# Assigning account roles for indirect rates

- URL: https://www.usewisecost.com/help/reports-and-audit-trail/indirect-rates-assigning-pools-to-accounts
- Audience: Admins
- Last updated: 2026-09-19
- Part of the WiseCost Help Center: https://www.usewisecost.com/help

> Give each QuickBooks account a role in Company Setup → Accounts (fringe, overhead, G&A, facilities, unallowable) so WiseCost can calculate your rates.

Your indirect rates depend on how your accounts are grouped into cost pools. In WiseCost you do that by giving each account a role in **Company Setup → Accounts**. The Indirect Rate report then groups your QuickBooks Online transactions by role and calculates fringe, overhead and G&A.

**Who can do this:** an Administrator, ideally with the company's CPA.

## What a role is

A **cost pool** is a group of indirect costs that is allocated together, such as fringe, overhead or G&A. An account's **role** tells WiseCost which pool or base the account belongs to: a direct cost, fringe, overhead labor, overhead non-labor, G&A, facilities or unallowable.

## Assign roles

1. Go to **Company Setup → Accounts**. You see your QuickBooks Online chart of accounts. Use the search box and the role filter to work through it.
2. Optional: click **Suggest with AI** to get a suggested role for your accounts. Treat it as a draft and review every suggestion.
3. On each account, choose the role in the **Role** column.

[Screenshot: Chart of accounts with a role selector per account and the Suggest with AI button]

Overhead is split into **Overhead: Labor** and **Overhead: Non-Labor**, so the report can show both parts of the pool.

[Screenshot: Expense accounts assigned to overhead and facilities roles]

## Two special roles

- **Unallowable:** costs the government does not reimburse. They stay out of every pool and are included in the G&A base.
- **Facilities (split):** costs such as rent or janitorial that serve both overhead and G&A. They are split between the two, and you document the allocation basis in the Indirect Rate report.

## What happens next

1. **WiseCost calculates the rates.** Each pool is divided by its allocation base. Because labor is posted by Labor Distribution from approved hours, your labor base comes from actuals, not estimates.
2. **Rates flow into your reports.** See them in the [Indirect Rate report](https://www.usewisecost.com/help/reports-and-audit-trail/indirect-rate-report), and applied per contract in the [P&L report](https://www.usewisecost.com/help/reports-and-audit-trail/p-and-l-report).

Accounts with an indirect labor role are also the ones you can enable for [internal and indirect time](https://www.usewisecost.com/help/time-tracking/internal-and-indirect-time).

Getting pool assignments right is the foundation of defensible rates. If you're unsure how to classify an account, your CPA is the right person to ask, and the same expense can belong to different pools depending on your structure.

## Common questions

### Can I trust the AI suggestions?

Use them as a starting draft. You decide the role of every account, and your CPA should review the result.

### I changed a role. Do I need to do anything else?

Run the Indirect Rate report again. Reports already in History keep the roles they were generated with.

## Further reading

- [Cost Pools Explained: The Five Building Blocks of a DCAA-Compliant Chart of Accounts](https://www.usewisecost.com/blog/chart-of-accounts-cost-pools-govcon)
- [How to Classify Any Transaction Into the Right Cost Pool](https://www.usewisecost.com/blog/how-to-classify-transactions-cost-pools-govcon)
- [The Right Chart of Accounts for GovCon in QuickBooks Online](https://www.usewisecost.com/blog/govcon-chart-of-accounts-quickbooks)