Grant Management
Nonprofit Accounting
Nonprofit Management
Schedule of Expenditures of Federal Awards (SEFA): How to Prepare It From Your Accounting System
Last updated: 7 October 2026 · Independent buyer’s guide · We do not sell rankings or coverage.
The schedule of expenditures of federal awards (SEFA) lists every federal program you spent money under during the fiscal year, by federal agency and Assistance Listing number, with pass-through details, subrecipient amounts and required notes. Under 2 CFR 200.510(b) you prepare it, and your auditor uses it to choose which programs to test. The schedule is only as reliable as the grant coding in your general ledger, so the real work is setting up your accounting system to produce it.
Key takeaways
- A Single Audit is required when you expend $1,000,000 or more in federal awards in a fiscal year beginning on or after 1 October 2024. The threshold was $750,000 for earlier fiscal years.
- The SEFA reports amounts expended in your fiscal year, not amounts awarded, received or drawn down.
- Federal money that reaches you through a state, county or another nonprofit is still federal and belongs on the SEFA.
- Your general ledger needs an award dimension that carries the Assistance Listing number, agency, pass-through entity and award number.
- Sage Intacct, Financial Edge NXT and MIP Fund Accounting can hold this structure natively. QuickBooks Online approximates it with classes, capped at 40 on the Plus plan.
- Reconcile SEFA totals to drawdowns and receivables for every award before your auditor arrives.
What the SEFA must contain under 2 CFR 200.510(b)
The SEFA covers the same period as your financial statements and must include total federal awards expended as determined under 2 CFR 200.502 (eCFR, 2 CFR 200.510, up to date as of 5 October 2026). The regulation sets six specific requirements.
- Programs by agency and Assistance Listing number. List each program under its federal agency with its Assistance Listing number. For a cluster, give the cluster name, its programs and listing numbers, and a cluster total.
- Pass-through details. For awards received as a subrecipient, show the pass-through entity’s name and the award number it assigned.
- Totals per program. Show total expended for each program, with another identifying number if no Assistance Listing number exists.
- Subrecipient amounts. Show the total provided to subrecipients from each program.
- Loan balances. For loan and loan guarantee programs described in 200.502(b), the notes must show balances outstanding at the end of the period.
- Notes on accounting policies and the de minimis rate. Describe significant accounting policies and state whether you elected the de minimis indirect cost rate of up to 15 percent.
The 2024 revision raised the de minimis rate from 10 percent to 15 percent of modified total direct costs (Federal Register, 89 FR 30046, 22 April 2024). Organizations without a negotiated rate may elect any rate up to that limit (eCFR, 2 CFR 200.414(f), up to date as of 5 October 2026). Our de minimis indirect cost rate guide explains how to apply it.
What counts as “expended”
Section 200.502 ties expenditure to when the federal activity occurs, such as incurring grant expenses, paying subrecipients, using loan proceeds, receiving property or distributing food commodities (eCFR, 2 CFR 200.502, up to date as of 5 October 2026). Non-cash assistance received as part of a federal award must be valued at fair market value at receipt, or at the value the federal agency assigns, and counts toward your total.
The Single Audit threshold after the 2024 revision
OMB’s revised Uniform Guidance, published on 22 April 2024 and effective 1 October 2024, raised the Single Audit threshold from $750,000 to $1,000,000 (Federal Register, 22 April 2024). Section 200.501 now requires an audit when you expend $1,000,000 or more in federal awards in a fiscal year (eCFR, 2 CFR 200.501, up to date as of 5 October 2026).
The Federal Audit Clearinghouse applies the $1,000,000 threshold to fiscal years starting on or after 1 October 2024 and the $750,000 threshold to earlier years (FAC Help Center, 7 November 2024). A calendar-year organization first used the new threshold for 2025, and a 30 June organization first uses it for the year ending 30 June 2026.
Common SEFA errors auditors find
CPA firms that perform Single Audits publish similar lists of problems. EisnerAmper cites omitted pass-through and non-cash awards, wrong Assistance Listing numbers, budgeted amounts reported instead of actual spending, and missing subrecipient amounts (EisnerAmper, 29 October 2025). Maher Duessel adds missing pass-through award numbers, unidentified clusters, missing notes and incorrect loan reporting (Maher Duessel, 29 January 2024). Keiter highlights reporting by grant period instead of fiscal year and totals that do not tie to the general ledger (Keiter, 19 May 2026). All three firms sell audit services.
