“The online effort reporting tool has allowed our auditor to quickly assess our compliance in this area. I find the software most useful as a budgeting and projecting tool for individual grants and the entire institution. Gone are the days of enormous spreadsheet allocations.”
Claudine Lurvey
Director of Finance
MDI Biological Laborotory
“Our Institute has been using the Effort Allocation and Reporting System (EARS) for many years, and we are very pleased with the results. It saves us considerable time in processing payroll, allocating labor costs across multiple grants, and performing other complex functions related to encumbrances, effort reports, as well as fringe benefit calculations. It is a very reliable system with effective internal controls and audit trail logs. It is well equipped with reporting tools for detailed analysis and forecasting. It provides users with a great flexibility to create their own user-defined reports and extract information as needed. The EARS has become an integral part of our day-to-day operations, and we would not hesitate recommending it.”
Michael J. Ruggiero
Controller
Wistar Institute
“After receiving an audit ding for weaknesses in our processing of labor costs, Chicago Botanic Garden implemented the EARS system last year. We researched the market and could not find another solution that met all our needs and did not intrude on existing processes. Organizations such as botanical gardens already have an established allocation process yet, in order to receive federal funding, must specially document a small portion of the overall labor expense. EARS allows us to isolate federally funded labor expense for this documentation and integrates the existing process used for the rest of our staff. This is meaningful at organizations where federal funding accounts for only a small part of the overall budget.”
Rob Pollack
Director of Finance and Information Systems
Chicago Botanic Garden
“The EARS software has proven to be a cost effective solution, as it meets all of our labor cost accounting needs, in addition to assisting us in remaining compliant with time & effort reporting, mandatory cost sharing, and key personnel requirements inherent in any Federal award. Many not-for-profit organizations attempt to address those unique reporting requirements when purchasing a new General Ledger or Payroll system, but for a very reasonable annual fee, the EARS software will meet all of the organization’s needs related to reporting on personnel costs funded by NIH. Further, the EARS software allows an organization to utilize almost any G/L or Payroll system available on the market, without any concern, about how to account for personnel costs and/or to document time & effort. I give it five stars!”
Matthew DeVol
Senior Director, Finance & Grants Administration
La Jolla Institute for Allergy & Immunology
“As a new institute, MIR was overwhelmed by the challenges inherit in setting up a systemic framework for federal grant compliance. Effort certification and salary allocation was especially onerous and the tools included in our integrated grants management system required extensive manual overhead. We looked at several Effort Reporting Solutions and EARS had the most features and was easy to use. BJG Consulting anticipated our needs and exceeded expectations.”
Kathi M. Stanek
Chief Financial & Administrative Officer
Morgridge Institute for Research
“I have known about this software for a long time but did not implement it because I looked at it as a compliance tool for time and effort. It does that but is much more powerful as a planning tool for use with PIs and the Finance Committee. I wish I had pulled the trigger earlier.”
Thomas J. McQuaid, CPA
VP Finance, CFO & Treasurer
The Forsyth Institute