UK, PhD. Funded by a local charity. Went to buy some materials for a large project for my final year. Found out I have no money left in my grant. Spoke with finance and it appears my supervisor gave some lab members carte blanche to spend the grant. 1 individual spent over half of the grant on materials for their project. Funder is asking for an update and report on spending. I feel this is fraud and want to state that to the funder. Am I right- is it fraud if a ring fenced budget ie when I applied I had to state how I was going to spend all aspects of the grant, has been misused for other projects in this way? What do I tell the funder?
Sorry if vague. Don’t want to dox myself.
Comments
Your university should have a research services office; best to contact them first rather than going directly to the funder. Look for governance officers, they’re the ones who will be able to understand and apply the rules (both of the funding body and of the institution).
Contact research director in your department. If you don’t have one of those go to HoD. If they’re not doing anything I would raise this with the faculty or university dean of research. That sounds sketchy as hell as you’ve described it. UK scholarship/rtsg funds are not supposed to be a free for all.
No one here can determine if this was fraud as it will depend on the exact wording of the grant award and your status within the university. I’d also advise you to avoid framing it this way, simply because leaping straight to accusations of fraud will raise the emotional temperature, will instantly destroy your relationship with your PI and won’t really help you resolve this.
You should speak to your grants/finance team. Instead of trying to determine if this was fraud, focus on establishing precisely what has happened, what spending was permissible within the grant, and how you should approach the grant reporting. If money has been spent outside the permitted terms, then finance/legal should be able to help you write a statement outlining what has happened to send to the charity. Leave it to the charity to decide if they wish to investigate further (it’s unlikely they would take this to the police). As angry as you may feel about this, throwing yourself into the centre of an investigation may not go the way you think it will and you could find yourself in trouble too. The best way to handle it is by being honest, sticking to the facts and avoid accusations or suppositions. Leave that to the people who are responsible for making those determinations.
Lastly, I’m not justifying wilfully misappropriating funds, but there is a pretty grey area about grant spending – that’s driven by a lot of perverse incentives and deep pressures on PIs. There are definitely lines that mustn’t be crossed, but a degree of fudging is broadly recognised and accepted. Obviously, if the money has been spent in ways that do not further the charity’s aims, are outside the T&C’s of the grant, and prevent the research they funded from being carried out, then that is unacceptable and will need to be reported.