Federal Reports

To see our report, click on the link below

To see our report, click on the link below

Extraterritorial Offices of Exchange (ETOEs) are businesses operated by – or in connection with – foreign postal operators. ETOEs perform a wide range of postal functions that can vary by country, but generally include consolidating, documenting, and transporting outbound international mail. Since the early 1960s, organizations have been using a practice called “remailing,” in which they bypass the national postal operator for delivery of outbound international mail service in order to access lower rates. The term ETOEs was later coined to describe this practice of foreign postal operators seeking to send dispatches directly to other countries from countries outside their own territories.The recent growth in the international mailing and shipping market — recently estimated to be $1.5 trillion — will likely continue to fuel discussions on the role and impact of ETOEs and the terminal dues system. ETOEs were a topic taken up during the 2016 UPU Congress and UPU member countries agreed on changes to the terminal dues system during that meeting, but it continues to be a topic of debate among the international mailing and shipping community. The future of ETOEs and their operations in the U.S. is unclear. This paper explores ETOE operations, their oversight structure, and stakeholder perspectives.

Program Integrity

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During this semiannual period, we issued several reports across a variety of topics. We reported on the effectiveness of controls for the Library’s financial management system as part of the audit of the Library’s fiscal year 2016 financial statements, the Library’s use of appropriated funds for mass deacidification activities, and the internal controls of the Library’s purchase card program. We also continued our focus on information technology-related issues and reported on the Library’s implementation of System Development Life Cycle processes, completion of the July 2016 power recovery exercise, and data storage needs.

March 31, 2017 Semiannual Report

This report is the result of a joint review conducted by the Inspectors General for the Intelligence Community, Department of Homeland Security, and Department of Justice.

Independent Readiness Review of FTC Management’s Implementation of the Digital Accountability and Transparency Act of 2014

The EEOC is heavily dependent on its FSSP, IBC, for its Data Act implementation and reporting. EEOC has performed some of the recommended steps from the DATA Act Playbook and has collaborated with IBC to ensure the accuracy and completeness of data to be reported on behalf of EEOC. The four steps that EEOC performed were:Organize team, Review Elements, Inventory Data, and Design and Strategize. The EEOC needs to specifically document roles and responsibilities between the EEOC and IBC. Additionally, EEOC should develop a comprehensive implementation plan at the agency level even if it is relying on its FSSP to report DATA Act information on its behalf. Though it appears that IBC is on track in meeting DATA Act reporting requirements by May 2017, according to a report issued by the DOI’s OIG in December 2016, EEOC has the ultimate responsibility of ensuring the accuracy, quality, completeness, and timeliness of the data reported on its behalf.

Our review determined that EEOC is on track to meet the reporting requirements of theDigital Accountability and Transparency Act. We did include three suggestions formanagement’s consideration. Also we have included management’s comments in ourreport.

Over half of the Medicaid payments that Ohio's Department of Medicaid made to providers for full vials of Herceptin were incorrect. Of the 248 line items reviewed, 135 (54 percent) were incorrect and resulted in overpayments of about $142,000 ($91,000 Federal share). The 113 remaining line items were correct.

Audit Report

We audited the Tennessee Valley Authority's (TVA) corporate card transactions from October 1, 2013, through June 30, 2016, totaling $45.2 million to determine the effectiveness of the processes TVA has in place for tax-exempt credit card transactions. We found the processes TVA has in place for tax-exempt corporate card transactions are not effective. Specifically, we identified (1) an estimated $2.48 million of taxes TVA paid on tax-exempt transactions; (2) tax information provided by TVA's credit card supplier, Comdata Network, Inc., was inaccurate; and (3) transactions were approved in TVA's Expense Reimbursement System without adequate support.

The objective of this report was to determine the Denali Commission's readiness to implement the Digital Accountability and Transparency Act requirements. This review is of the process, system and controls the Commission has implemented, or plans to implement, to report federal agency expenditures and linking federal spending information in accordance with the DATA 2014.

The United States Capitol Police (USCP or the Department) Office of Human Resources (OHR) provides human capital strategies and tools for recruiting, hiring, developing, retaining, and transitioning a highly skilled and high-performing workforce to support the Department mission.  The Office of Inspector General (OIG) conducted a performance audit to determine if the Department (1) established adequate internal controls and processes for ensuring compliance with Department policies and (2) complied with applicable policies and procedures as well as applicable laws, regulations, and best practices. The scope included control, processes, and operations surrounding employee performance evaluations during FY 2015 through January 2017.

This is our audit of the Census Bureau’s controls over administrative records and third-party data for decennial census planning. The objective of this audit was to assess the Bureau’s controls for obtaining, using, retaining, and disposing of administrative records and third-party data as part of its planning for the 2020 Census.

The Office of Inspector General examined NASA’s process for ensuring only high-quality parts are used in its launch vehicles, propulsion systems, robots, satellites, telescopes, and other science instruments.

At the request of the Tennessee Valley Authority's (TVA) Supply Chain, we examined the cost proposal submitted by a company for handling and maintenance of coal combustion products. Our examination objective was to determine if the company's cost proposal was fairly stated for a planned <br> $100 million contract. In our opinion, the company's cost proposal contained overstated time and material (T&M) and fixed unit rates as follows:The proposed T&M rates included: (1) markups on third-party equipment rentals not provided for in the draft contract; (2) overstated hourly, daily, and weekly equipment rental rates; (3) overstated hourly craft and noncraft labor rates and noncraft labor classifications for labor costs that are typically recovered through the company's overhead markup rate; and (4) markups on subcontract costs not provided for in the draft contract.The proposed fixed unit rates included overstated equipment, overstated labor, and markups not provided for in the draft contract.We estimated TVA could avoid about $8.934 million on the $100 million contract by negotiating the appropriate reductions to the company's proposed T&M and fixed unit rates.(Summary Only)

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Audit Report

This is our audit of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's (USPTO’s) information technology (IT) security posture. Our objective was to determine whether key security measures are in place to adequately protect USPTO systems that utilize databases to store business information.