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B-227682 1 (1988-01-15)

handle is hein.gao/gaobadmzb0001 and id is 1 raw text is: The Comptroller General of the United States Washington, D.C. 20548 Decision GSA's Post-Payment Examination of Utility Matterof: Invoices by Statistical Sampling File: B-227682 Date: January 15, 1988 DIGEST The General Accounting Office has no objection in principle to a General Services Administration (GSA) proposal to combine elements of fast pay procedures and statistical sampling to pay and audit utility invoices, even though payments involved may be larger than normally associated with statistical sampling procedures. However, a valid sampling plan should be carefully designed and documented to provide for effective monitoring, meaningful sampling of all invoices not subject to 100 percent audit, audit emphasis commensurate with the risk to the government, and a basis for the certification of payments. In our opinion, GSA, with appropriate modification to current proposal, could develop a valid statistical sampling plan to meet these requirements. DECISION This advance decision to the General Services Administration (GSA) is in response to a request from Raymond A. Fontaine, GSA Comptroller, requesting our approval under 31 U.S.C. § 3521 (1982), of a change in the procedures GSA employs to estimate and audit utility bills.l/ As will be explained in greater detail later in this decision, we have no objection to a proposal by GSA to combine elements of fast pay procedures and statistical sampling techniques to examine utility invoices, even though invoice amounts exceed the 1/ We note that 31 U.S.C. S 3521(a) provides authority for waiver of agency administrative audit with the consent of the Comptroller General. However, since GSA's submission requests approval of a sampling procedure, we assume its request is for approval of a statistical sampling procedure pursuant to the authority of 31 U.S.C. S 3521(b)-(d). In any event, subsection (a) was enacted at a time when GAO performed post-payment account settlement audits. Since that time, we have come to rely increasingly on agency internal audits for account settlement purposes. Thus, waiver under subsection (a) now would rarely, if ever, be appropriate. Q-\C4k

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