Food Stamp Receipts

Who's Watching the Money? Gao ID: CED-77-76 June 15, 1977

Misuses and mishandling of over $34 million in food stamp receipts went undetected for extended periods because neither the Food and Nutrition Service nor the States were effectively monitoring the agents who sold food stamps.

Known major weaknesses in the monitoring system at both the Federal and State levels were allowed to continue for years without adequate efforts to correct them. Reported deposits were not verified; agents' depositing patterns were not monitored; and there was no follow up when agents failed to submit required reports. The Service's computer-produced management reports, designed to identify problem agents, were not usable because they listed too many agents without problems, as well as agents with problems. Although some improvements have been made, much more needs to be done.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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