Open Recommendations

We recommend that Retirement Services develop and implement additional cost-effective corrective actions, aimed at the root causes of improper payments, to further reduce the improper payments rate.

The Mint Director ensures the Mint considers additional procedures to oversee refiners including, but not limited to, obtaining and periodically reviewing documentation from the Mint’s approved refineries, such as the LBMA-required third party audits and supporting documentation, to ensure that refineries are sourcing gold responsibly in accordance with U.S. law and the best interests of the U.S. Government.

The Mint Director ensures the Mint within 30 days of issuance of this report, develops a plan that outlines the steps and controls the Mint will implement to comply with Public Law 99-185 and Public Law 109-145 in the production of gold coins which includes a review of the Mint’s current methodology to ensure it complies with U.S. law. As part of this review, the Mint should publish its procedures for acquiring newly mined U.S. gold in the Federal Register. Furthermore, the Mint needs to update its website for accuracy and its BOAs and operating procedures to ensure that these…

Review the two loans in our sample that did not receive appropriate servicing and take administrative actions if appropriate.

We recommend that the Chief Financial Officer for the Department develop and implement procedures to ensure that thesampling populations of drawdowns are complete for the basis of calculating the improper payment and unknown paymentestimates.

We recommend that the Chief Financial Officer for the Department ensure changes made for the query design concerningthe use of three filters, are implemented in subsequent years for programs that are required to produce an improper paymentestimate.

We recommend that the Chief Financial Officer for the Department, for programs that require them, design and implementimproper payment and unknown payment sampling and estimation plans that are appropriate for the sampling of paymentsbased on accurate sampling populations and result in reliable estimates. The improper payment and unknown paymentsampling and estimation plans should also include language stating why sampling populations in Stage 1 may not matchsampling population in Stage 2 and explain the statistical impact on the estimates.

We recommend that the Chief Financial Officer for the Department implement its quality assurance checklist to ensure theproper details from the drawdown population are accurately included on the extrapolation sheet.

We recommend that the Chief Financial Officer for the Department, in conjunction with the acting Chief Financial Officer forFSA, develop sampling and estimation plans for the Pell and Direct Loan programs that will produce reliable estimates.Specifically, the plan should (a) produce appropriate and accurate confidence intervals around a statistically valid pointestimate; (b) consistent with 31 U.S.C. section 3352(c)(1)(A), produce an estimate that is otherwise appropriate using amethodology approved by the Director of OMB; or (c) consistent with OMB Circular A-123 Appendix C, Part II, B(2), include adetailed explanation as to why it is not possible to produce a statistically-valid point…

The Office of the Chief Management Officer and Security Services Office assign the staffing and resources necessary to conduct pending reinvestigations.

The Security Services Office develops and implements adequate internal policies and standard operating procedures.

The Security Services Office develops and implements a required training framework for its Security Specialists and program personnel.

The Security Services Office implements an internal database to house investigation and clearance documentation.

Develop and implement a plan, including communication strategy and available staff, for the timely deployment and installation of mail theft initiatives nationwide.

Require the New York 2 District Manager to establish procedures to complete annual safety inspections, remediate deficiencies, and document the results for blue collection and green relay boxes.

Develop a process to define roles, responsibilities, and frequency for inspecting green relay boxes, and to record and track the location and condition of green relay boxes.

Review and appropriately resolve hold codes related to the 5,044 7(a) loans to determine impact on 7(a) eligibility and seek remedy or repayment of all 7(a) loans deemed ineligible.

Implement written procedures to test recipients' CARES Act payments using methodologies to sufficiently validate that costs are supported and eligible. These procedures should include guidance for determining the extent of transaction level testing needed to sufficiently validate recipient's payment.

Implement written procedures to test recipients' financial system controls to prevent duplicate payments from Federal, State, and local sources.

Implement a written policy requiring that FTA officials develop and implement enhanced oversight processes to specifically mitigate identified risks associated with any funding appropriation, when applicable.

For FTA funds identified at elevated risk for misuse, implement written procedures to strengthen the Agency's ability to assess expense eligibility prior to recipients receiving payments. Implementing this recommendation could put up to $446.9 million in Region 9 funds to better use by improving FTA's ability to identify unsupported costs and ineligible expenses before issuing CARES Act payments. This could also result in hundreds of millions in Agency funds put to better use among the other nine FTA regions.

Develop and implement a process to identify and provide oversight of real property to active recipients with new grants that do not receive a triennial or State management review.

Update FTA's Contractors Manual to require contractors to request a current and complete real property inventory that complies with FTA Circular 5010.1E reporting requirements and require contractors to review and verify that the real property inventory complies with FTA reporting requirements.

Establish and implement a process to verify that FTA's financial interest in real property dispositions is managed in accordance with FTA Circular 5010.1E. Implementing this recommendation could put up to $996,877 in funds to better use.

Develop and implement a process to require grant recipients to annually certify, when applicable, adherence to FTA's requirements for the approval of disposed real property funded with Federal grant assistance.