Business and consumer surveys - SGA

Q: My company name seems not to be in the system although we have been working for the European Commission for many years.

A: If your company (under its current official name) is not in the system, please register it to obtain a PIC before starting your proposal. Please refer to the instructions on Registration and validation of your organisation - Online Manual - Funding Tenders Opportunities

According to ARTICLE 2 - DEFINITIONS and SECTION 1 CONSORTIUM: BENEFICIARIES, AFFILIATED ENTITIES AND OTHER PARTICIPANTS of the MGAPDF:

- Partner (beneficiary):

A partner is an entity that signs the Grant Agreement as a beneficiary. Beneficiaries implement the action, declare costs, and receive EU funding. Each beneficiary has direct rights and obligations under the Grant Agreement. Please see MGAPDF Article 7

- Associated partner:

Associated partners are entities involved in the action but do not sign the Grant Agreement and do not receive EU funding. They may provide input or expertise, but their costs cannot be reimbursed. Please see MGAPDF Article 9.1

- Subcontractor:

A subcontractor is a third party contracted by a beneficiary to carry out specific tasks or services related to the action, usually via a contract. Subcontracting must comply with the conditions of the Grant Agreement.

Subcontractors are not considered partners or associated partners; they provide services, and their costs can be declared by the beneficiaries under the subcontracting budget heading. Please see MGAPDF Article 9.3

This refers to the main contact person responsible for the operational implementation of the Project.

When one subcontract covers several surveys (work packages), the concerned surveys shall be specified in one field of the first column of the table (“Work Package No”). The information must then be filled in only once for all surveys concerned.

It is possible to declare costs both based on time and on deliverables, as long as both meet the eligibility conditions set out in Article 6 of the general-mga_bcs_en.pdfPDF.

A participant is the legal entity applying for the grant and signing the grant agreement. If several offices or departments belong to the same legal entity, they are considered one participant. The term partner refers to associated partners or linked third parties with a separate legal identity.

Q: Could you accept the Request for Unit Cost Grid Validation validated for other projects or should we fill in a new document to be signed by the legal representative.

A: A form signed for other projects is not valid. Please use the standard form for Unit Cost Grid Validation that is published on the Website of the BCS Call. As indicated on top of the document, please print it out with the letterhead of your organisation, fill it in and let it be signed by the PLSIGN (legal representative) of your institute.

Costs for voluntary participation in ad hoc questions must be included in the budget under categories A.6 (staff costs) and/or B (subcontracting), together with the costs for the compulsory questions of the action. These costs do not need to be presented separately. Under item 8 of the worksheet “Info on Budget” in the Detailed Budget Table, applicants must indicate whether their budget (under A.6 and/or B) contains costs for the implementation of the ad hoc questions.

A small difference in decimals (0.01) between the 'Budget Overview' in the F&T portal and the sheet 'Annex 2 AG' of the Detailed Budget table (Excel file) can appear. This is due to the fact that you are copying rounded amounts (to 2 decimals) in the 'Budget Overview' while the amounts in the Excel file 'Detailed Budget table' contain a higher number of decimals. The rounding error does not affect the validity of the proposal. Note that the figures mentioned in the 'Budget Overview' of the Administrative Form (Part A) are the official figures that will be mentioned in the potential grant agreement.

• Under Administrative forms (Part A), click “Edit forms”.
• In the menu on the left side, click on Budget. A part of the budget overview table appears. Information must be filled in in line 1 (see blue entries in image of test application below).
• To be able to fill in cells in the right part of the table (which are not immediately visible), use the grey sliding bar at the bottom of the table (see yellow marking in the image below).

The Total sheet of the budget table does not need to be signed. The signature box appearing at the bottom of the page is not applicable and should simply be disregarded.

The budget information to be provided via the Portal in Part A of the Application Form has to be filled in manually, by copying the respective amounts from the Worksheet “Annex 2 AG” of the Detailed Budget Table (Excel Workbook). The Worksheet “Annex 2 AG” is populated automatically with the detailed information from the Worksheets “Consumer” and/or “Business”. The sheet is there to help you when filling in the budget information in the Funding and Tender Portal.

The additional fields “Income generated by the action (o)”, “Financial contributions (q)” and “Own resources (r)” have to be filled, respectively, with the amounts from the fields “Direct Revenue from the Action”, “Contributions from other organisations” and “Own contribution” in the Worksheet “Total” of the Detailed Budget Table. The field “In kind contributions (p) does not apply and can be left empty/zero.

