Circular No. 116/2015/TT-BTC stipulates financial management for consulting, establishing, applying, maintaining, and improving Quality Management Systems according to the National Standard TCVN ISO 9001:2008 in the operations of administrative state agencies.

CIRCULAR

Regulations on financial management for consulting, establishing, applying, maintaining, and improving the Quality Management System according to National Standard TCVN ISO 9001:2008 in the activities of agencies and organizations under the administrative state system

      Pursuant to Decree No. 60/2003/NĐ-CP dated June 6, 2003 of the Government detailing and guiding the implementation of the Law on State Budget;

      Pursuant to Decree No. 215/2013/NĐ-CP dated December 23, 2013, promulgated by the Government stipulating the functions, tasks, powers, and organizational structure of the Ministry of Finance;

      Pursuant to Decision No. 19/2014/QĐ-TTg dated March 5, 2014 of the Prime Minister on applying the Quality Management System according to National Standard TCVN ISO 9001:2008 in the activities of agencies and organizations under the administrative state system;

       At the proposal of the Director of the Administrative and Public Service Financial Department;

      The Minister of Finance issues this Circular regulating financial management for consulting, establishing, applying, maintaining, and improving the Quality Management System according to National Standard TCVN ISO 9001:2008 in the activities of agencies and organizations under the administrative state system.

PART I

GENERAL PROVISIONS

Article 1. Scope of Regulation and Applicability

2. Applicability:

This Circular regulates financial management for activities including: consulting, establishing, applying, maintaining, and improving the Quality Management System according to National Standard TCVN ISO 9001:2008 (hereinafter referred to as the Quality Management System); propaganda, training, inspection, hiring certification organizations to cooperate in inspection, and other related activities prescribed in Decision No. 19/2014/QĐ-TTg dated March 5, 2014 of the Prime Minister on applying the Quality Management System according to National Standard TCVN ISO 9001:2008 in the activities of agencies and organizations under the administrative state system (hereinafter referred to as Decision No. 19/2014/QĐ-TTg).

第二条 组织和实施奖励工作的支出水平，如政府第152/2025/NĐ-CP号决定关于分级授权和奖励领域的分权规定

a) Agencies and organizations under the administrative state system as stipulated in Clause 1, Article 2 of Decision No. 19/2014/QĐ-TTg (hereinafter referred to as the agency);

b) Consulting organizations, independent consultants performing consulting activities to establish the Quality Management System for agencies;

c) Certification organizations hired by Ministries, ministerial-level agencies, and the Vietnam Social Security (hereinafter referred to as Ministries and sectors); People's Committees of provinces and centrally-administered cities (hereinafter referred to as People's Committee of province) to cooperate in inspecting the establishment, application, maintenance, and improvement of the Quality Management System at agencies under Ministries and sectors, localities;

d) Training bases for consulting and evaluation of the Quality Management System for consultants and evaluators implementing consulting and evaluation activities of the Quality Management System at agencies;

đ) Leading units implementing the tasks of Ministries and sectors, provincial People's Committees;

e) Managing agencies and related organizations and individuals.

3. Encourages the subjects stipulated in Clause 2, Article 2 of Decision No. 19/2014/QĐ-TTg to implement consulting, establishing, applying, and maintaining the improvement of the Quality Management System in their own units according to the provisions of this Circular.

Article 2. Sources of Funds

a) Annual state budget funds according to the provisions of the Law on State Budget;

b) Sponsorship and aid;

c) Other lawful revenue sources of Ministries and sectors, localities.

Chapter II

SPECIFIC PROVISIONS

Article 4. Contents of Expenditure

1. Contents of expenditures implemented by agencies:

a) Expenditures for building framework models of the Quality Management System (hereinafter referred to as framework models);

b) Expenditures for propaganda, dissemination, learning experiences, surveys, statistics on the application of the Quality Management System in agencies;

c) Expenditures for office supplies, materials, travel expenses, leasing assets (if any);

d) Expenditures for training and familiarizing with knowledge on establishing, applying, maintaining, improving, expanding, and perfecting the Quality Management System;

đ) Expenditures for compiling guidance documents, work procedures;

e) Expenditures for internal assessment activities;

g) Expenditures for maintaining, improving, expanding, and perfecting the Quality Management System;

h) Expenditures for direct implementation activities of establishing and applying the Quality Management System by Ministries and sectors, provincial People's Committees;

i) Expenditures for the activities of the Ministry of Science and Technology implementing Decision No. 19/2014/QĐ-TTg;

k) Expenditures for inspection activities of establishing, applying, announcing, maintaining, improving, expanding, and perfecting the Quality Management System, including:

- Training on inspection of the establishment, application, announcement, and maintenance, improvement, expansion, and perfection of the Quality Management System;

- Hiring certification organizations to cooperate in inspecting the establishment, application, announcement, and maintenance, improvement, expansion, and perfection of the Quality Management System (if any);

- Specialized conferences to implement inspection activities;

- Travel expenses, leasing transportation means (if any) for inspection activities.

l) Other direct expenditures related to the implementation of contents on establishing, applying, announcing, maintaining, improving, expanding, perfecting, and inspecting the Quality Management System.

