How-to guides
Budgeting participation: facilitation, venues, participant compensation
A Horizon Europe budget has no line called participation. The costs of a workshop series, a citizens' panel or a citizen science campaign are split across personnel, subcontracting and purchase costs. Where an item goes depends mainly on whether it is an action task described in Annex 1 (the description of the action) or only something needed to carry out a task. The rules below come from the Annotated Grant Agreement (AGA), version 2.0 of 1 April 2025, the Commission's commentary on the grant agreement and the version on the Funding and Tenders Portal in October 2026.
Where each cost goes
| Cost item | Budget category | What the AGA says |
|---|---|---|
| Your own staff designing, recruiting and facilitating | A. Personnel | Covers employees of the beneficiary. |
| An external organisation running a whole engagement task | B. Subcontracting | Covers parts of the project described in Annex 1 that the beneficiary does not implement itself. Best value for money, no conflict of interests. |
| Rooms and catering for a meeting | C.3 Other goods, works and services | Given as an example of a purchase, as long as organising the meeting is not itself a subcontracted action task. |
| Travel and accommodation of invited citizens | C.1 Travel and subsistence | Eligible for persons taking part on an ad-hoc basis, if their participation is foreseen in Annex 1 or justified in the periodic report and approved. |
| Vouchers for participants | Purchase costs | Support in kind, such as vouchers, is not financial support to third parties and is declared elsewhere, for example as a purchase of vouchers. |
| Cash grants or prizes to third parties | D.1 Financial support to third parties | Only where the call conditions provide for it, with the conditions set out in Annex 1. |
The 25% flat rate for indirect costs is not applied to subcontracting or to financial support to third parties, so a facilitator hired as a subcontractor adds nothing to your indirect costs.
What the AGA does not say
AGA version 2.0 has no annotation on paying citizens a fee for their time. Vouchers for people outside the project appear only in the section on financial support to third parties. A category for volunteers' work (A.5) exists, but Horizon Europe is not among the programmes listed for it. Where a C.3 cost is in doubt, the AGA advises contacting the granting authority.
In the proposal
The standard application form for RIA and IA, version 5.1 of 22 January 2026, asks you to justify subcontracting in table 3.1g and notes that core tasks should not be subcontracted. Table 3.1h covers only equipment above 15% of a participant's personnel costs. No table covers venues, catering or vouchers, so the work package text is the place to name them.
In a lump sum grant you still estimate these costs. How to manage your lump sum grants, version 1.5 of 1 June 2026 asks for realistic estimates per cost category, beneficiary and work package, under the same eligibility rules as actual cost grants. Actual costs are not reported afterwards.
Published figures on paying participants
The Commission documents give no rates.
- The UK National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) publishes payment guidance, version 1.9 of December 2025. Its benchmark rates are £27.50 for about one hour or less, £82.50 for about half a day and £165 for an all-day meeting, described as a thank-you payment, not a wage. It also lists childcare and carer costs, catering (coffee and buffet lunch at £10-20 per head) and an independent facilitator (upwards of around £500 per day). NIHR treats public involvement and taking part in a study as a participant as separate budgets.
- The OECD report Innovative Citizen Participation and New Democratic Institutions (2020) found that participants were compensated in some way in 57% of the 172 deliberative processes with data: 44% paid them, 7% covered transport and 6% covered expenses. The OECD good practice principles name remuneration, expenses, childcare and eldercare as ways to support inclusion.
Both sources warn that payments can affect a participant's social security benefits. The NIHR figures are UK benchmarks for health research, not EU rates.
Sources
- Annotated Grant Agreement, version 2.0, 1 April 2025
- Standard Application Form (HE RIA and IA), version 5.1, 22 January 2026
- How to manage your lump sum grants, version 1.5, 1 June 2026
- NIHR payment guidance, version 1.9, December 2025
- OECD (2020), Innovative Citizen Participation, chapter 4
- OECD (2020), Good practice principles