Please read carefully the help and instructions provided in the Worksheets “Guidance BS” and “Info on Budget” of the Detailed Budget Table and the information provided on the Portal in the info field “How to fill in the budget” on the budget tab of the Application Form Part A.

As stated at the top of the template “Request for Unit Cost Grid Validation”, the request has to be printed out with the letterhead of the organisation, filled in and signed by a legal representative and uploaded with the handwritten signature in a single file in the Portal Submission System as part of the application.

There are different ways to calculate the distribution ratios in the business surveys. For example they can be calculated based on the sample size of one individual survey relative to the sample size for all business surveys, or based on the number of questions of one individual survey relative to the total number of questions for all business surveys.

The calculation method must be coherent and explained in section 2 of the sheet ‘Info on Budget’.

As indicated at the top of the form ‘Request for unit cost grid validation’, the document has to be signed by the legal representative of the institution submitting a proposal. The legal representative is the person that will also sign the agreements.

Q: In the detailed budget table for the BCS call FPA2026-2028, when applying for one survey only, the EU-related ratio of the total of business surveys has been applied instead of the EU-related ratio for the specific business sector (which is significantly lower). How do I have to change the EU-related ratio in the business tab?

A: as mentioned in the sheet ‘Info on Budget’ (section 11) of the detailed budget table, if you see reason to deviate from the automatic calculation of the EU BCS ratios, please explain the reasons and state what you base the calculation on in section 11 of the sheet. Please then overwrite the automatically calculated EU-related ratios in column I of the survey sheet.

For both the FPA and SGA calls, applicants must complete the “Request for Unit Cost Grid Validation (BCS)Word” form as part of the application process. This requirement is specified in the Call DocumentPDF BCS-2025/2026-FPA-SGA, under Section 5 – Admissibility and documents.

Q: For the BCS-2025-FPA, should the detailed budget table include only the first year (May 2026 – April 2027), the full duration of the grant (May 2026 – April 2028)?

For the BCS-2025-SGA, should the budget cover only the period May 2026 – April 2027?

If preparatory work starts in 2025, can the related hours and costs be included?

A: As indicated in the Call document BCS‑2025/2026‑FPA‑SGAPDF (see Section 5 – Admissibility and documents):

for the BCS‑2025‑FPA application you must upload the detailed budget table/calculator “for the first year”, i.e. May 2026 – April 2027;

for the BCS‑2025‑SGA application you must upload the detailed budget table/calculator “for the first year”, i.e. May 2026 – April 2027.

As mentioned further: Please note that for the first year, the FPA and SGA applications will be submitted in parallel due to time constraints. You must first complete the FPA application, and then use the FPA application number in the SGA application. The applications for both levels must be aligned/identical; where documents are required at both levels, please submit the same documents. I.e. two budgets must be identical.

Any preparatory work or hours spent in 2025 should not be included in the FPA/SGA budget table, as they fall outside the eligible implementation period defined for the action.

Only one “Tpl_Detailed budget table.xls” file must be uploaded, covering the combined costs of all surveys to be implemented in a country. In that file, the ‘Business’ sheet must be completed with the total costs for all business surveys planned. If the Consumer survey is included in the application, then the ‘Consumer’ sheet must be completed as well.

Internal IT costs may be declared under “other goods, works and services”, provided they meet the eligibility conditions set out in Article 6 of the general-mga_bcs_en.pdfPDF.

Regarding the locked budget template, it is acknowledged that cells D65 and D66 in the Consumer sheet, and D70 and D71 in the Business sheet, are currently locked.

• For applicants who have already started completing the budget, the file may be sent to ecfin-bcs-call-questions@ec.europa.eu for assistance in unlocking the cells.
• For those who have not yet started, an updated version of the Detailed Budget Table will be uploaded shortly to the Funding & Tenders Portal.

Regarding the “Request for Unit Cost Grid ValidationWord” document, as indicated in point 7 of the first part of the document, the section on social security contributions (page 2) should be completed only if the social contributions are paid by a public authority other than the applicant’s organisation.

Therefore, if the social security contributions are already fully included in the salary figures declared in the unit cost grid, then the table relating to the social security contributions does not need to be completed separately.

There are no additional guidelines for this part beyond the general instructions provided in the template itself. It is recommended to follow your usual accounting practices and ensure consistency with what is declared under personnel costs.

