“We are right in the peak season for Education Grant and so the purpose of this session is to help you better understand what we can easily call the complex policy for Education Grant.”

These were the opening remarks from Ms. Jana Warming, Service Delivery Manager for Education Grant, Claims and Travel Section of the Regional Service Centre Entebbe (RSCE) as she opened the first in a series of Education Grant Clinics for the RSCE client missions.

The Education Grant Service Line (EGSL) that processes Education Grants for all the eligible UN staff members in the peacekeeping and small political offices in Africa, hosted colleagues from the United Nations Office for West Africa and The Sahel (UNOWAS) and Cameroon-Nigeria Mixed Commission (CNMC) via a virtual Microsoft Teams call this afternoon.

In his detailed presentation, Drissa Soro, Team Lead for Team 2, spelled out the types of EG and eligibility for each, all related policies, admissible expenses and explained how to fill out the various forms related to EG.

He informed the colleagues that in the processing of EG, the team relies on the latest policies and advised the team to encourage their colleagues to familiarize themselves with all the current changes and urged the need to use the latest forms issued by UNHQ. He emphasized the requirement to provide a breakdown of the eligible fees to enable the process EG faster and to avoid the back and forth that is synonymous with the peak season.

The team took the opportunity to clarify on the sliding scale on how EG is reimbursed, a topic that many staff member seemed to have an issue with. They also reminded staff of the need to submit EG claims and advances in a timely manner as they are time barred especially since exceptional rule set up during COVID19 pandemic had been cancelled.

Ms. Warming assured UNOWAS staff that since EG is processed once a year, she and her team are organizing the clinics as part of their outreach strategy to help eligible staff with accurate and complete submission of EG claims in pursuance of excellent service.