Division 1.1.3 Legal status according to the Rules for Participation for FP7 (Categories of legal entities)F1

The FP7 RP (as well as, in certain cases, the Work Programme and the call for proposals) refer to different categories of legal entities. These differences are mainly based on the legal status and/or characteristics of the legal entity.

According to the category(ies) of legal entities to which it belongs, a legal entity may have different rights and obligations, in particular with respect to:

• rights in terms of the EU financial contribution to a participant (including its maximum level of funding);

• whether or not a financial capacity check of a legal entity will be mandatory;

• whether or not a competent public officer is allowed to certify the financial statement(s);

• the financial responsibility in the implementation of the indirect action (cf implementation modalities of the Participants' Guarantee Fund).

The main categories of legal entities that shall be identified are the following:

The verification of the eligibility criteria that are introduced in specific funding schemes and/or in specific calls for proposals will also be part of the categorization exercise.

As a general rule, if a legal entity may be categorized in different categories the validation services shall consider the most favourable one for this legal entity in terms of rights and/or obligations.

Even if the participant loses its status/category of non-profit public body, secondary and higher education establishment, research organisation or SME, he/she will retain the advantages of this status for the signed grant agreements for the whole duration (unless it can be shown that the status/category granted was based on false declarations or manipulated intentionally with the sole purpose of obtaining the FP7 grant). However, participants must inform the validation services whenever such change occurs. If the participant signs another grant agreement after having lost the respective status it will not qualify to have the status.