Audit Objective

Determine whether Brocton Central School District (District) claims were properly audited before payment.

Key Findings

Claims were not properly audited before payment. As a result, there was an increased risk that improper or unsupported payments could have been made and may not have been detected and corrected.

Had the Board of Education (Board) provided the claims auditor with adequate guidance to perform her duties, we may not have found that of the 184 claims we reviewed totaling $1.9 million, 100 claims totaling approximately $141,000 should not have been approved for payment because they had one or more exceptions. For example:

• All 100 claims were paid without documentation to demonstrate that claims complied with the District’s procurement policy.
• 28 of the claims totaling approximately $66,000 also did not contain evidence indicating that the goods or services were received.

Key Recommendations

• Update written policies to define the claims auditor’s duties and provide this guidance and the District’s procurement policy to the claims auditor.
• Ensure that claims contain sufficient supporting documentation before approving them for payment.

District officials generally agreed with our recommendations and indicated they planned to initiate corrective action.Appendix B includes our comment on issues raised in the District’s response.