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Brought to you by the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency
Federal Reports
Report Date
Agency Reviewed / Investigated
Report Title
Type
Location
Department of Defense
Management Advisory: The Military Services Should Fully Comply with DoD Requirements When Responding to Complaints Related to Harassment over Electronic Communications or Social Media
Our objective was to determine whether USDA’s password management practices effectively prevented the use of passwords that are commonly used, expected, or compromised.
We performed an audit of costs billed to the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) by Wright Brothers Contracting, Inc. (Wright Brothers) for site grading services and materials under Contract No. 16512. The contract provided for TVA to compensate Wright Brothers for work on a fixed price basis for deliverables and materials and on a time and material (T&M) basis for performance of the work. Our audit objectives were to determine (1) if costs were billed in accordance with the contract terms and (2) the reasonableness of TVA’s process for evaluating and awarding proposed fixed price tasks issued under the contract. Our audit scope included approximately $28.7 million in costs paid by TVA between September 3, 2021, and May 31, 2024. This included approximately $24.5 million for 17 fixed price tasks and $4.2 million for one T&M task.
In summary, we determined:
• Wright Brothers billed TVA $1,401,563 in T&M billings for cost categories that were not included in the contract, Wright Brothers proposal, or TVA’s purchase order. Additionally, the proposal and invoice documentation did not provide adequate detail for a field invoice approver to effectively review invoices. • Wright Brothers billed TVA $49,355 in unsupported T&M costs, including (1) $43,860 in unsupported equipment costs and (2) $5,495 in unsupported labor costs. (Note: $11,320 of the $49,355 unsupported cost were also included in the $1,401,563 ineligible T&M billings.) • There were opportunities to strengthen TVA’s process for evaluating and awarding fixed price tasks. Specifically, TVA did not always compete fixed price tasks as required by the contract. In addition, when TVA received only one bid for a fixed price task, there were no policies or guidance for steps TVA should take to ensure the fairness of the fixed price amount.
Termination Memorandum – Audit of the Department of the Treasury‘s Pre-award Process for the SSBCI Program Funds for Socially and Economically Disadvantaged Business Owners for States, U.S. Territories, and Tribal Governments
The VA OIG conducted this review to determine whether VA complied with the requirements of the Payment Integrity Information Act of 2019 (PIIA) for FY 2024. PIIA requires federal agencies to identify and review all programs and activities they administer that may be susceptible to significant improper payments based on OMB guidance. PIIA also requires each OIG to review its agency’s improper payment reports and issue an annual report. In FY 2024, VA reported improper and unknown payment estimates totaling $2.2 billion for seven programs. Of that amount, $1.1 billion (about 50 percent) represented a monetary loss, and the remaining $1.1 billion was considered either a nonmonetary loss that cannot be recovered or an unknown payment. These results represent a reduction of about $1 billion (32 percent) from FY 2023 results. VA satisfied five of the six requirements under PIIA. VA did not meet requirement 6 because it did not report an improper and unknown payment rate of less than 10 percent for two programs that had estimates in the materials accompanying their financial statements. VA met additional requirements for high-priority programs by providing quarterly updates to OMB that included plans to prevent and recover monetary losses from improper payments. The OIG recommended the under secretary for benefits reduce improper and unknown payments to below 10 percent for the Pension Program—a repeat recommendation from the previous two fiscal years’ reports—and the under secretary for health reduce improper and unknown payments to below 10 percent for the Purchased Long-Term Services and Supports Program—a repeat recommendation each year since the OIG’s first PIIA report for FY 2020.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Office of Inspector General conducted this audit to examine locality pay for employees working in a telework and remote work status. The objective was to determine whether the EPA ensures employees are paid the correct locality pay in accordance with regulations and policy.
Summary of Findings
The EPA cannot ensure that employees are paid the correct locality pay because it does not have comprehensive or reliable data to verify employees’ worksite locations. Without a mechanism to verify an employee’s worksite location against his or her locality pay, the Agency remains at risk of overpaying or underpaying employees.