Technical equipment must be described on an institution-wide level only (examples: CATI studio, numer of CAPI tablets, intangible assets like access to email-, telephone- or address-databases or online panels). There is no use in listing computer equipment of individual staff.

Staff costs can be declared based on deliverables, as long as they meet the eligibility conditions set out in Article 6 (more specifically 6.1 (b) and 6.2) of the general-mga_bcs_en.pdfPDF. Personnel costs calculated based on deliverables must be declared in section A.7 of the Detailed budget table

Q: We are facing problems when uploading the documents “Part B Declaration” and “Request for unit cost grid validation” that need to be signed by the authorised person. Using electronic signature seems to "lock" the documents and stop the process of uploading. Do these documents have to be signed "by hand" only?

A: Yes. As stated at the top of the template “Request for Unit Cost Grid Validation”, the document has to be printed out with the letterhead of the organisation, filled in and signed by your legal representative (PLSIGN) and uploaded with the handwritten signature in a single file in the Portal Submission System.

As regards the Part B Declaration, it must be printed out and filled in and signed ONLY by the coordinator and uploaded with the handwritten signature in the Portal Submission System as part of the application.

Q: Can you review the attached files and confirm that everything is in order, or advise us of any changes that may be required, before we submit them through the Portal?

A: The rules of the call do not allow us to review the application before submission. The Funding and Tender Portal will do an automatic check of completeness of the documents/annexes to be uploaded.

It is important that the uploaded Part B application Form is the same as the one uploaded for the Call FPA 2025 (as must be declared in Part B declaration) and that all survey questionnaires must be uploaded (as one pdf). Any additional information/updates can be uploaded as a separate document in the section named ‘Other annexes’.

Q: How should Part B be updated in case of a change in the position of one of the persons listed in point 2.2, or an update regarding data protection and computer equipment, or the release of publications to the press?

A: You must not update the form Part B that was submitted with the FPA call. Please add an annex to your file in the section ‘Other Annexes’ explaining the changes in your form B. Please indicate the page number and the section of the Part B document where a modification has taken place compared to your proposal.

Q: How should we understand the sentences below:

Please make sure that the Part B is the same as submitted in your proposal for the framework partnership agreement. Use the declaration Part B confirming that no modifications have been made. You can download it in the F&T portal.

We hereby confirm that:

The Part B submitted for the SGA is the same as the one submitted for our proposal for the framework partnership agreement and that no modifications have been made. YES / NO

A: As indicated on the top of the document, you must indeed confirm that the Part B submitted for the SGA is the same as the one submitted in your proposal for the framework partnership agreement and that no modifications have been made. Please therefore indicate YES in that cell.

Q: Should Application form Part B be updated or must the form used in the Call for Proposal BCS FPA 2025 be uploaded again?

A: Please upload the Application form Part B as it was submitted and accepted in the Call for Proposal BCS FPA 2025 without any changes.

The question on similar proposals is empty in the preview of the SGA Part A because in the section 'General Info' of part A of the SGA application this question does not appear.

This is a shortcoming of the system. Please disregard that question in the SGA application but do not forget to check ‘No’ in the administrative form of the FPA application.

Only 2 documents must be signed handwritten. The 'Request for Unit Cost Grid Validation' to be uploaded in your proposal for an FPA and SGA, and the Declaration Part B to be uploaded in your proposal for an SGA.

Do not sign with a qualified electronic signature because the system will reject the resulting .pdf file. Instead, please print the document, sign it handwritten and upload again.

The meaning of the sentence “Quarterly EU questions asked on a monthly basis in national questionnaires shall be inserted as quarterly” is that no additional national questions must be introduced in the table in that case. That means, to acknowledge potential efficiency gains in the implementation of the surveys, quarterly harmonised EU questions that feature national questionnaires in every month of the quarter (i.e. 12 times a year instead of only 4 times) do NOT have to be declared as non-EU BCS questions.

Under “Role” applicants should specify the role of the participant in the project concerned, choosing among the following:

COO = Coordinator

BEN = Beneficiary

AE = Affiliated Entity

OTHER = any other relevant role (to be specified).

The question refers to the sampling frame (i.e. the source from which the sample of businesses is drawn), not to the sample itself. Information on the sample is requested further down in the methodological Excel file, under “Panel sampling and response rates (refers to award criteria 1 (b), (c), (d))”. In that section, applicants are asked to provide figures for the number of firms to be contacted (sample size) and for the number of completed surveys expected (effective sample size).

