Financial Management
The U.S. Mint's Accounting and Control Problems Need Management Attention Gao ID: AFMD-89-88 July 26, 1989Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed aspects of the U.S. Mint's numismatic programs and overall financial management, focusing on: (1) whether the Mint complied with legal requirements involving the shipment of Statue of Liberty coins; (2) internal controls for die inventories and coins; (3) cost accounting systems, funds control systems, and management information reports; and (4) the budgetary fund structure for numismatic programs.
GAO found that the: (1) Mint did not comply with a legal requirement that it ship Statue of Liberty coins to customers only after payment or guarantees of payment, but the number of coins incorrectly sent represented less than 1 percent of the 15.5 million coins shipped; (2) Mint had weak internal controls over dies and coins; (3) physical inventories of dies were not frequent enough; (4) resolution of die inventory discrepancies was not independently reviewed; and (5) Mint did not always report coin shortages to field mint security offices. GAO also found that the: (1) Mint's June 30, 1987, reports on revenues and expenses related to numismatic programs were unreliable; (2) Mint's cost accounting system was manual and decentralized and did not produce reliable cost information; (3) Mint's funds control system had deficiencies in its design, reporting, and use of financial plans; (4) Mint has not developed management information reports needed to support decisionmaking; and (5) Mint accounted for its numismatic programs through its annual salaries and expenses appropriation, instead of through a revolving fund.
RecommendationsOur 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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