2. Contents of expenditures for hiring consulting services to perform the following tasks:

a) Organizing assessments of the current quality management work in agencies before establishing the Quality Management System;

b) Implementing training, including:

- Training on the Quality Management System;

- Training on how to build document systems and work procedures;

- Internal audit training.

c) Guiding the establishment of document systems and work procedures for application in agencies; guiding the expansion of the scope of application of the Quality Management System, ensuring all administrative procedures are included in the Quality Management System (hereinafter referred to as expanding the Quality Management System);

d) Guiding the implementation of internal audits, corrective actions, maintenance, improvement, and expansion of the Quality Management System.

Article 4. Budget Framework for Expenditure

The expenditures for consulting, establishing, applying, announcing, maintaining, improving, expanding, and perfecting the Quality Management System, publicity, training, inspection, and hiring certification organizations to conduct inspections shall be carried out according to the current financial expenditure system (travel expenses, conference fees, seminar fees, training and capacity building costs, investigation and survey costs, inspection costs, publicity costs, construction of regulatory documents, procurement of goods and equipment, rental of transportation means, etc.) and certain special expenditure items shall be implemented according to the following provisions:

1. Expenditure levels for agencies without a framework model:

a) For Ministries and sectors:

- Expenditure on activities involving the hiring of consulting organizations:

+ For agencies establishing the Quality Management System for the first time: maximum expenditure of 100 million VND per agency.

+ For agencies expanding the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 65 million VND per agency.

- Expenditure on activities conducted by the agency itself (excluding funding for framework model construction; maintenance and improvement funding; inspection activity funding):

+ For the first-time establishment of the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 130 million VND per agency.

+ For expanding the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 100 million VND per agency.

Among which: the maximum expenditure for constructing one work process to apply within the agency is 2.5 million VND per process.

b) For agencies at the General Department, Bureau level under Ministries and equivalent:

- Expenditure on activities involving the hiring of consulting organizations:

+ For agencies establishing the Quality Management System for the first time: maximum expenditure of 80 million VND per agency.

+ For agencies expanding the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 50 million VND per agency.

- Expenditure on activities conducted by the agency itself (excluding funding for framework model construction; maintenance and improvement funding; inspection activity funding):

+ For the first-time establishment of the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 80 million VND per agency.

+ For expanding the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 50 million VND per agency.

Among which: the maximum expenditure for constructing one work process to apply within the agency is 2.5 million VND per process.

2. Expenditure levels for agencies with a framework model:

a) For provincial People's Committees:

- Expenditure on activities involving the hiring of consulting organizations:

+ For agencies establishing the Quality Management System for the first time: maximum expenditure of 60 million VND per agency.

+ For agencies expanding the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 30 million VND per agency.

- Expenditure on activities conducted by the agency itself (excluding funding for framework model construction; maintenance and improvement funding; inspection activity funding):

+ For the first-time establishment of the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 65 million VND per agency.

+ For expanding the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 50 million VND per agency.

Among which: the maximum expenditure for constructing one work process to apply within the agency is 2 million VND per process.

b) For district People's Committees; specialized agencies under provincial People's Committees; vertical sector agencies at the Bureau level located in localities under Ministries and sectors and equivalent:

- Expenditure on activities involving the hiring of consulting organizations:

+ For agencies establishing the Quality Management System for the first time: maximum expenditure of 45 million VND per agency.

+ For agencies expanding the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 25 million VND per agency.

- Expenditure on activities conducted by the agency itself (excluding funding for framework model construction; maintenance and improvement funding; inspection activity funding):

+ For the first-time establishment of the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 50 million VND per agency.

+ For expanding the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 40 million VND per agency.

Among which: the maximum expenditure for constructing one work process to apply within the agency is 2 million VND per process.

c) For agencies at the Branch Office level or equivalent under Bureau-level or Department-level agencies; specialized agencies under district People's Committees:

- Expenditure on activities involving the hiring of consulting organizations:

+ For agencies establishing the Quality Management System for the first time: maximum expenditure of 33 million VND per agency.

