Regulations on making estimate and settlement of training expenses for officials in Vietnam

Regulations on making estimate and settlement of training expenses for officials in Vietnam (Illustrative photo)

In Article 4 Circular 221/2010/TT-BTC, the regulations on preparing estimates, allocating, executing, and settling the budget are specified as follows:

1. Preparing the Estimate:

Annually, according to the regulations on state budget estimation, based on the annual Implementation Plan tasks, the ADB Project Management Board prepares the budget estimate for the Implementation Plan and sends it to the Ministry of Home Affairs of Vietnam for general aggregation into the budget estimates of the Ministry, and submits it to the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Planning and Investment for aggregation to present to the Government of Vietnam, which then submits to the National Assembly for approval.

2. Allocating the Estimate:

After the estimate is approved by the competent authority, the Ministry of Home Affairs of Vietnam allocates the estimate for the Implementation Plan to the ADB Project Management Board, which then sends it to the Ministry of Finance for approval according to current regulations.

3. Executing the Estimate and Controlling Expenditure:

- The ADB Project Management Board withdraws the estimate from the State Treasury to implement the Plan.

- The State Treasury is responsible for controlling expenditures according to current regulations as for state budget expenditure.

- Any unused funds at the end of the year are allowed to be carried over to the next year to continue the implementation of the Plan, adhering to the approved objectives and content.

4. Finalizing Expenditure:

- The finalization dossier for contracts signed by the ADB Project Management Board hiring external agencies and units includes:

- The allocation decision of the Ministry of Home Affairs of Vietnam for the ADB Project Management Board;

- The approval decision of the expenditure level and estimate for some specific contents according to the Circular;

- The signed contract between the parties (with an attached budget estimate appendix); if tendering is required, the tender approval decisions are also included;

- The acceptance minutes for the completed work volume and products meeting the requirements; contract liquidation (with a list of the utilized expense documents from the agency or unit executing the contract). The ADB Project Management Board is responsible for checking and approving these expense documents to ensure proper spending according to the prescribed content, expenditure norms, and targeted subjects as stipulated in the Circular, as the basis for contract liquidation. The executing agency or unit is legally responsible for the legality of the payment documents and must keep these accounting documents at their respective accounting units.

- The ADB Project Management Board hires auditors to audit the spending documents according to the stored contracts at agencies, units, and expenditures executed by the ADB Project Management Board, as a basis for making annual expenditure finalization reports, sending them to the Ministry of Home Affairs of Vietnam for aggregation in the Ministry's final budget report to the Ministry of Finance for approval according to current regulations.

5. Inspection and Reporting Regime:

- Every 6 months, annually, the ADB Project Management Board is responsible for evaluating, summarizing the implementation of the Plan, and sending reports to the Ministry of Home Affairs of Vietnam and the Ministry of Finance.

- In 2013, the ADB Project Management Board organized a comprehensive review, evaluating the entire implementation process of the Plan, and submitted it to the Ministry of Home Affairs of Vietnam to report to the Prime Minister of the Government of Vietnam.

More details can be found in Circular 221/2010/TT-BTC, which comes into effect in Vietnam from February 16, 2011.

Nguyen Phu

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