licence
negotiations, formation of start-up company)

Any activity listed in Note 8 which is non-remunerated at the time it is undertaken and
which cannot be attributed to either Support for Teaching or Support for Research.
Note 11 General Management and Committee work
This section covers time spent on Support activities which cannot be attributed to Support for
T, R or O activities, such as internal management duties (e.g. Safety Officer; training on new
financial system; work on departmental strategic review) or committee work (e.g. RCM;
Finance; Planning & Resources). Include here Advisory work for Government which is not
attributable to T, R or O activities and public engagement Activities.
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