Proposal submission

Proposals must be submitted electronically using the Portal Submission System.

Where? Access to the Submission System is available through the Topic page on the Portal> Start Submission.

Who? Proposals must be created and submitted by a contact person of the coordinating organisation. Exceptions exist for some programmes/types of action which are fully focused on individuals (e.g. the Principal Investigator in Horizon Europe ERC grants or the Fellow in Horizon Europe MSCA grants).

How? The Submission wizard will guide you step-by-step through the process. You will need to use the online forms and templates available in the Submission System. The application form is described below.

Submission process

Get prepared: Finding your topic > Find partners > Plan your work and budget

Electronic proposal submission: Get an EU Login account > Get a PIC number (Participant Register) > Launch Submission wizard > Pre-register your draft proposal > List participants, contact persons > Fill in Administrative Forms (Part A) gt; Upload Technical Description (Part B) > Submit your proposal > Acknowledgement of receipt

Application form (Part A and B)

Proposals are submitted using the application forms available in the Submission System. The application form is structured in into two parts, Parts A and B:

• Part A: contains the structured Administrative Forms with data on the participants, legal declarations and contact persons (retrieved from the Submission System screens). It may also include some programme-specific questions.
• Part B (the narrative part): Technical Description of the project with the planned activities, work packages, costs, etc. (must be uploaded as PDF).

Part A is generated while entering the data into the Submission System; Part B needs to be prepared in advance (using the template downloaded from the system; do NOT use the standard template from the Topic page).

Part B will also include annexes and supporting documents if required by the call conditions (detailed budget table, declarations from national authorities, CVs, annual activity reports, etc.)

All participants can contribute to the parts, but it is the person from the coordinating organisation who created the application who must finalise and submit the application.

For programmes with specific security requirements, special instructions may apply (e.g. for EDF, documents must be uploaded through a password-word protected zip file). For such programmes, detailed instructions will be available in the call documentation.

Tasks of the Coordinator:

• Mandate: Make sure that you have the mandate of all participants to submit the application (explicit agreement to participate).
• Quality check:

Check that the application is coherent and that Part A and B are consistent (especially budgetary information).

Make sure that the template has been followed and all sections are completed; make sure that no annexes are missing.

Confidentiality

EU services will treat your proposal confidentially, as well as any related information, data and documents received.

Our evaluators (both in-house and outside experts, if any) are also bound by an obligation of confidentiality.

 Please do NOT discuss your proposal with persons that might act as expert evaluator for us or be otherwise involved in the evaluation, since this could lead to a conflict of interest with adverse consequences both for you and the concerned person.

Security, data protection and document retention

Your proposal and all the information received from you will be stored under secure conditions at all times. The Portal is a closed, secured platform with multiple safeguards.

After the evaluation, we will keep the proposals for audit trail purposes (at least 5 years for unsuccessful proposals and 10 years after project end for successful proposals and, possibly, longer if needed for controls, checks and audit purposes).

Personal data will be handled according to the standards set out in Regulation No 2018/1725 and in line with the Portal Privacy Statement.

 Please be aware that your proposal MUST NOT contain any classified information (Decision 2015/444 or national rules).

Access to proposals

The proposals will remain sealed and closed until after the call deadline.

However, in order to plan the evaluation process (organise translations, evaluation capacities, evaluators with specialist knowledge, etc.) we will ask you for permission to access to certain information already before:

• call title and topic for which the proposal is submitted
• title of your application, proposal abstract, keywords
• PICs of the participating organisations
• relevant panel (for proposals submitted to specific panels, e.g. Horizon Europe MSCA, UCPM).

A warning will inform you that the Granting Authority will be accessing this information and will give you the opportunity to refuse access.