Abuse of authority is the improper use of a position of influence, power or authority by UNDP personnel against UNDP or external personnel or a group thereof. This includes situations when the person in question uses their influence, power or authority to arbitrarily influence the career or employment conditions (including, but not limited to, appointment, assignment, contract renewal, performance evaluation or promotion) of other UNDP or external personnel. Abuse of authority can include a one-time incident or a series of incidents. It may also consist of conduct that creates a hostile or offensive work environment, which includes, but is not limited to, the use of intimidation, threats, blackmail or coercion.
Components or systems described as accepted or supported are not primary options, but are considered fully in line with UNDP ICT standards. Accepted or supported components are not mandatory.
The AAA report is designed to provide Country Offices with a tool to analyze balance sheet accounts. The report gives details of all transactions from various modules for a given account and Operating Unit (OU) for a chosen period. The report selects activities from source systems (AP, AR, GL, etc.) within a fiscal year based on the posting date of the journal tied to the activity. The report can be run for the OU, specified on the run control. Country offices should run generally for one OU only. Upon select account 16005, this report provides all movements in the account by Operating Unit/ Project and or Fund for a specific accounting period.
Accountability is the obligation to (i) demonstrate that work has been conducted in accordance with agreed rules and standards and (ii) report fairly and accurately on performance results vis-à-vis mandated roles and/or plans.
An Accounts Payable invoice must be fully processed in order to be correctly recorded in Projects and the General Ledger (GL). An invoice needs to be fund reserved in order for it to record in budget control.An Accounts Payable (AP) voucher records a liability due to a vendor and expense against a given Chart of Account.
Ad-hoc services may be required or requested in certain circumstances, for instance the provision of legal advice or representation on an agreement or case,1 enhanced local security services for movement of cash in countries without banking facilities, or other services such as advisory support. Ad-hoc services are not included in the UPL and should be managed based on a Local Price List (LPL) or other locally negotiated prices using transparent, prevailing market rates or on the existing guiding costing methodology (Annex 1) and set out in a local price list and agreed locally between the parties.
Adjusted Risk Rating is defined as the Overall Risk Assessment derived from the Micro Assessment adjusted for other available information including: results of the Macro Assessment; past experience with the Partner, prior capacity assessments and micro assessments by other agencies.
Encompasses critical systems of internal control that complement and ensure the proper functioning of checks and balance, including financial ones. These include international civil service standards and incentives, ethics codes, criminal penalties, and administrative review.
Administrative leave is an exceptional status provided for by Staff Rule 10.4 in which a staff member may be suspended from performing his or her functions. A staff member may be placed on administrative leave, subject to conditions specified by the Administrator, at any time from the receipt of an allegation of misconduct and prior to the initiation of an investigation, through the course of an investigation until the completion of disciplinary proceedings as appropriate. Administrative leave can be with pay (ALWP), with partial pay or without pay (ALWOP).
Advance payments received by a staff member from the Organization that are authorized under the UN Staff Regulations and Staff Rules and relevant policies;
An Agency for which the Vendor Review Committee (VRC) has determined that Proscribed Practices took place in respect of one or more of its procurement activities.
Agency implementation is one of the four modalities available to UNDP for the implementation of projects and programmes. A UN agency may be either an Implementing Partner (accountable for the delivery of overall results in a programme or project) or a Responsible Party (accountable for delivery of elements of a programme or project).
Assigned UNDP individuals, acting as liaison with UNDSS CATSU and are responsible for responding to questions relating to air travel safety in accordance with the UNSMS Commercial Air Travel Safety Policy and these guidelines. Based on available information, ATSFPs prepare an analysis and provide a recommendation to UNDP units on the use of airlines not on UNDP booking list.
A financial authorization issued by the Administrator to an official or to a unit to incur commitments for specific purposes relating to the institutional budget and within specified limits, during a definite period;
Amortization is the systematic allocation of the amortizable amount of an Intangible Asset over its useful life. Amortization expenses the cost of the asset in equal instalments (Straight line method of amortization) over the life of the asset, rather than when the asset is paid. Amortization is the systematic allocation of the amortizable amount of an Intangible Asset over its useful life. Amortization expenses the cost of the asset in equal instalments (Straight line method of amortization) over the life of the asset, rather than when the asset is paid for. Amortizable amount is the cost of an asset, or other amount substituted for cost, less its residual value and Residual value of an asset is the estimated amount that would currently be obtained from disposal of the asset, after deducting the estimated costs of disposal, if the asset were already of the age and in the condition expected at the end of its useful life. In UNDP all intangibles will have a zero residual life.
Annual leave is granted by UNDP to provide staff members with periods of time off from work at full pay for personal reasons and for purposes of health, rest and recreation. Subject to the exigencies of service, staff members are expected to exercise their leave within the period in which it is earned.
