Contractor Use of Purchasing Cards

The Office of the Inspector General included an audit of contractor use of TVA’s purchasing cards in its fiscal year 2021 Audit Plan, based on the significant amount of charges made using TVA purchasing cards assigned to contractors. The objective of the audit was to determine if adequate controls were in place to ensure purchases made by TVA contractors using a TVA purchasing card were (1) for TVA business purposes and not the use of another entity and (2) not being billed back to TVA. We found controls were generally adequate to ensure purchases made by TVA contractors using a TVA purchasing card were for TVA business purposes and not the use of another entity. However we also determined (1) TVA does not have controls in place to ensure purchases made by contractor employees assigned a TVA purchasing card are not being billed back to TVA on invoices from the contractor, (2) required language to govern contractor’s usage and liability for purchasing cards issued to TVA contractors is not included in contracts, and (3) over 50 percent of the transactions we tested were not reconciled by the cardholder in a timely manner, resulting in untimely approval by the approving official.