As stated in the Funding & Tenders Portal Online Manual – Roles and access rights, to give access to colleagues working on the application, the organisation’s main contact person or LEAR can assign them roles in the system, such as “Task Manager” or “Team Member”. These roles allow them to view or edit the proposal as needed, even if they are not listed as formal contacts.

The signatory person should be somebody that can represent the entity for this type of declaration (general legal requirement for signatures).

The [No] refers to the beneficiary’s number. The number of the Coordinator is always 1.

Do not separate the List of Previous Projects from Part B before uploading the latter, i.e. the List of Previous Projects shall be filled out in the Form Part B. It is not compulsory to again upload the List separately in the FPA Call – upload section.

Q: Need to fill in grey fields (e.g. in Section 2.4, section 5, section 6) in template form B?

A: No, when information appears in grey fields referring to other information, nothing has to be filled in. Only white fields must be filled in.

The purpose of the question is to detect duplicates or double funding among different programmes. For the BCS Programme, given its repetitive, annual nature, even if the applicant has submitted proposals in previous years for the same surveys, the proposals for both FPA and SGA are considered new applications, and not resubmissions of previous proposals. Therefore, the correct answer in the application form is “NO”.

For the header in Part B of the application form, the Call ID and Call Title as published on the Funding & Tenders Portal can be used, for example:

Call identifier: BCS-2025-FPA (or BCS-2025-SGA)

Call title: Business and Consumer Surveys – FPA (or SGA)

While there is no strict rule on how to complete these fields, it is suggested to follow this format.

Any additional (non-harmonised) question and any harmonised question that features on the questionnaire in a month that does not correspond to the Commission’s time schedule for the harmonised questions must be counted as non-EU BCS questions.

ONLY exception to this rule: To acknowledge potential efficiency gains in the implementation of the surveys, quarterly harmonised questions that feature national questionnaires in every month of the quarter (i.e. 12 times a year instead of only 4 times) do NOT have to be declared as non-EU BCS questions.

The information concerning the "Previous projects" annex is included in the Application Form Part B, which can be downloaded from the submission system under the section "Download Part B Templates." The relevant content is provided in Annex 4, located at the end of the document.

Q: ·In the detailed survey methodology descriptions (xlsx files), does the question “How many survey questions which are NOT from the harmonized EU BCS questionnaire will you include on your questionnaire?” refer to the total number of non-harmonised questions used over the year, or an average number of questions included in the monthly questionnaires? For example, if the questionnaire includes 2 monthly, 2 quarterly, 1 annual (August), and 3 annual (December) questions, should the total figure (e.g. 36) be reported?

A: In the detailed survey methodology descriptions (xlsx files), the question “How many survey questions which are NOT from the harmonized EU BCS questionnaire will you include on your questionnaire?” refers to an average monthly questionnaire. For instance, if a questionnaire includes 2 monthly, 2 quarterly, 1 annual in August, and 3 annual questions in December, the correct number to report would be 3, not the total annual count (e.g. 36).

The system technically accepts a maximum of 20 characters for the project acronym field. Unfortunately, this means the full recommended format from the call fiche cannot fit as originally suggested (Call document: Point 5 - Admissibility and documents).

To comply with the system limit, please use a shortened version that still contains the key elements: ‘Country-code–Institution–FPAYY/SGAYY’ - (e.g. XX-XXX-FPA25; XX-XXX-SGA25)

The call document will be updated accordingly to reflect this clarification.

The Project Name should indicate the full title of the proposal, for example: Business and Consumer Surveys in [Country].

The Project Acronym must be limited to a maximum of 20 characters. It is recommended to use the following format: ‘Country-code–Institution–FPAYY/SGAYY’ - (e.g. XX-XXX-FPA25; XX-XXX-SGA25)

The abstract should briefly describe which surveys will be conducted, in which country, and the planned data collection methods (e.g. telephone, personal interviews, online, mixed mode, etc.).

Draft national questionnaires have to be provided in line with the harmonised questionnaire (Annex 1 of the Call document), which is the questionnaire for the action period May 2026-April 2027.

Q: Could you please advise which period should be used when calculating the average exchange rate?

A: Please take the same period of 12 months that you use to calculate your daily rates and administrative costs.

As an example, if your daily rates are calculated covering the period 1 October 2025 – 30 September 2026, please take the exchange rate for the same period. Please refer to the general grant agreement (BCS MGA) section 21.3 on how to convert into euro.

Q: In the sheet “Info on Budget”, it is not possible to check the boxes in cell A5 (CAPI/CAWI...). It is also not possible to increase the height of the cells in the sheet, which makes it difficult to work with.

