CONTRACTS

Contracts

FIND A CONTRACT

The University is a public entity and a Constitutional corporation, so there are legal and Board of Regents policy requirements for University contracts. To help you meet those requirements, follow these procedures.

  1. Review the policy on Entering Into Contracts.
  2. Use a contract from the Standard Contracts Library whenever possible. OGC has approved the use of Standard Contracts. If you use a Standard Contract, no additional OGC review or approval is necessary, unless the other party makes edits to a Standard Contract. Revisit the Standard Contracts Library each time a contract is prepared to ensure you have the most current version. OGC will update Standard Contracts on a regular basis.
  3. Seek OGC review for non-standard contracts. This includes when a vendor makes edits to a Standard Contract. 
  4. To initiate OGC review of a non-standard contact, please start by completing a Contract Review Form (CRF).
  5. The CRF may direct you to UIS for a Vendor Review Assessment (VRA) or to work with other subject matter experts.  If a VRA or other consultation is required, please complete that before sending anything to OGC. 
  6. Upon completion of any VRA or other consultation, or if no such consultation is required, please send a copy of the completed CRF and a copy of all contract documents to OGC for review by emailing: ogcpurchasing@umn.edu
  7. At that point, the contract will enter OGC’s queue for review.  An initial contract review may take 2-3 weeks, but please allow more time in December and June due to end-of-year deadlines.  Even more time may be needed to negotiate with a vendor.      Please communicate any firm deadlines or product expiration dates at the time of submission. 
  8. Make sure the person signing the contract is authorized. Only persons with expressly delegated authority may sign contracts. See the President's Delegation of Authority Library.
  9. For some types of agreements, the Subject Matter Expert must be consulted, and the Subject Matter Expert will initiate OGC review when needed.  Please contact the Subject Matter Expert found at the link in this section for the following types of contracts: 
    • Affiliation Agreements
    • External Sale of Goods and Services
    • International Affiliation and Contracts (non-Academic Health Center)
    • Patent or Technology Commercialization
    • Purchases of Goods or Services over $50,000
    • Real Estate Agreements
    • Sponsored Projects, Data Use Agreements, Material Transfer Agreements