In most cases, the Award Contract Date field on the opportunity should use the date that the agreement is fully executed. However, the Award Contract Date may be determined based on one of the following criteria if the agreement is not executed in a timely manner. 

• If the agreement is not yet fully executed, but the terms are clearly stated, we should use that date as the award start date in Salesforce. This approach helps maintain transparency and consistency, especially when the intent and scope of the agreement are already defined.
• If the terms are not clearly defined, but a first payment has been received or an invoice issued, that action effectively activates the agreement. In that case, the date of the payment or invoice should serve as the award start date. This is also practical since the award can't be activated in Concur or NetSuite without that first financial transaction. Typically, project activities don’t begin before that point, unless there’s explicit early expense approval—which only happens with a fully executed agreement in place.
• If the agreement isn’t fully executed and there’s no payment or invoice, then we should default to the grant inception date stated in the contract. This date often aligns with when the agreement is fully executed, which keeps us in line with our revenue recognition practices.