In line with the UN Staff Regulations and Rules, an annual performance review (referred to in Paragraph 11) will take place to evaluate the performance of the staff members during the year, confirm the achievement of agreed goals and other performance expectations, demonstrated.
The annual planning process starts with the preparation of an Annual Business Plan, which establishes corporate annual priorities to achieve results established in the Strategic Plan. Annual Business Plan priorities cascade throughout the organization through integrated workplans.
The Application Development Lifecycle (ADL) typically encompasses a six-step process starting with analysis, then wireframing before moving into design and development followed by deployment and maintenance.
A subdivision of the appropriations for which a specific amount is shown in the appropriate decision and within which the Administrator is authorized to make transfers without prior approval;
The total amount approved by the Executive Board for specified purposes for the current institutional budget against which commitments may be incurred for those purposes up to the amounts so approved. The appropriations are divided into “appropriations lines”, for each of which a specific amount is shown in the appropriate decision adopted for each budget period by the Executive Board and within which the Administrator is authorized to make transfers without prior approval.
Deals with the preservation and maintenance of non-current records on a temporary or permanent/indefinite basis in accordance with an established retention schedule. The public record of UNDP should be electronic whenever possible, and should be stored in UNDP official systems.
Area Security Coordinators (ASC) are staff members appointed in writing by the DO, in consultation with the SMT, in areas of larger countries which are separated from the capital in terms of both distance and exposure, in order to coordinate and control security arrangements applicable to all personnel, premises and assets in their area of responsibility. ASCs are accountable to the DO for their security-related responsibilities, in accordance with their respective letters of appointment. ASCs may be UNDP staff members.
Is the process of collecting, preserving and securing basic evidence, and the evaluation of this evidence to determine whether an investigation into reported allegations of wrongdoing is warranted
In the HACT framework, these refer to planned activities used to determine whether funds transferred to implementing partners were used for their intended purpose and in accordance with the annual work plan.
The role of the Audit and Evaluation Advisory Committee (AEAC) as an independent body is to assist the Administrator in fulfilling responsibilities regarding oversight, financial management and reporting; internal audit and investigation, external audit; risk management; the evaluation and ethics functions, and systems of internal control and accountability. The primary role of the Committee is to advise the Administrator, taking into consideration the Financial and Staff Regulations and Rules as well as policies and procedures applicable to UNDP (including UNV) and its operating environment, as well as one of its affiliates, the United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF). The AEAC makes recommendations to the Administrator, including on the strategy and workplans of the independent offices as well as on the appointment, performance evaluation, extension and dismissal of the heads of those offices.
Authenticity. An electronic signature is considered to be authentic if it can be proved that the electronic signature was not modified, altered or otherwise compromised after it was placed. The authenticity of an electronic signature is established by the following parameters: i. Association of the electronic signature with a signatory; ii. Indication of the date and time of the electronic signature.
“Authority” refers to the power or decision making rights of an individual by virtue of his/her appointment and/or as appropriately delegated to him/her.
Any authorized user of UNDP ICT resources. May be a staff member, contract holder, intern, UN Volunteer, a member of another UN agency using UNDP ICT resources or other any other third party using UNDP ICT resources.
A centralized process that auto-matches Quantum transactions against the bank statements loaded into Quantum via Treasury Management System (TMS) payment hub.
Azure DevOps collaboration tools includes customizable team dashboards with configurable widgets to share information, progress, and trends, built-in wikis for sharing information, and configurable notifications.
The EC Donor Report is designed for submission to the EC and consistent with the budget categories agreed under the FAFA. It can be used for both fund-level co-financing (EC trust funds), as well as for project-level co-financing (cost sharing agreements signed with the EC). If ‘trust fund' is selected, the report will be generated for all projects funded from the selected fund.
Electronic Funds Transfers (EFT): When disbursing payments through the Electronic Funds Transfers (EFT), payment instructions are generated in electronic format using the batch process of the ‘PPR’ for using ‘TRF’ method..
EFT is an Electronic Funds Transfer method implemented with banks using a) ISO Standard 20022, b) and any other electronic method using a ICT approved security standards.
Electronic record. An electronic record is a record in electronic format. This includes, but is not limited to, electronic data interchange, electronic mail and other computer-based programs.
Electronic signature. An electronic signature is an electronic symbol or process that is attached to or logically associated with an electronic record and executed or adopted by a person with the intent to sign the record. The electronic signature is an integral part of the electronic record and indicates the identity of the signatory. The electronic signature represents the signatory’s acknowledgement, agreement and/or approval of the information contained in the electronic record. Electronic signatures include, among others, digital signatures, which are a type of electronic signature and are therefore covered by this Policy.2 An email may be used to indicate approval under certain business processes, but it does not constitute an electronic signature. Copied-and-pasted images of a signature are not electronic signatures for the purposes of this Policy either.
