Annual accountability

These requirements are supplemented with any reporting requirements for the applicable financial year.

Note that state and local government agencies, universities and other bodies established under NSW legislation aren’t required to report corporate-level accountability.

On this page

• General requirements
• Due date for submissions
• How we deal with late submissions
• Reporting corporate-level accountability
• Addressing focus areas
• Reporting contract-level accountability
• Reporting indirect contract administration costs
• Reporting government grants and subsidies
• Support and assistance

General requirements

Under your contract with DCJ, you’re accountable for the funding you receive and the services you deliver to individuals, families and communities of NSW on our behalf.

For you, as a contracted service provider, annual accountability is a mandatory process of submitting information to us so that we can verify you have:

• used funds as agreed in your contract with us, and can account for that usage
• complied with key elements of the contract
• achieved the performance requirements agreed in the contract.

We also use the process to ensure you have relevant practices in place for stable and uninterrupted delivery of services.

There are separate requirements for reporting annual accountability at the corporate and contract levels.

Corporate-level accountability requires you to report financial health for the whole of your organisation, declare compliance with your ongoing responsibilities and contractual obligations, and address requirements for any annual accountability focus areas required for the financial year.

Contract-level accountability requires you to report income and expenditure against the funding your organisation received from DCJ, declare unspent funds, and certify you met the financial responsibilities and contractual obligations for the reported financial year.

At the end of each financial year, we notify you of any additional requirements for reporting annual accountability for that financial year.

Due date for submissions

You must submit your annual corporate- and contract-level accountability documents for a financial year via the Contracting Portal on or before 31 October following the end of that financial year.

If your financial year-end date isn’t 30 June, submit your corporate-level accountability within four months of your financial year-end.

However, all contract-level accountability must align to the DCJ financial year-end date of 30 June.

The following table provides an example of the accountability due dates based on different financial year-end dates.

Any exceptions to the due date are included in the reporting requirements for the applicable financial year.

How we deal with late submissions

It’s important that we receive your financial reports by the due date, as agreed in the contract with us.

If your annual accountability submission hasn’t been lodged by 31 October, we may issue a notice of breach to your organisation. In addition, the contract gives us the option to suspend and/or reduce your funding payments until we receive your submission. Your organisation may also be placed on a formal improvement plan, including conditions that may affect your future engagement with us.

Reporting corporate-level accountability

You’re required to report corporate-level accountability using the form allocated in the Contracting Portal to submit details about your organisation and its finances.

Only one corporate-level accountability submission is required, regardless of the number of separate contracts you held during the applicable financial year.

As part of your reporting, you’re required to submit signed financial statements for your organisation. The financial statements don’t require endorsement at your annual general meeting before you submit them to us.

We may request other documents from time to time.

You’re also required to fill in, sign and submit the Service Provider Declaration for Corporate-level Accountability. The declaration is a certified statement confirming that your organisation:

• complies with its ongoing responsibilities and contractual obligations (subject to any noted exceptions and reasons for them)
• is a going concern and has the ability to meet its debts
• has submitted all information and documents requested by us.

On the declaration form, you’re able to list any exceptions to your compliance with the requirements and the reasons for those exceptions. The declaration form must be signed by authorised or delegated signatories of your organisation.

The declaration form may change from year to year, and is issued as part of the reporting requirements for the applicable financial year.

Any additional requirements for corporate-level accountability are included in the reporting requirements for the applicable financial year.

Addressing focus areas

As part of our commitment to continual improvement of services, we may target particular practices with focus areas as part of your corporate-level accountability.

The focus areas are used to satisfy us that your organisation has relevant policies and/or practices in place to minimise the risk of instability to, or interruption of services. They address your governance, financial management and/or service delivery practices.

We determine the focus areas, and whether to include them for a financial year, based on:

• legislative or regulatory requirements that DCJ and/or its service providers must comply with
• significant systemic issues arising during the year
• common issues identified from previous annual accountability assessments
• complaints received about service providers or their staff.

Requirements for any focus areas are explained in the reporting requirements for the applicable financial year. If focus areas are included, you’re required to:

• respond to questions in relation to the focus areas
• submit the documents requested, such as policies and procedures, if any were requested.

Reporting contract-level accountability

You’re required to report contract-level accountability separately for each contract you held during the applicable financial year.

Using the form allocated in the Contracting Portal, you must report income and expenditure against the funding your organisation received from DCJ, and declare unspent funds.

As part of your reporting, you’re required to submit a detailed income and expenditure statement for the contract, certified by two (where applicable) authorised signatories. The income and expenditure statement doesn’t require endorsement at your annual general meeting before you submit it to us.

