Payments from the Sapard agency to the beneficiary shall:

• be made in national currency and debited as appropriate against the Sapard euro account. The payable order(s) to the beneficiary(ies) shall as a general rule be issued within five days of this debit,

• F1be based on declarations of expenditure incurred by the beneficiary. Such declarations shall include only projects selected and expenditure paid from the date of the Commission decision referred to in Article 3(1), except for feasibility and related studies concerning the selected projects and for technical assistance. However, where the Commission determines that an exceptional natural disaster has occurred, payments to beneficiaries for projects related to that disaster may benefit from a derogation replacing the requirement concerning declarations of expenditure by the possibility of payment of advances.

The Community contribution shall be made simultaneously with the national contribution. However, in the case of beneficiaries in the public sector, the national contribution may precede that of the Community.

The total public contribution to the individual measures and to the grants at project level shall be readily identifiable at the level of the Sapard agency.

The Sapard agency shall maintain records of each payment which shall include at least the following information:

• amount in national currency,

• the corresponding amount in euro.

Any overpayment, namely amounts in excess of the sum due, noted by the Sapard agency, shall be recorded without delay in the Sapard euro account and subtracted from the applications for payment to the Commission referred to in Article 10.

The final balance of the assistance shall be paid in accordance with Article 32(4)(a) and (b) of Regulation (EC) No 1260/1999 and after the decisions referred to in Articles 13 and 14 have been adopted.