Finding Text
Federal Agency: United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service
Federal Program Name: Cooperative Forestry Assistance
Assistance Listing Number: 10.664
Federal Award Identification Year: 2021
Pass-Through Agency: N/A
Award Period: 09/01/21-08/31/26
Compliance Requirement Affected: Allowable Costs & Activities (Payroll)
Type of Finding: Significant Deficiency in Internal Control over Compliance and Nonmaterial Noncompliance
Criteria: 2 CFR 200.403(a) - Except where otherwise authorized by statute, costs must meet the following
general criteria in order to be allowable under Federal awards: Be necessary and reasonable for the
performance of the Federal award and be allocable thereto under these principles.
Condition: For five hourly employees, CFSC performed a review of payroll discrepancies occurring between 2020-
2024, due to differences when comparing time recorded on time sheets to time recorded to payroll,
which resulted in a non-significant payment made to back to the employees.
Questioned Costs: The known questioned costs are $8,600.
Context: A nonstatistical sample of 60 out of >250 employee pay periods were selected for testing for the
Cooperative Forestry Assistance program. The condition noted above was identified during our
procedures over CFSC’s payroll disbursements.
Effect: CFSC's internal controls did not include thorough review of time entry when processing payroll, which
can result in understatement of payroll expense.
Cause: CFSC's internal controls did not include thorough review of time entry when processing payroll.