The remuneration of internationally recruited staff members comprises of all or several of the following elements. a) Base salary; b) Post adjustment; c) Rental subsidy/deduction scheme; d) Mobility and hardship allowance; e) Allowances relating to the family status of the staff member; f) One-time allowances relating to appointment, assignment, reassignment, or separation, such as: i) Assignment grant; ii) Repatriation grant; iii) Termination indemnity; iv) Commutation of annual leave; g) Ad hoc allowances relating to unique situations, such as: i) Danger Pay; ii) Extended monthly evacuation allowance; iii) Special operations living allowance; iv) Hardship Allowance.
The engagement facility provides a rapid and flexible response mechanism to support upstream policy results, evaluation and assessments, crisis responses and the testing of innovations with scale-up potential. It must support results identified in the UNDP Strategic Plan and relevant country or regional programme documents. Any country office, regional hub or Bureau may establish one or more engagement facilities in accordance with this policy. Resources can be committed by the programme manager/Resident Representative by signing the updated multi-year workplan maintained for the engagement facility. The facility always uses direct implementation. Terms of reference and concept notes, as relevant, are required to justify and detail expected results.
E-requisition is used to request procurement of goods or services, defining the specifications and covering other details such as what is needed, when it is needed, and where it is needed. From the e-requisition, a buyer will source the necessary goods or services, evaluate the offers of relevant suppliers, and conclude the process by placing a Purchase Order with a specified supplier.
The Ethics Panel of the United Nations consists of the heads of the Ethics Offices of the separately administered funds and programmes of the United Nations and the Ethics Office of the United Nations Secretariat, and is chaired by the head of the United Nations Ethics Office.
Since 2015, the EU Pillar-Assessed Grant or Delegation Agreement (PAGoDA) templates was introduced. There are some specific reporting requirements for contracts funded through DG ECHO (EU Humanitarian Assistance) linked to their obligatory on-line platform used for submission of reports.
An assessment, as systematic and impartial as possible, of an activity, project, programme, strategy, policy, topic, theme, sector, operational area or institutional performance. Evaluations should focus on expected and achieved accomplishments, critically examining the presumed causal chains, processes, and attainment of results, as well as the contextual factors that may enhance or impede the achievement of results. Evaluations focus on determining the relevance, impact, effectiveness, efficiency and sustainability of UNDP work in order to make adjustments and improve its organizational and system-wide contributions to development.
The evaluation policy sets out the purpose and basic principles of evaluation, and defines the institutional architecture for UNDP and its associated funds and programmes. The policy covers the independent evaluations conducted by the Independent Evaluation Office of UNDP; the decentralized evaluations commissioned by UNDP programme and policy units, the United Nations Volunteers (UNV) programme and the United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF); as well as the activities of UNDP and the Independent Evaluation Office in support of national evaluation capacity.
The occurrence or change of a particular set of circumstances. An event can be one or more occurrences, can have several causes, and can consist of something not happening.
Any type of proof which tends to establish or disprove a fact material to the case. It includes, but is not limited to, oral testimony of witnesses, including experts on technical matters, documents, electronic, audio, video records and photographs.
Per Staff Rule 7.15, excess baggage means baggage in excess of the accompanied baggage carried without extra charge by the transportation company.
Excess baggage should be avoided to the extent possible in order to minimize the environmental impact of transportation. Staff members traveling by air shall be entitled to reimbursement of the cost of excess baggage for themselves and their eligible family members for one bag in addition to their free baggage allowance or up to 25 kilogram per traveller.
The Bureau for Management Services (BMS), Office of Financial Management (OFM), prepares three main papers for the Executive Board:a. Statistical Annex to the Annual Report of the Administratorb. Structured Funding Dialogue in collaboration with BERAc. Detailed annual review of the financial situation and appendixes – integrated as Annex I to Structured Funding Dialogue.
Refers to the closure of the staff member’s case after disciplinary proceedings have been initiated through the issuance of a charge letter to him or her.
Includes disbursements and accruals for goods and services received, and the use or impairment of assets, dependent on the implementation arrangement and in accordance with administrative instructions issued by the Comptroller for a financial period.
The call for an expression of interest is a notice used to assess interest in an upcoming solicitation for goods, works or services. Vendors are requested to express interest and provide information about products, services, resources, qualifications and experience before a fixed deadline. This method may be used to continually update a UNDP office’s vendor database, where procurement planning has forecasted future requirements of specific goods, services or civil works.