Most of these errors share one cause. The ledger records that money came from the state or the county, but not that the state or county was passing through a federal program, so someone has to rebuild that information from award agreements at year end.
How to build the SEFA from your general ledger
Step 1: Create an award record for every grant
Section 200.302(b)(1) already requires your financial management system to identify each federal award by Assistance Listing title and number, federal award identification number, year of award and federal agency or pass-through entity (eCFR, 2 CFR 200.302, up to date as of 5 October 2026). Use that list as the specification for your grant dimension, and add the award period and a federal or non-federal flag to each award value.
Step 2: Code federal and non-federal funds separately
Many programs combine federal money with state grants, foundation grants and your own match. Set up separate award values for the federal portion and for other funding, and code each transaction to the correct one at entry, so you never have to split them by hand at year end.
Step 3: Code subrecipient payments to their own accounts
Payments to subrecipients must appear as a separate total for each program. Use a dedicated expense account for subaward payments so one report shows the subrecipient amount by award. Payments to contractors do not belong in that total, so classify each payee when you set it up.
Step 4: Reconcile expenditures to drawdowns
Federal payment rules require recipients to minimize the time between receiving federal cash and disbursing it (eCFR, 2 CFR 200.305(b), up to date as of 5 October 2026). Your drawdowns, adjusted for receivables and advances, should therefore explain expenditures on each award, and any unexplained difference needs to be resolved before fieldwork.
Illustration: a homeless services nonprofit records $486,900 of expenditures in its fiscal year on one HUD Continuum of Care award. It drew $452,300 during the year. Of that, $27,200 paid off a receivable from the prior year, and at year end it has an unbilled receivable of $61,800. The reconciliation is $452,300 minus $27,200 plus $61,800, which equals $486,900 and agrees to the ledger. These figures are illustrative.
Step 5: Produce the schedule and the notes
Run a report of federal expenditures by agency, Assistance Listing number and award, with cluster subtotals and a subrecipient column. Tie the total to federal revenue in your financial statements and explain any differences. Then write the notes on basis of accounting, indirect cost policy, non-cash assistance and loan balances.
Illustrative SEFA
The table below is an illustration for a fictional nonprofit with a fiscal year ending 30 June 2026. Pass-through numbers and amounts are invented. Confirm Assistance Listing numbers for your own awards on SAM.gov.
| Federal agency / pass-through entity / program | Assistance Listing / pass-through ID | Passed to subrecipients | Federal expenditures |
|---|---|---|---|
| US Department of Agriculture, passed through State Department of Education: Child and Adult Care Food Program | 10.558 / CACFP-2025-0417 | $0 | $212,400 |
| US Department of Housing and Urban Development, direct: Continuum of Care Program | 14.267 / not applicable | $118,000 | $486,900 |
| US Department of Health and Human Services, passed through County Community Action Agency: Low-Income Home Energy Assistance | 93.568 / LI-26-033 | $0 | $341,700 |
| Total federal awards expended | $118,000 | $1,041,000 |
Total federal expenditures of $1,041,000 are just over the threshold, so a Single Audit is required. If the food program had been recorded as a state grant because the cash came from a state agency, the federal total would have been $828,600 and the organization would have wrongly concluded that it needed no Single Audit.
Which nonprofit accounting systems make the SEFA easier
None of the nonprofit accounting products we reviewed documents a standard SEFA report built from Assistance Listing data. They differ in how easily they hold the award attributes from Step 1 and report by award without adding accounts. If you are still choosing a system, our guide to choosing nonprofit software covers the wider selection process.
Sage Intacct uses the project dimension as its main grant tracking tool, either on transaction lines or through the Projects application, which flags billable expenses for reimbursement (Sage Intacct Help, last modified 1 October 2026). It also supports user-defined dimensions alongside standard ones such as location, department and class (Sage Intacct Help, last modified 1 October 2026), so a funding source dimension is practical. Sage partner CBIZ lists SEFA reporting among the Sage Intacct reports it describes for grant management (CBIZ, 7 April 2026), but we found no Sage documentation of a standard SEFA report. Sage does not publish Intacct prices (Sage, no date shown).
Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT tracks revenue and expenses by project and grant without adding accounts, and calculates grant reimbursements with spending rules (Blackbaud, 29 July 2026). Grant records capture grant information and reimbursement rates, with automated alerts for reporting deadlines (Blackbaud, 12 May 2025). Blackbaud does not mention SEFA or Assistance Listing fields by name, so ask how you would store them. Pricing is not published.
MIP Fund Accounting, part of Momentive Software, uses a segmented chart of accounts and grant records that hold grantor, grant period, reporting periods and indirect cost rate (MIP, 12 February 2024). Momentive sells it to nonprofits, associations and government organizations (Momentive Software, no date shown). A grant segment plus a funding source segment maps well to the SEFA. Pricing is not published.
Aplos, now sold as Velora Fund Accounting, tracks restricted and unrestricted funds and uses tags for grant and program detail (Velora, no date shown). A fund per award plus tags can work for a handful of federal grants. We found no vendor documentation of drawdown or subrecipient tracking. Aplos lists Lite at $79, Core at $129 and Advanced at $229 a month before promotions, with a Custom plan priced on request (Aplos, checked 7 October 2026).
QuickBooks Online has no fund accounting module, so grants are usually tracked with classes or locations. These are unavailable on Simple Start and Essentials, limited to 40 combined values on Plus and unlimited on Advanced (Intuit, updated 5 August 2026). Plus lists at $140 a month and Advanced at $340 a month before promotions (Intuit, no date shown). The usual workaround is one class per award, with award attributes kept in a spreadsheet.
| System | How you tag federal awards | What usually stays outside the system | Published pricing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sage Intacct | Project dimension plus user-defined dimensions | SEFA layout not documented by Sage | No, quote by module |
| Financial Edge NXT | Projects and grant records | Assistance Listing fields not documented | No |
| MIP Fund Accounting | Grant and funding source segments | Notes to the schedule | No |
| Aplos (Velora) | Funds and tags | Drawdown and subrecipient tracking | Lite $79, Core $129, Advanced $229 per month |
| QuickBooks Online | Classes or locations (40 on Plus) | All award attributes, in a spreadsheet | Plus $140, Advanced $340 per month |
For a wider comparison, see our nonprofit accounting software guide and our article on grant tracking and compliance reporting.
Our independent take
The software matters less than the award record behind it. A QuickBooks user with a disciplined award register and monthly drawdown reconciliations will produce a better SEFA than a Sage Intacct user whose project codes mix federal and matching funds. Software helps most at volume: once you manage more than 20 to 30 active awards, a system with a true grant dimension saves real time.
Before you buy, ask each vendor to produce a report of federal expenditures by agency, Assistance Listing number and pass-through award number, with a subrecipient column. If that requires Excel, plan for the work at year end.
Three buyer scenarios
A community health nonprofit with $3 million in revenue, eight federal awards and QuickBooks Online Plus. Programs, departments and awards will soon exhaust the 40-value class list. Move to QuickBooks Advanced to stay with Intuit, or evaluate MIP or Aplos if you need fund balances. Build the award register first either way.
A multi-site human services agency with $25 million in revenue, 60 active awards and many pass-through grants from the state. Shortlist Sage Intacct, Financial Edge NXT and MIP, and make the SEFA report and drawdown reconciliation part of every demo script.
A small town with $1.2 million in federal expenditures, mostly from one infrastructure program. A program-specific audit is an option only if all your federal spending is under one program and that program does not require a financial statement audit (eCFR, 2 CFR 200.501(c), up to date as of 5 October 2026). Your current fund accounting system probably supports the coding you need, so focus on award documentation and notes.
When you do not need dedicated software for this
If you have fewer than about ten federal awards, no subrecipients and no loans, an award register in a spreadsheet, joined to a class or fund report from your current system, is enough. Auditors can test a spreadsheet SEFA if it ties to the general ledger and every line traces to an award agreement.