A: Through an inadvertent error, this sheet has been locked. Please indicate the methodology applied in the description field instead (cell C6). The height of the cells cannot be increased; however, all information filled in is visible to the evaluators. If you would prefer to increase the height of these cells to see the information in them, please send your document to the Call coordinator via ecfin-bcs-call-questions@ec.europa.eu.

Q: How should I modify the formula for calculating the EU-BCS ratio?

A: As indicated in the sheet Guidance BS, if you see reason to deviate from the automatic calculation of the EU BCS ratios in the sheet “EU-related ratios BS”, please explain the reasons and state what you base the calculation on in sections 11 & 14 of the sheet “Info on Budget”.

The cells in column I relating to personnel and subcontracting costs can then be overwritten. By oversight, cells in column I relating to administrative costs are protected and cannot be modified. If needed, please send your budget statement to the dedicated functional mailbox ecfin-bcs-call-questions@ec.europa.eu and ask the Call coordinator to unprotect these cells.

Q: Pay grades are required for the budget for May 2027–April 2028. Until now, the budgeting process has commenced at the start of each year. This meant that the most recent calendar year could be used as a full year, including annual staff costs (January–December). Due to the requirement to submit the budget for the project period May 2027–April 2028 as early as October 2026, complete payroll data for January to December 2026 is not yet available. How to proceed?

A: The pay-grades must be calculated following the guidance in section 3 of the unit cost decision on personnel costs and in the ‘Request for unit cost grid validation’ to be signed by the legal representative of the institution.

• Section 3 of the ‘unit-cost-decision-personnel-costs_bcs_en.pdfPDF’ mentions that the unit costs must be calculated using the beneficiary’s own data incurred during a reference year (12 months) and expressed in full-time equivalents belonging to the respective pay grade. The 12-month reference period could therefore be from November 2025–October 2026. The calculation of the average daily rate per pay grade must be based on the formula proposed in that document.
• The application form ‘Request for unit cost grid validation (BCS)’ informs about all the conditions to comply with when calculating the unit costs.

It is important to follow the instruction on the naming convention which is:

Country-code–Institution’s acronym–FPA25/SGA25

Example: FR-INSEE-FPA25 or FR-INSEE-SGA25

There are maximum 20 characters allowed by the system.

You can find the call identifier for the FPA and the SGA on the Funding and Tender Portal.

Q: When all four business surveys (industry, construction, retail trade, services) are implemented, does only the overall ceiling of EUR 195 000 apply, or must the indicative ceilings for each individual survey also be respected? For example, is it acceptable to allocate EUR 35 000 to construction (EUR 5 000 above its ceiling) if the budget for industry is reduced by the same amount?

A: According to the call fiche (Section 6.1 – Project budget), the budget ceilings apply to the overall combination of surveys implemented. For example, the ceiling of EUR 195 000 applies when all four business surveys (industry, construction, retail trade, and services) are carried out.

There are no separate binding ceilings per individual survey.

Specific information on the EU-related ratios is included in Section 1 of the sheet “Guidance BS” of the Detailed Budget Table.

Q: If one wants to apply for several surveys in a country (e.g. retail trade and services), does one have to submit a single joint application (one BCS-2025-FPA and one BCS-2025-SGA) covering both surveys, or should two separate applications be submitted (i.e. two BCS-2025-FPA applications—one for retail trade and one for services—and two BCS-2025-SGA applications—again one for each survey)?

A: A single joint application must be submitted for the BCS-2025-FPA, covering all surveys to be implemented (e.g. services and retail trade), and one single joint application must also be submitted for the BCS-2025-SGA, again covering all relevant surveys. Within each of these applications (FPA and SGA), the individual surveys are treated as ‘work packages’. The detailed survey methodology descriptions (xlsx files) must be filled in separately for all individual surveys (e.g. services and retail trade) and submitted (identically) for both the FPA and SGA applications.

CVs must be provided for all key actors. Apart from the overall project manager(s) of the surveys, this normally includes in particular experts and technical staff involved in the methodological planning and implementation of the surveys, including data quality control.

Please disregard the separate entry for the investment survey. This is a leftover from the past, which has been overlooked. There is no longer a stand-alone investment survey. The methodological descriptions need to be completed only for industry, services, retail trade, construction and consumers.

There are no other Guidelines than those available in the section “Guidance” of the EU Funding & Tender Portal.