Inspection of the U.S. Pacific Fleet's Accounting Stations

A survey was made of accounting controls at 21 U.S. Pacific Fleet accounting stations, including 21 ships, the Naval Amphibious Base of the Surface Force, 2 submarines, 2 bases of the Submarine Force, 2 naval air stations, and an air squadron.

The survey disclosed that many internal control weaknesses existed in the accounting system. The following weaknesses were found at one or more of the locations: (1) excessive cash levels were being retained by ships' disbursing officers; (2) imprest funds were not properly managed; basic control procedures were not in use, questionable expenditures were being made, and excess cash balances were being held; (3) disbursements for travel were not effectively controlled, the vouchers were not adequately preaudited and excess advances were not recovered; (4) collections were not properly handled, adequately safeguarded, or promptly deposited, effective collection action was not taken on delinquent accounts, and the duties of employees involved in cash collections were not segregated; and (4) statistical sampling procedures were being applied to vouchers with dollar values much greater than those authorized by the Comptroller General.