+ For agencies expanding the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 20 million VND per agency.

- Expenditure on activities conducted by the agency itself (excluding funding for framework model construction; maintenance and improvement funding; inspection activity funding):

+ For the first-time establishment of the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 40 million VND per agency.

+ For expanding the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 25 million VND per agency.

Among which: the maximum expenditure for constructing one work process to apply within the agency is 2 million VND per process.

d) In cases where village, town, township People's Committees, and public service units establish and apply the Quality Management System according to National Standard TCVN ISO 9001:2008, the maximum expenditure will be 80% of the expenditure levels specified in point c, Clause 2, Article 4 of this Circular.

3. In cases where independent experts are hired for consultation, the head of the agency decides the expert's remuneration within the range of 2.8 to 7.4 million VND per person per month, and the total remuneration does not exceed 80% of the cost of hiring consulting organizations as stipulated in Clause 1 and Clause 2, Article 4 of this Circular.

4. Consulting organizations and independent consulting experts must meet the requirements regarding capability and conditions as prescribed in Article 7 of Decision No. 19/2014/QĐ-TTg and Circular No. 26/2014/TT-BKHCN dated October 10, 2014, issued by the Ministry of Science and Technology detailing the implementation of Decision No. 19/2014/QD-TTg dated March 5, 2014, of the Prime Minister on the application of the Quality Management System according to National Standard TCVN ISO 9001:2008 for agencies and organizations under the administrative state apparatus.

5. Expenditure levels for agencies that self-establish the Quality Management System without hiring consultants:

For agencies with staff capable of self-establishing the Quality Management System without needing to hire consultants for part or all of the consulting activities, the head of the agency will enter into a contract with the person performing the work based on a lump-sum payment not exceeding 85% of the consultant fee as stipulated in Clause 1 and Clause 2, Article 4 of this Circular, according to the volume of work assigned within the overall consulting activity.

6. Expenditure levels for regular maintenance and improvement activities of the Quality Management System of the agency: maximum expenditure of 15 million VND per year.

7. Expenditure levels for activities to build a framework model of the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 12 million VND per framework model.

8. Expenditure levels for hiring certification organizations to cooperate in inspecting the establishment, application, announcement, maintenance, improvement, expansion, and perfection of the Quality Management System: maximum expenditure of 5 million VND per agency.

The levels of expenditure specified in Clauses 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, and 8 of this Article are the maximum levels of expenditure. Based on the performance of tasks and the financial capacity of each agency, the heads of agencies shall determine appropriate expenditure levels for uniform implementation within their agencies and bear legal responsibility for their decisions.

For other related expenditures that have not been prescribed with expenditure levels by the competent authority, they shall be implemented according to the expenditure levels of similar tasks or settled according to the actual contract costs within the unit's financial resources and must be approved by the competent authority.

Article 5. Budget preparation, execution, and settlement of funds

The preparation of budgets, management, allocation, settlement, and finalization of funds for task implementation shall be carried out in accordance with the State Budget Law and relevant documents. This Circular provides detailed guidance on certain matters as follows:

1. Annually, at the time of preparing the state budget, agencies shall base their budget estimates for implementing advisory, development, application, publication, maintenance, improvement, expansion, and completion of the Quality Management System, training, publicity, inspection plans, and the provisions set forth in this Circular, detailing the budget for specific tasks from sources such as central government budget, local government budget, funding and aid, and other lawful revenues, and consolidate them into their own state budget estimates to submit to the competent authority for approval in accordance with regulations.

2. The operating funds of the Ministry of Science and Technology for implementing tasks as stipulated in Article 13 of Decision No. 19/2014/QĐ-TTg shall be balanced and allocated in the annual state budget estimate of the Ministry of Science and Technology.

3. The allocation, assignment, utilization, and settlement of funds for implementation shall be carried out in accordance with current regulations.

Chapter III

IMPLEMENTATION

Article 6. Implementation Provisions

1. This Circular takes effect from October 26, 2015, and replaces Circular No. 159/2010/TT-BTC dated October 15, 2010, issued by the Ministry of Finance, which regulates financial management for the development, application, and maintenance of the Quality Management System according to the national standard TCVN ISO 9001:2008 in the operations of administrative state agencies.

2. During the implementation process, if there are any difficulties, agencies and units are advised to report to the Ministry of Finance for consideration and resolution./.