New software also does not fix the most common errors. Missing pass-through awards and wrong listing numbers come from incomplete award intake, so fix intake before you blame the system.
How we researched this
We read the current eCFR text of the relevant sections of 2 CFR 200, the 2024 Federal Register notice and Federal Audit Clearinghouse guidance, then reviewed SEFA guidance from three CPA firms and vendor documentation for each product named. No vendor paid for or reviewed this article.
Related guides
Frequently asked questions
Who prepares the SEFA, the auditor or the organization?
The organization does. Section 200.510(b) places the requirement on the auditee, and the SEFA is part of the reporting package you submit to the Federal Audit Clearinghouse. Your auditor may help with formatting, but the accuracy remains your responsibility.
Do I report the award amount or the amount spent?
You report the amount expended during your fiscal year. The total award, the amount received and the grant period are not the measure. A three-year grant with spending in each year appears on three SEFAs, each showing only that year’s expenditures.
Does state funding go on the SEFA?
Only the federal portion. Federal money passed through a state agency belongs on the SEFA with the original federal agency, the Assistance Listing number and the state’s award number. Purely state-funded grants do not, although some states require their own schedule.
What is the Single Audit threshold for 2026?
The threshold is $1,000,000 in federal expenditures for fiscal years beginning on or after 1 October 2024. For a fiscal year that began before that date, it was $750,000. The Federal Audit Clearinghouse confirms this split in its guidance.
Do we have to disclose the de minimis rate if we did not use it?
Yes. Section 200.510(b)(6) requires the notes to state whether you elected the de minimis indirect cost rate of up to 15 percent. If you have a negotiated rate or charged no indirect costs, say that in the note.
Sources
- eCFR, 2 CFR 200.510 Financial statements, up to date as of 5 October 2026. ecfr.gov
- eCFR, 2 CFR 200.501 Audit requirements, up to date as of 5 October 2026. ecfr.gov
- eCFR, 2 CFR 200.502 Basis for determining federal awards expended, up to date as of 5 October 2026. ecfr.gov
- eCFR, 2 CFR 200.302 Financial management, up to date as of 5 October 2026. ecfr.gov
- eCFR, 2 CFR 200.305 Federal payment, up to date as of 5 October 2026. ecfr.gov
- eCFR, 2 CFR 200.414 Indirect costs, up to date as of 5 October 2026. ecfr.gov
- Office of Management and Budget, Guidance for Federal Financial Assistance, 89 FR 30046, 22 April 2024. federalregister.gov
- Federal Audit Clearinghouse, Is my organization required to conduct a Single Audit?, 7 November 2024. support.fac.gov
- EisnerAmper, SEFA preparation, 29 October 2025 (CPA firm that sells audit services). eisneramper.com
- Maher Duessel, Best Practices for the SEFA: The Driver of the Single Audit, 29 January 2024 (CPA firm). md-cpas.com
- Keiter, Tips for ensuring the SEFA is complete and audit ready, 19 May 2026 (CPA firm). keitercpa.com
- Sage Intacct Help, Grant tracking and billing, last modified 1 October 2026. intacct.com
- Sage Intacct Help, Types of dimensions, last modified 1 October 2026. intacct.com
- Sage, Sage Intacct pricing, no date shown. sage.com
- CBIZ, Sage Intacct grant management for not-for-profits, 7 April 2026 (Sage partner). cbiz.com
- Blackbaud, Financial Edge NXT: accounting for grant-funded organizations, 29 July 2026. blackbaud.com
- Blackbaud, Managing grants in Financial Edge NXT, last modified 12 May 2025. blackbaud.com
- MIP Fund Accounting, demo confirmation page with product feature summary, 12 February 2024. mip.com
- Momentive Software, MIP Accounting, no date shown. momentivesoftware.com
- Aplos, Pricing, no date shown, checked 7 October 2026. aplos.com
- Velora, Fund accounting (Aplos), no date shown. joinvelora.com
- Intuit, Usage limits in QuickBooks Online, updated 5 August 2026. quickbooks.intuit.com
- Intuit, QuickBooks Online pricing, no date shown. quickbooks.intuit.com
Sherman Hsieh
Independent analysis of enterprise software — ERP, CRM and more
