New GAO Report: Federal Agencies reported $8.8 billion in Fraud Last Year

In Fiscal Year 2017, federal agencies reported $8.8 billion in confirmed fraud, according to a new report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office.  The GAO report looks at progress made by federal agencies and OMB to reduce fraud risks since Congress enacted the Fraud Reduction and Data Analytics Act of 2015 (FRDAA). That Act requires agencies to establish financial and administrative controls for managing fraud risks, creating a Fraud Risk Framework in the process.

One leading practice described in the Fraud Risk Framework is using the results of monitoring, evaluation, audits, and investigations to improve fraud prevention, detection, and response. In its new report, the GAO said that about 86 percent of agencies indicated that they use results of monitoring, evaluation, audits, and investigations to manage fraud risk, but only 54 percent did so on a regular basis.

The federal agencies’ reports of their fraud risk management activities is illustrated below:

Areas of risk include grant fraud, defined as when award recipients attempt to deceive the government about their spending of award money outside the parameters of the grant. Other high risk areas described in the report are payroll, beneficiary payments, large contracts, and purchase and travel cards.

​Click here to read more: https://www.gao.gov/assets/700/695812.pdf