Finding Text
Federal Program: Federal Assistance Listing Number #93.498; US Department of Health and Human Services; Provider Relief Fund and American Rescue Plan (ARP) Distribution Criteria: The terms and conditions of the CARES Act Provider Relief Fund (PRF) distributions state that funds are to only be used to prevent, prepare for and respond to coronavirus, and that funds may only be used for healthcare related expenses or lost revenue that is attributable to the coronavirus and represent actual costs. Condition: During the process of identifying expenses that were incurred to prevent, prepare for or respond to the coronavirus pandemic, management utilized projected expenses claimed for reimbursement. Cause: Due to the amount of detailed information that was required to be compiled by management in order to enter data into the PRF reporting portal, management inadvertently claimed projected expenses for future periods. Effect: Management included amounts in the PRF reporting portal which were not actual costs based on the terms and conditions of the PRF distributions and subsequent HRSA guidance. Questioned Costs: None reported. Context: We performed testing on a sample of six expenditures out of a population of 36 transactions. Four of the six sample selections contained expenses related to reporting projected expenses for reimbursement instead of using actual costs. Recommendation: We recommend that management continue to monitor and enhance its internal controls over federal award compliance to ensure that only eligible costs are included in amounts expended. Views of Responsible Officials: Management agrees with the noted finding and will continue to refine processes to more diligently review allowable costs to ensure only actual costs are included in future reporting. However, the Organization also incurred and reported unreimbursed expenses attributable to the coronavirus in the PRF reporting portal that if the noted questioned costs were not reported, the Organization would have satisfactorily incurred eligible expenses in excess of the PRF funds received.