Open Recommendations

We recommend that USAID's Office of Acquisition and Assistance Cost, Audit and Support Division/Contract Audit Management Branch determine the allowability of $1,389,642 in questioned costs USAID Office of Inspector General ($1,389,642 unsupported) on page 34 of the audit report and recover any amount that is unallowable.

We recommend that USAID's Office of Acquisition and Assistance Cost, Audit and Support Division/Contract Audit Management Branch verify that Pathfinder corrects the one material weakness in internal
control detailed on page 34 of the audit report.

We recommend that USAID/Tanzania verify that Christian Social Services Commission corrects the one material weakness in internal control detailed on page 40 of the audit report.

We recommend that USAID/Tanzania verify that Christian Social Services Commission corrects the two instances of material noncompliance detailed on pages 43 and 44 of the audit report.

We recommend that USAID/West Africa verify that ECOWAS Regional Agency for Agriculture and Food corrects the two instances of material noncompliance detailed on pages 13 and 14 of the audit report.

We recommend that USADF Department of Financial Management and Finance and Chief Financial Officer: Reassess the Funds Held Outside of Treasury reconciliation process for ways to improve the process to maximize the use of electronic records and bank access.

We recommend that USADF Department of Financial Management and Finance and Chief Financial Officer: Reassess the Funds Held Outside of Treasury reconciliation process for ways to improve the process to address inactive accounts and close accounts as necessary.

We recommend that USADF Department of Financial Management and Finance and Chief Financial Officer: Revisit the current policy and procedures related to the recording of financial transactions and reconciliation of bank accounts for the Funds Held Outside of Treasury accounts and make the appropriate changes to ensure that the trial balance and financial statements reflect the true course of events that occurred in their appropriate period.

Perform an assessment of employee resources in the Office of Financial Management, Planning, and Evaluation, and other relevant financial process areas to ensure an appropriate complement of resources are in place to manage accounting and reporting matters as they arise and through their normal course of business.

Provide training and supervision for personnel on financial management matters that affect the financial statements, including adhering to accounting policies and procedures, as appropriate, performing key internal control functions in support of financial reporting.

Develop desktop manuals to assist personnel in meeting their assigned responsibilities.

Improve the risk assessment process at the financial statement assertion and process level to ensure that CPSC management is appropriately capturing significant changes in the control environment and subsequently responding to those risks.

Implement key monitoring controls over the financial reporting process and develop robust policies and procedures to increase oversight, review, and accountability of accounting events at the process level to ensure the successful implementation of an effective internal control environment.

Improve the communication process between offices within the CPSC to ensure relevant and necessary financial reporting information requirements are communicated timely to achieve financial reporting requirements.

Enhance design, policies, and procedures related to monitoring and oversight of internal controls related to journal entries.

Review the existing roles for both journal entries and the compensating control of journal entry log recordation, and update as appropriate to ensure segregation of duties.

Provide training on the importance of internal control and segregation of duties based on updated policies and procedures.

Document their understanding of the acquisition process and determination of the appropriate recognition date of PP&E in order to update and enhance policies and procedures to align with the requirements of the applicable financial reporting standards.

Design and implement processes and controls in accordance with those updated policies and procedures to ensure PP&E balances are completely and accurately recorded in the general ledger.

Establish recurring communication with the appropriate stakeholders to ensure necessary information is available for analysis.

Design and implement processes and controls for accountable property to ensure accountable property is completely and accurately tracked.

Formalize and document a policy over prepaid expenses, including consideration of compliance with Generally Accepted Accounting Principles.

Design a control to identify, analyze, and respond to risks related to the reporting of pre-paid expenses.

We recommend that HHS update its enterprise architecture system inventory and software/hardware asset inventories to include the information systems and components that are active on the HHS network. HHS should utilize the inventories to continuously monitor assets and identify and remediate vulnerabilities timely to better manage the risks to these assets.

We recommend that HHS complete implementation of a cybersecurity risk management strategy to assess and respond to identified risks within the agency and identified across OpDivs, watch for new risks, and monitor risks and confirm implementation. The strategy should define a standardized process to accept and monitor risks that cannot be adequately mitigated.