The Extended Monthly Evacuation Allowance (EMEA) is applicable when staff members assigned to duty stations designated as non-family duty stations are therefore unable, for security reasons, to have their family members join them. The EMEA was established to alleviate hardships of staff members faced with the inconvenience and cost of maintaining two households and with having to pay rental costs in two locations. Staff members may opt to settle their family either in their place of home leave, previous duty station, or a third country.
Rank-in-post is a system by which staff are graded and paid for their expected contribution. Rank-in-post means that a serving staff member who is competitively selected for a post classified and budgeted at a higher level, for an expected period of one year or longer, is automatically promoted to that higher level immediately upon assumption of the higher level duties. There are no qualifying periods and no seniority requirements and no promotion bodies to recommend approval. Only candidates meeting the pre-defined requirements for a post as per the job description can be selected. Rank-in-post is based on standardized classification of jobs and transparent recruitment and selection processes, with oversight exercised by the relevant Compliance Review Bodies i.e. Compliance Review Board (CRB) or Compliance Review Panel (CRP) . Hiring units will be responsible for strictly complying with the corporate procedures on classification, recruitment, reassignment and selection, to ensure that only candidates with “the highest standards of efficiency, competence and integrity” as required by the Charter of the United Nations and who possess the right skills, experience and competencies required for the properly classified and budgeted posts are selected.
DAP can be used on all means of transport. The seller clears the goods for export when the goods are placed at the disposal of the buyer on the arriving means of transport and the goods are ready for unloading at the named place of the destination. All risks to that point are for the account of the seller. The Buyer must pay costs of unloading and import formalities.The Receipt date is the date when the goods have arrived at the specified place, whether they are unloaded from the forwarder’s truck, vessel or other means of transport. This is the date at which the ownership for the goods procured is transferred to UNDP.
The FOB is commonly used in the sale of bulk commodity cargo such as oil, grains and ore. In FOB, the seller clears the goods for export and is responsible for the costs and risks of delivering the goods on the ship at the named port. Carriage to be arranged by the buyer. Buyer pays for the cost of pre-shipment inspection, except if the inspections are required by the country of export. The Buyer pays all costs associated with securing documentation originating in the country of export as required for import. The Receipt date is the date when the goods are placed on board the vessel, because on that date the risk is transferred from the supplier to UNDP
Components or systems described as recommended are considered as the primary options when designing or specifying a new system. Not complying with recommended options, while complying with accepted or supported options is not considered as non-compliance.
Reconciliation is the accounting process used to compare at least two sets of records to ensure the figures are in agreement and are accurate. Given that the Intangible Assets data will be initiated in one module and ultimately recorded in the Quantum Asset Module as well as the General Ledger Account, there will be a need to reconcile the data and information in the three modules.
Records comprise any information, regardless of physical form or characteristics, which originate from, or are received by, UNDP within the framework of its official activities.
An overpayment that creates a debt to the Organization on the part of the staff member will normally be recovered immediately by means of deductions from salaries, wages, and other emoluments payable under the UN Staff Regulations and UN Staff Rules. However, the HR Specialist or the Resident Representative, as the case may be, may agree with the staff member who has received overpayments on: a) Alternative means of repaying the amount due, such as payment by bank transfer, bank cheque or personal cheque from the staff member; or b) Recovery in monthly instalments subject to the contract expiry date of the staff member; or c) Other methods of recovery at the disposal of the Organization.
The resources of UNDP that are comingled and untied. These will include voluntary
contributions, contributions from other governmental, intergovernmental or nongovernmental sources and related interest earnings and miscellaneous revenue.
The designated process in a particular case, through which a Vendor that has been Sanctioned regains its eligibility status and the particular entry related to a specific case is updated on UNDP and the UNGM Ineligibility Lists. This only affects Sanctions issued by UNDP, and not any sanction that may be issued at any given time by another Agency.
The purpose of the rental subsidy scheme is to facilitate the settlement of new staff members and to encourage mobility within the UN Common System. It subsidizes the rental costs of eligible staff members whose rental accommodations are of a reasonable standard but cost significantly more than the average for the duty station. There are two different types of rental subsidy: one for staff members serving in Europe and North America and another for staff members serving outside Europe and North America.
A repatriation grant is paid to internationally recruited staff members upon separation from service as compensation for being stationed away from the home country at the Organization's initiative for a period exceeding 5 years, in order to contribute to the extraordinary one-time expense of relocation and reinstallation.
Reporting is an important accountability function. It draws on data and analysis collected through monitoring and communicates updates on results, risks, quality, learning and operational performance to oversight mechanisms, funding partners and other stakeholders. Reporting is a key input to decision-making at all levels as it provides information required to adjust programming to ensure results are achieved. To this end, reports must capture lessons learned on what worked and what didn’t work and explain how data and learning were used to adjust course or inform other interventions.