Single Audit Act

Single Audit Quality Has Improved but Some Implementation Problems Remain Gao ID: AFMD-89-72 July 27, 1989

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Office of Management and Budget's (OMB) implementation of the Single Audit Act, focusing on the: (1) quality of single audits by determining their compliance with generally accepted government auditing standards; and (2) usefulness of single audits to report recipients.

GAO found that: (1) certified public accountants (CPA) complied with auditing standards in 35 of the 40 audits reviewed because their audits showed sufficient evidence of studies and evaluations of internal controls and compliance testing; (2) five CPA firms had problems relating to either internal controls, compliance testing, or reporting significant enough to warrant referral to the appropriate state boards of accounting; (3) federal inspectors general did not provide consistent oversight, and the degree of monitoring over audit quality varied; and (4) although most report recipients had concerns about the usefulness of single audits, most of the reports included findings and covered the majority of federal funds provided, but did not always identify the programs tested for compliance or the extent of testing.

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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