Site Feedback

Title 32

Displaying title 32, up to date as of 9/03/2026. Title 32 was last amended 8/17/2026.
eCFR Content

The Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) is the official legal print publication containing the codification of the general and permanent rules published in the Federal Register by the departments and agencies of the Federal Government. The Electronic Code of Federal Regulations (eCFR) is a continuously updated online version of the CFR. It is not an official legal edition of the CFR.

Learn more about the eCFR, its status, and the editorial process.

Reports and Records

§ 34.40 Purpose of reports and records.

Sections 34.41 and 34.42 prescribe requirements for monitoring and reporting financial and program performance and for records retention.

§ 34.41 Monitoring and reporting program and financial performance.

Grants officers may use the provisions of subparts A and B of 2 CFR part 1134 for awards to for-profit organizations, or may include equivalent technical and financial reporting requirements that ensure reasonable oversight of the expenditure of appropriated funds. As a minimum, equivalent requirements must include:

(a) Periodic reports (at least annually, and no more frequently than quarterly) addressing both program status and business status, as follows:

(1) The program portions of the reports must address progress toward achieving program performance goals, including current issues, problems, or developments.

(2) The business portions of the reports shall provide summarized details on the status of resources (federal funds and non-federal cost sharing or matching), including an accounting of expenditures for the period covered by the report. The report should compare the resource status with any payment and expenditure schedules or plans provided in the original award; explain any major deviations from those schedules; and discuss actions that will be taken to address the deviations.

(3) When grants officers previously authorized advance payments, pursuant to § 34.12(a)(2), they should consult with the program official and consider whether program progress reported in the periodic report, in relation to reported expenditures, is sufficient to justify continued authorization of advance payments.

(b) Unless inappropriate, a final performance report that addresses all major accomplishments under the award.

[63 FR 12204, Mar. 12, 1998, as amended at 85 FR 51244, Aug. 19, 2020]

§ 34.42 Retention and access requirements for records.

(a) This section sets forth requirements for records retention and access to records for awards to recipients.

(b) Financial records, supporting documents, statistical records, and all other records pertinent to an award shall be retained for a period of three years from the date of submission of the final expenditure report. The only exceptions are the following:

(1) If any litigation, claim, or audit is started before the expiration of the 3-year period, the records shall be retained until all litigation, claims or audit findings involving the records have been resolved and final action taken.

(2) Records for real property and equipment acquired with Federal funds shall be retained for 3 years after final disposition.

(3) When records are transferred to or maintained by the DoD Component that made the award, the 3-year retention requirement is not applicable to the recipient.

(4) Indirect cost rate proposals, cost allocations plans, and related records, for which retention requirements are specified in § 34.42(g).

(c) Copies of original records may be substituted for the original records if authorized by the grants officer.

(d) The grants officer shall request that recipients transfer certain records to DoD Component custody when he or she determines that the records possess long term retention value. However, in order to avoid duplicate recordkeeping, a grants officer may make arrangements for recipients to retain any records that are continuously needed for joint use.

(e) DoD Components, the Inspector General, Comptroller General of the United States, or any of their duly authorized representatives, have the right of timely and unrestricted access to any books, documents, papers, or other records of recipients that are pertinent to the awards, in order to make audits, examinations, excerpts, transcripts and copies of such documents. This right also includes timely and reasonable access to a recipient's personnel for the purpose of interview and discussion related to such documents. The rights of access in this paragraph are not limited to the required retention period, but shall last as long as records are retained.

(f) Unless required by statute, no DoD Component shall place restrictions on recipients that limit public access to the records of recipients that are pertinent to an award, except when the DoD Component can demonstrate that such records shall be kept confidential and would have been exempted from disclosure pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act (5 U.S.C. 552) if the records had belonged to the DoD Component making the award.

(g) Indirect cost proposals, cost allocation plans, and other cost accounting documents (such as documents related to computer usage chargeback rates), along with their supporting records, shall be retained for a 3-year period, as follows:

(1) If a recipient is required to submit an indirect-cost proposal, cost allocation plan, or other computation to the cognizant Federal agency, for purposes of negotiating an indirect cost rate or other rates, the 3-year retention period starts on the date of the submission. This retention requirement also applies to subrecipients submitting similar documents for negotiation to the recipient.

(2) If the recipient or the subrecipient is not required to submit the documents or supporting records for negotiating an indirect cost rate or other rates, the 3-year retention period for the documents and records starts at the end of the fiscal year (or other accounting period) covered by the proposal, plan, or other computation.

(h) If the information described in this section is maintained on a computer, recipients shall retain the computer data on a reliable medium for the time periods prescribed. Recipients may transfer computer data in machine readable form from one reliable computer medium to another. Recipients' computer data retention and transfer procedures shall maintain the integrity, reliability, and security of the original computer data. Recipients shall also maintain an audit trail describing the data transfer. For the record retention time periods prescribed in this section, recipients shall not destroy, discard, delete, or write over such computer data.