2.7. Project related secondments

Secondments for carrying out activities related to projects must comply with the national legislation and the rules laid down by the funder.

Prior to commencement of a secondment you must submit a secondment order, which can be found under Secondments on the intranet. A separate secondment order shall be prepared for each secondment. A secondment order should be submitted before expenses are incurred or advance payment is received.

A secondment order can be filled out only by an employee working at the university under an employment contract.

According to the valid TalTech procurement contract for travel management services No 251114, requests for price quotes must be sent to the following travel service providers:

1. AS WRIS Ingrid Metsaäär, Kristi Eichelmann, tel 6129130, e-post ttu@wris.ee
2. Reisieksperdi AS, taltech@reisiekspert.ee

MAKE AN INQUIRY HERE
Form for requesting travel services

The reopening of a competition shall be conducted by the secondee or an employee appointed by the structural unit. In order to harmonise the requests for price quotes of travel services, the request form must be completed and attached to the e-mail (Form for requesting travel services).

Please try to describe the required service as accurately as possible  upon reopening a competition and filling in the form: 

• Which travel services are ordered (flight, internal flight, train, insurance, checked baggage or cabin baggage (e.g. more than 8 kg; measuring up to 55 x 40 x 23 cm)
• the dates of the trip and the preferred flight times (morning, evening, ...). If you cannot determine it yourself, the start and end time of the event for which the trip needs to be taken;
• For hotel accommodation, please indicate the area where you wish to stay or distance from the address of the venue (e.g. distance up to 20 minutes on foot, near King’s College, address London, Strand, WC2R 2LS).

If the secondee wishes to pay for the hotel and travel tickets himself/herself, he/she is not required to request price quotes from the contracting partners. The payment order must then be attached to the secondment report.

When you return from the trip, you need to fill in the secondment report, attach the supporting documents (hotel voucher, boarding passes) and other expense receipts (electronically). All the expenses are covered only based on expense receipts. In the case of a project, the documents must include an agenda for the event or a link to it, a presentation with an acknowledgement of the project grant and other relevant documents (e.g. memos of the meetings, seminars).

A secondment report must clearly indicate the purpose of the trip and its connection with the project.

In the case of projects involving unit cots (daily allowance rate, etc.), only the daily allowance rate applicable under our legislation is paid to the employee (EUR 50 for the first 15 days of secondment and EUR 32 for each following day or a reduced rate if, for example, meals or on-site transport are covered by the host).

If you plan to reimburse travel expenses for a person who does not work at the university under an employment contract, a clause must be included in the authorisation agreement or contract for services concluded with the person, which sets out the type and amount of expenses to be reimbursed to the person, e.g.  travel expenses will be reimbursed in the amount of 500 euros.

As a rule, daily allowance cannot be paid to persons employed under an authorisation agreement or contract for services.

If the secondee is a student who is not employed at the university, the student shall not fill in the secondment order, but must submit a report of the student’s travel expenses

The secondment for carrying out the activities related to a project must be clearly linked to the project; leave and secondment cannot be combined. In the latter case, there is a high risk that the travel expenses are ineligible.

The starting point of a trip must be the place of work indicated in the employment contract. In exceptional cases and with the prior agreement of the funder, it is possible to start the trip from other locations. Such an agreement should be recorded in writing (e-mail confirmation, etc.).

The relation of the secondee to the project shall be clearly verifiable - the secondee shall be a member of the project team, a student involved in the project or a person involved in the core activities of the project.

Prior to planning a secondment, you need to review the rules of the project to make sure whereto you can be seconded based on the concrete funding scheme. There are funding instruments, which allow travel only within Europe (Interreg, target grants), but most of them do not have such restrictions.  To be sure, contact the action consultant in the Research Administration Office to find out what you need to consider.

As regards going on and returning from secondment, the funder usually agrees to cover also one travel day before the activity and one travel day following the activity - the event or meeting. If you want to stay in the destination country for a few days after a specific event, you must state the reasons for that (e.g. additional meetings held outside the specific event or a comparison of airline tickets, which shows that the fares are significantly lower for the flights taking place, for example, two days later).