Dear Luskin Faculty and Staff,

Please see email below from the office of EVCP Hunt and IVCCFO Hanna-Harwell regarding a new policy on Consultants/Professional Services as part of the broader efforts to address UCLA’s financial challenges, and following discussions with the Executive Budget Action Group.

Additional approvals will now be required for consultant agreements totaling $25,000 or more.

The policy does not apply to contract and grant or gift/endowment funding, as these fund sources are exempt from the new process.

Our internal Luskin School process for requesting approval for consultants $25,000 or more will be as follows:

For new or amended consultant approval requests totaling in the amounts of $25K or more on non-Contract & Grant or Gift/Endowments, please submit the following to Lisa Merin (lmerin@luskin.ucla.edu):

1. Business justification including:
   • A clear statement of total cost, need (business / research purpose), and expected outcomes.
   • A specific explanation of why the work cannot be performed internally
   • Defined scope, deliverables, timeline, and total cost
2. Scope of work/Quote from the vendor
3. Funding source (fund number and name of fund)

Once I obtain the approval email from the Dean, it will be sent back to the requestor who can submit the Purchase Order (PO) request per their usual process.

Please note, for requests over $75,000, additional approvals will be obtained from the CFO/Chancellor’s Office within the BruinBuy Plus system workflow.

As a reminder, all consultant/services should have an approved PO in effect, before any services begin. All after-the-fact requests for consulting or professional services will require additional central review and approvals from the CFO and potentially Chancellor’s Office.

As additional guidance is received from central offices, we will relay the information accordingly.

This information will also be available on the Financial Services intranet page.