Under the contract with DCJ, your organisation is required to keep proper accounts and records of your usage of DCJ funds, and to keep them separately from your other accounts and records. Your accounts and records are expected to support the figures you submit in the detailed income and expenditure statement, and you report on the form in the Contracting Portal. DCJ may, at its discretion, require you to provide an itemised breakdown of any income and expenditure item.

There are special requirements for reporting indirect administration costs for a contract.

You’re also required to fill in, sign and submit the Annual Accountability Certification for Contract-level Accountability. This certifies that your organisation met the financial responsibilities and contractual obligations for the reported financial year, including that you:

• provided services as agreed in the contract
• collected and provided the data and information required
• have returned previous year unspent funds, if required.

On the certification form, you’re able to list any exceptions to your compliance with the requirements and the reasons for those exceptions. The certification form must be signed by authorised or delegated signatories of your organisation.

The certification form may change from year to year, and is issued as part of the reporting requirements for the applicable financial year.

If your contract with us is for funding of $25,000 (excl GST) or less, you’re only required to submit the completed Annual Accountability Certification for Contract-level Accountability.

Any additional requirements for contract-level accountability are included in the reporting requirements for the applicable financial year.

Reporting indirect contract administration costs

What are ‘indirect contract administration costs’?

Indirect contract administration costs are all indirect costs incurred by you in support of delivering the services agreed in the contract with DCJ. These costs include all administrative, fixed and variable overhead costs.

You’re required to report indirect contract administration costs as expenses, separately for each contract you hold with DCJ, as part of your contract-level accountability.

Expenses that can be included as indirect contract administration costs

You may include all expenses that aren’t directly connected to providing the services to DCJ clients as agreed in the contract.

Typical examples of indirect contract administration costs are:

• fees paid to another organisation to perform administrative services such as payroll
• rent, shared office space costs and rates
• utility costs for telephone, water, electricity and gas
• licensing fees
• insurance
• other corporate overheads such as accounting, auditing, technology, human resources, marketing, legal, security and motor vehicle costs.

Download the Income & Expenditure Statement template for a more comprehensive list of examples.

We understand that an indirect cost for one organisation may be a direct cost for another. That’s your organisation’s indirect contract administration costs must be justifiable and reasonable based on providing the services agreed in the contract.

For expenses to be included as indirect contract administration costs, they must:

• have been incurred and/or paid by your organisation during the applicable annual accountability reporting period
• be reasonable, based on the DCJ services agreed in the contract
• be relevant to providing the services agreed in the contract
• be justifiable, based on your accounts and records
• not include any direct costs; this means don’t include operating expenses incurred by your organisation that can be directly attributed to delivering the services and achieving the contract outcomes
• not have been included as part of any other expense reported for the same contract
• be apportioned correctly when applied to multiple contracts
• not have been included in the expenses of any other contract (with DCJ or another funding agency) you’ve reported for the same annual accountability reporting period.

DCJ may, at its discretion, require further information and justification from your organisation to determine the costs reported.

Determining the amount to report

Indirect contract administration costs are a legitimate and necessary business expense, and can vary from organisation to organisation, depending on:

• the size of the organisation
• the complexity of running a program
• the impact in the community, where having more impact may relate to higher administration costs and vice versa.

So, there’s no one-size-fits-all standard ratio or percentage that can be used to measure the reasonableness of the costs associated with managing a contract.

However, your organisation must be able to justify the amount reported.

We understand that it may be difficult to track indirect costs in organisations that hold multiple contracts with DCJ and/or other government agencies.

For this reason, DCJ will accept a certain percentage of the contract funding amount as a means of apportioning indirect contract administration costs for different contracts.

However, the percentage used must be justifiable to actual indirect costs incurred while providing the services agreed in each contract. This percentage of the funding must:

• be reported as a value in the Indirect contract administration costs field of the contract-level accountability form in the Contracting Portal
• be reflected in the accompanying income and expenditure statement
• not form part of any other expenditure reported for the same contract or another contract.

If using this method, we ask that your organisation regularly reviews the percentage it applies, to ensure it reflects actual costs incurred and it doesn’t result in large variances between the actual and percentage allocated costs.

Reporting government grants and subsidies

If your organisation received a grant payment from DCJ, or another Commonwealth or NSW Government subsidy, we expect you to report these in your financial statements as a corporate-level subsidy or as required by other funding agencies.

Grants from DCJ have their own reporting and acquittal requirements, as specified in the grant agreement.

You’re not required to acquit these funds as part of your annual accountability reporting, nor include nor report them as income for any of your of DCJ contracts.

If DCJ made any special payments to your organisation, the reporting requirements for the applicable financial year explain how to acquit those funds.

Support and assistance

If you have any questions about annual accountability, or require support or assistance with any aspect of completing your organisation’s reporting requirements, contact your DCJ contract manager.

If you require assistance accessing or using the Contracting Portal, contact the Systems, Funding and Cards team.