Staff costs represent the University's single largest area of expenditure. In order to be able to calculate the cost of certain activities we need to understand how staff spread their time over the range of University activities they carry out.

The current guidance stipulates a three-year cycle.

This data is being collected in order to obtain a picture, at department and University level, of how time is spent over a range of activities. Materiality should be borne in mind when completing the schedules since small percentage point variations at an individual level will have little or no impact at an aggregate level.

Yes - if when you log onto the Qualtrics system there is a TAS questionnaire to be completed you should do so. (Please note that questionnaires will only be published at the end of each data collection period - you will be notified of publication at that time).

It is very important that a satisfactory response rate is received if we are to be able to apply to Research Councils on a fEC basis. If we cannot apply on a fEC basis then we will certainly lose out on the additional funding being made available and in addition are likely to recover less Research Council income than we do presently.

TAS questionnaires have been targeted at certain categories of staff. If you have no questionnaire at the end of the collection period then you do not need to take part.

If you are on Teaching grade 7 or above the TAS should have been released to you and you should complete it. If you are on Teaching grade 6 the TAS has not been released to you on the assumption that you will spend your time on Publicly Funded Teaching (PFT). If this is not an appropriate assumption please contact Simon Walker (simon.walker.100@strath.ac.uk).

It will be used solely for the purposes of Transparency Review / Full Economic Costing. It will assist Finance Office staff to allocate costs to a range of University activities (teaching, research etc).

All time spent on University work, including that undertaken in evenings and weekends, should be included.

The University recognises that there is no fixed number of hours worked per week by academic staff. If actual hours were used, then staff would be required to identify the total hours worked and complete time sheets to account for distribution of hours worked. The TAS methodology aims to provide a "lighter touch" solution by asking academic staff to account for proportions of time rather than absolute hours worked.

All staff should complete the schedule for the period under review based on the work actually undertaken in that period. i.e. for staff who have only worked for one month in the period, the return should reflect how their time was split during that month.

Under normal circumstances, the general rule is that only time actually worked should be included for the purposes of the return. Therefore time spent on holidays or normal sick leave should not be included. However, longer periods of leave such as long-term sick, maternity leave or sabbatical should be treated as follows:

• long term sick and maternity should be included as General Support
• sabbatical leave taken as study leave should be recorded as Institution Funded Research

Any person covering your duties during your absence should allocate their time to the activities that they undertook.

If the travel time is required as part of your teaching/research duty it should be attributed to the relevant category of Teaching or Research. If the travel time was spent on other University business it should be attributed to General Support.

Subject review should be classified as support for Teaching.

Work that relates to the support of research activity in the higher education sector should be reported as support for Research.

This should be recorded as teaching support.

Time spent writing research papers should be coded as core research time (using the same category as the research funder). Time spent writing papers on teaching should be recorded as teaching support.

A separate category has been included for time spent on EU (European Commission) projects.

Record according to the primary purpose. If the primary purpose is to develop the student record as teaching. If the primary purpose is research record as research (under the relevant funder).

Record as postgraduate research supervision.

Time spent on dissemination or publicaton work after a grant has ended should be charged to Research Support.