Finding Text
Finding 2025-001: AL #84.063 Federal Pell Grant Program; AL #84.268 Federal Direct Student Loans Criteria: An institution must submit Pell Grant and Federal Direct Student Loans (FDL) disbursement records to Common Origination and Disbursement (COD), no later than 15 days after making the disbursement or becoming aware of the need to adjust a previously reported disbursement (34 CFR 668.164(a)). Condition: Out of a sample of forty Pell Grant students and sixteen return to Title IV (R2T4) students, our audit procedures identified the University did not report five Pell Grant disbursements and two R2T4 adjustments to COD within 15 days of crediting the student billing statements. Cause: Significant staffing turnover coupled with automated COD communication and reporting rules in the Student Information System (SIS) not working properly during the 2024-2025 aid year resulted in reporting to COD not being timely. Effect: The University did not complete the required reporting within the required time frames. Questioned Costs: None Auditors’ Recommendation: The University should update its procedures to include review of automated COD reporting to ensure automated breakdowns are identified and corrected and reporting to COD is done timely. Views of Responsible Officials: The University identified certain automated COD communication and reporting rules in the SIS that were not working properly during the 2024-2025 aid year. The breakdown of these automated rules required manual interventions to have all Pell and R2T4 Grant disbursements reported to COD. Due to significant staffing turnover in the financial aid department and the manual interventions needed, not all reporting was able to be completed within 15 days.