Federal Reports

Our objective was to determine the accuracy of maintenance employee workhour charges at selected processing facilities in the U.S. Postal Service’s Southern Area.

The VA Office of Inspector General (OIG) investigated an allegation that during fiscal year 2017 an employee of the Hunter Holmes McGuire VA Medical Center (VAMC) in Richmond, Virginia, misused official time by recording overtime and compensatory time in excess of 500 hours and 200 hours, respectively. During its review, the OIG also evaluated the employee’s use of telework. Concurrent with the OIG investigation, the Veterans Integrated Service Network 6 (VISN 6) Financial Quality Assurance Manager audited the time worked by the employee and concluded that the extent of the employee’s additional work hours was known to the VAMC’s management, but that documentation and internal controls governing the use of overtime were insufficient. VISN 6 recommended that the VAMC prioritize the hiring of an additional staff member in the employee’s work group to reduce the need for overtime, and that the VAMC management establish and maintain proper internal control structure over the approval of overtime and compensatory time. The OIG concurred with the findings and recommendations of the VISN 6 audit and made no additional recommendations. The OIG investigation also determined that the employee lacked a telework agreement, and that the employee’s position was not coded in the Personnel and Accounting Integrated Data system as telework eligible. When the employee was alerted to this during the OIG investigation, the employee took corrective action to obtain a telework agreement. The agreement was approved by the employee’s supervisor and the Associate Director of the VAMC. Because remedial action was taken, the OIG made no recommendations.

The VA Office of Inspector General (OIG) Administrative Investigations Division investigated an allegation that an employee in the Veterans Health Administration, Office of Quality, Safety and Value engineered the award of a contract valued in excess of $1 million to a company whose Chief Executive Officer was alleged to be a personal friend. The complainant alleged that an existing contracting vehicle was available to meet the requirement and should have been used to procure the services at issue, and that the employee instead improperly steered the contract to the company run by the employee’s friend. The OIG did not substantiate the allegations.