SME owner daily rates in EU projects: good news!
Intro
Are you managing the financial reporting of an EU-funded project for an SME and wondering how to monetize the cost of the owners working on the project without a salary? Or maybe you are the owner working “for free” on your company’s main project, and would like to know which unit cost to apply?
Either way, keep reading. We have very interesting news for you!
Background
In the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7), the European Commission introduced a unit cost rate for SME owners participating in EU-funded projects. The rate established a value for the work of owners that were dedicating hours to the project without a salary and could not charge their costs as personnel costs in financial reports. This unit cost option for SME owners has been maintained until now and is applicable also to Horizon Europe.
The current rate for SME owners is a daily rate established at the Grant Agreement level, in Annex 2a. A specific country-coefficient correction is also established so the daily is different for each country participating in the Horizon Europe program.
The update
On August 1st 2025, 4 years after the start of the Horizon Europe program, the European Commission updated Annex 2a of the Annotated Model Grant Agreement with a new SME owner rate.
The new daily rate is 485,85 Euros multiplied by the coefficient of the country where the SME is located. The daily rate is obtained by dividing the monthly cost of 8745,40 by 18, the number of days the EC considers as monthly working days according to the methodology for the personnel costs calculation in Horizon Europe.
The increase in the daily rate is quite significant, as the previous one was of 282,22 Euros, corresponding to 5080,00 Euros divided by 18 days.
Who can use it?
Many have been waiting for this update for a while, but unfortunately it only applies to EU-funded projects submitted in calls from the 30th of July 2024 onward.
So be very careful. If your project was funded under a call closing before that date, you must keep using the previous lower daily rate.
Positive impact
The increase of the SME owner rate is definitely good news. The updated SME unit cost will allow small companies to build the project budget more precisely in terms of personnel costs at the proposal stage.
However, if the project is granted, the question remains whether the new rates are close enough to the reality, especially considering that in small companies, SME owners are quite often part of the top management team. It´s good to see that the Commission continues to update the rates over time.
On December 15th 2025, another update of Annex 2 a has been published increasing the amount per unit (daily rate) from 485,85 to 515,06 for call with opening date as from December 16th 2025.
Want more about how to make the most of the updated SME owner rates? Get in touch: [email protected]
