Financial Integrity Act

The Government Faces Serious Internal Control and Accounting Systems Problems Gao ID: AFMD-86-14 December 23, 1985

As part of its second governmentwide report on the Federal Managers' Financial Integrity Act of 1982 (FMFIA), GAO reviewed the internal control and accounting system problems facing the government and highlighted the problems which have hindered federal agency efforts to implement FMFIA.

GAO noted that: (1) widespread and long-standing weaknesses and breakdowns in agency internal controls continue to result in wasteful spending, poor management, and losses involving billions of dollars in federal funds; (2) internal control weaknesses have also made outright fraud more feasible; and (3) inadequate agency accounting systems and financial reports have contributed to the government's dilemma. GAO found that: (1) agencies reported that 53 percent of their accounting systems were not in conformance with the Comptroller General's requirements; (2) serious internal control problems continue in such areas as weapon systems procurement, social security, property management, and automatic data processing; (3) agencies have also reported that thousands of less serious weaknesses have been corrected which were collectively important and could have led to fraud, waste, and abuse; and (4) programs to evaluate internal control systems have not yet evolved to the point that agencies know whether their controls are adequate. GAO also found that: (1) although federal agencies generally identified their problems, their annual reports did not always provide an accurate, clear assessment of the overall status of their systems; (2) there is an inadequate basis for reporting on internal control weaknesses because the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has not changed its reporting guidance, as GAO recommended; and (3) agency programs which evaluate internal control and accounting systems need further strengthening to ensure that weaknesses are identified and corrected.

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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