Finance and leadership
CFOs, finance directors, COOs, general counsel, board members, and compliance leads responsible for grant risk and financial exposure.
Confidential internal advisory
EU Grant Risk & Compliance Advisory (Confidential)
Confidential, non-certifying internal advisory for EU grant coordinators, beneficiaries, CFOs, general managers, and compliance leads — at award, during implementation, and before reporting, closure, or external scrutiny. Four distinct entry points, calibrated to the project stage and the level of exposure.
Who it is for
Serious roles carrying EU grant risk.
Programme responsibility
Coordinators of multi-beneficiary grants, beneficiary project managers, programme directors — anyone accountable for defending the file.
Legal and regulatory
Legal and compliance leads in associations (ASBLs and AISBLs), NGOs, SMEs, universities, consortia, and public-private structures exposed to EU funding.
Trigger moments
When advisory work is most useful.
At award
Set governance, evidence discipline, and the reporting calendar on the right foundations before habits set in.
Change of key role
New coordinator, new finance lead, or new project manager inheriting the file — clarify the real exposure.
Before first reporting
Align cost, narrative, and evidence before the first periodic report is submitted — not after questions come back.
Internal doubt on one area
Personnel and time, procurement, subcontracting, governance, evidence, GDPR — when exposure is narrow but serious.
Before closure
Identify weak points in the final file before the closure package leaves the organisation.
Before external scrutiny
Before a control, an audit, an authority request, or a board meeting — understand where the file is soft.
Scope and deliverables
Four entry points. Scope tailored to each.
Entry point 1 — Diagnostic, fixed fee from €4,500
Compliance Health Check
A focused two-week diagnostic to identify where your grant file may be exposed — fast enough to inform a near-term decision, light enough to commission without a full engagement.
What it covers
- Confidential initial discussion and scoping
- High-level scan across governance, cost, evidence, reporting, and procurement
- Targeted sample of supporting documents (10–20 items)
- Up to two short interviews with the finance and project leads
- Identification of the main exposure areas
- Fast read on positions that would be hard to defend
What you receive
- Confidential synthesis note (8–12 pages), readable at leadership level
- Traffic-light map of vulnerabilities by area and severity
- Top 5–10 priorities with immediate actions
- Debrief call with leadership and practical corrective direction
- Recommendation on whether to act through quick fixes, a Targeted intervention, or a Full Review
Where the Health Check stops
The Health Check is a triage tool, not an exposure report. It tells you whether to act and where to start. It does not produce a Risk Register, a 30/60/90-day corrective roadmap, or a board-grade management report — those belong to the Review (entry point 3). If the Health Check identifies serious or systemic exposure, the natural next step is a Review.
A foundation for what comes next
If a deeper engagement follows, the Health Check is not lost effort. The exposure map, document review, and interview findings serve as the starting point for a Targeted intervention or a Review — sharpening the scope, focusing the document request, and shortening the kick-off. Clients who progress from a Health Check to a Targeted or Review typically reach actionable conclusions faster than clients who commission those engagements cold.
Entry point 2 — At award, scoped engagement
Build
The right moment to install grant discipline before habits set in. Build is a multi-week implementation engagement — not a diagnostic — that puts governance, evidence, and reporting on defensible foundations from day one.
What it covers
- Governance architecture, roles, and decision chain
- File structure, evidence classification, audit trail
- Reporting calendar, internal milestones, control points
- Cost-eligibility logic and time-recording discipline
- Framework for procurement and subcontracting
What you receive
- Governance and internal-control framework tailored to the project
- File structure and evidence rules that are defensible from day one
- Reporting calendar and internal control points
- Management briefings to align the key role-holders
How Build differs from Health Check and Review
Build is forward-looking and structural. Where the Health Check identifies risk in an existing file and the Review documents it, Build prevents risk from being created in the first place. It is the engagement to commission at award or kick-off.
Entry point 3 — During implementation, scoped engagement
Review
A senior, multi-week diagnosis of an existing grant file — designed to give CFOs, general counsel, and boards a defensible picture of exposure before reporting, closure, or external scrutiny.
What it covers
- Governance, roles, decision records, consortium discipline
- Cost eligibility and financial defensibility
- Personnel costs and time-recording logic
- Procurement, subcontracting, and third-party exposure
- Evidence, record-keeping, and audit-trail coherence
- Reporting defensibility — narrative, evidence, cost alignment
- Deliverables vs obligations alignment
- Confidentiality and GDPR exposure where relevant
- Closure and control readiness
- Risk-based sample review (40–100 evidence points)
- Interviews with finance, project, legal, procurement, HR, and operational leads (5–10 typically)
What you receive
- Confidential management report (25–40 pages) pitched at CFO, general counsel, or board level
- Risk Register with issue, evidence, consequence, urgency, owner, and corrective action
- Risk heat map by domain
- Evidence Readiness Matrix linking obligations, costs, deliverables, and proof
- 30/60/90-day corrective and containment roadmap
- Debrief workshop with senior leadership and operational team
Where the Review stops
The Review documents exposure; it does not implement the corrections it recommends. Implementation typically follows in one of three ways — focused fixes through a Targeted engagement, structural rebuild through a Build engagement, or ongoing senior support through a fractional retainer.
Entry point 4 — On request, narrow scope
Targeted
A focused intervention on one specific area — when the exposure is known and narrow, or when the Health Check has identified one weak domain that warrants depth without a full Review.
What it covers
- A single area — personnel costs, procurement, governance, evidence, reporting, GDPR
- Document review limited to the agreed scope
- Read on positions that would be hard to defend within that area
What you receive
- Synthesis note focused on the agreed area
- Identification of the main vulnerabilities within that area
- Practical corrective direction limited to the scope
Scope is tailored to the project. Not all files need the full perimeter; a focused module may be more useful than a broad sweep.
Fees
Four entry points, four fee levels
Compliance Health Check
From €4,500 excl. VAT
Fixed-scope, fixed-fee engagement. The final fixed fee depends on the number of beneficiaries, documentation volume, urgency, and scope complexity.
Build · Review · Targeted
Indicative fee on scoping excl. VAT
Build, Review, and Targeted are broader or deeper engagements, scoped project by project. An indicative range is shared after the confidential initial discussion and written scope.
The final fee depends on the project stage, documentation volume, number of beneficiaries, urgency, and scope complexity.
Statutory audit and assurance engagements. EU City does not perform statutory audit, certification, or assurance engagements. Such work is referred to an independent qualified audit firm on request.
Confidential internal advisory only. None of the four entry points is a statutory audit, certification, assurance engagement, or an official opinion for authorities.
Please note. EU Grant Risk & Compliance Advisory — including Compliance Health Check, Build, Review, and Targeted — is confidential internal advisory. It is not a statutory audit, not a regulated audit, not a certification, not an assurance engagement, and not a legal opinion intended for authorities. It does not replace programme-specific, statutory, accounting, or legal obligations, and it does not guarantee the absence of findings, cost rejections, financial corrections, or recoveries.
Discuss your grant risk situation.
A senior, confidential first exchange.