Suchergebnisse

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Improper payments are a long-standing problem throughout the government. The Department of Defense (DOD) has been overpaying contractors by hundreds of millions of dollars each year. For fiscal years 1994 through 1999, DOD contractors returned nearly $1.2 billion that the Defense Finance and Accounting Service (DFAS) had mistakenly paid them as a result of errors, such as paying the same invoice twice or misreading invoice amounts. Sometimes, however, the contractors do not promptly respond to government demands that the overpayments be returned. The Debt Management Office was created at the DFAS Columbus Center to deal with contractors that are unresponsive to the government's demands that overpayments be returned. GAO found that the Debt Management Office at DFAS Columbus is not effectively and proactively pursuing collections of debts assigned to it. Specifically, the Office is not (1) taking appropriate action to establish the validity of the debts that it receives for collection, (2) promptly issuing letters demanding payment, (3) actively communicating with contractors or resolving issues related to the debts, and (4) effectively using the Department of the Treasury's centralized debt collection programs to maximize collections and the Defense Criminal Investigative Service to pursue potential fraud. Ineffective and insufficient efforts by the Office are the results of both deficiencies in and lack of adherence to policies and procedures."

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) collects health insurance payments, known as third-party collections, for veterans' health care conditions it treats that are not a result of injuries or illnesses incurred or aggravated during military service. In September 1999, VA adopted a new fee schedule, called "reasonable charges," that it anticipated would increase revenues from third-party collections. In January 2003, GAO reported on VA's third-party collection efforts and problems in collections operations for fiscal year 2002 as well as VA's initiatives to improve collections (VA Health Care: Third-Party Collections Rising as VA Continues to Address Problems in Its Collections Operations, (GAO-03-145, Jan. 31, 2003)). GAO was asked to discuss its findings and update third-party collection amounts and agency plans to improve collections."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) collects health insurance payments, known as third-party collections, for veterans' health care conditions it treats that are not a result of injuries or illnesses incurred or aggravated during military service. In September 1999, VA adopted a new fee schedule, called "reasonable charges," that it anticipated would increase revenues from third-party collections. In 2001, GAO testified that problems in VA's collections operations diminished VA's collections. For this report, GAO was asked to examine VA's third-party collections and problems in collections operations for fiscal year 2002 as well as its initiatives to improve collections."

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "In December 2001, GAO testified at a hearing, before the Subcommittee on Government Efficiency, Financial Management and Intergovernmental Relations, House Committee on Government Reform, that the Department of Agriculture, primarily the Rural Housing Service (RHS) and the Farm Service Agency (FSA), faced challenges in implementing key provisions of the Debt Collection Improvement Act of 1996 (DCIA). The testimony focused on RHS's and FSA's progress in referring delinquent debt for administrative offset and cross-servicing and Agriculture's implementation of administrative wage garnishment (AWG). During the hearing, Agriculture pledged to place a higher priority on delinquent debt collection and to substantially improve its implementation of DCIA by December 31, 2002. After the hearing, GAO made recommendations The Subcommittee requested GAO to review and provide an update on actions Agriculture has taken to resolve these problems. In addition, the Subcommittee requested that GAO report on the status of Treasury's implementation of a debt collection improvement account, a vehicle authorized by DCIA to give agencies financial incentives to improve their debt collection efforts."

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO discussed the Department of Veterans Affairs' (VA) efforts to increase revenues from alternative sources as a way to supplement its medical care appropriations, focusing on trends in third-party collections."

Report of the Texas State Auditor's Office related to determining whether the Office of the Attorney General is complying with the General Appropriations Act (75th Legislature) debt collection rider.

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) multiple collection notices, focusing on: (1) how many individual taxpayers were sent multiple notices to collect the same tax assessment, particularly after IRS received full payment of the assessment; and (2) IRS' reasons for sending collection notices after receiving full payment."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Recent legislation requires that, beginning in October 2001, the Defense Department (DOD) collect procurement data on purchases of information technology (IT) products and services worth more than $100,000. DOD is required to issue its first annual report to Congress by March 2001. GAO found that DOD is making good progress in meeting the requirements of the legislation. DOD has modified data collection systems to enable them to collect and report mandated data. DOD officials see no obstacles to issuing their first report on IT data collection efforts by the March 2002 deadline."

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO discussed the Department of the Treasury's progress in implementing the cross-service provision of the Debt Collection Improvement Act (DCIA) of 1996, focusing on the: (1) status of nontax delinquent debts that federal agencies have referred to Treasury for cross-servicing and Treasury's actions to encourage these referrals; (2) Treasury's cross-servicing process for collecting referred debts; (3) Treasury's method for allocating debts to private collection agencies (PCA) for collection; and (4) Treasury's estimated cross-servicing costs and related fees earned on collections."