Figures ‘shaky’

THE AUDITOR GENERAL HAS BLASTED one of Government’s biggest revenue collection agencies, complaining that something is desperately wrong with the way it is operating and demanding that it follows the financial rules set out in the law.
In his 2013 report laid in the House of Assembly yesterday, Auditor General Leigh Trotman tendered a stinging criticism of the Inland Revenue Department (IRD) for its many errors in overpaying refunds, using the cash-based system of accounting rather than the accrual method as it is required to do, failing to provide bank reconciliations for audit inspections, and ignoring the Auditor General’s requests to inspect its documents, among several other issues.
“The department did not provide a statement of revenue to the Audit Office for verification as required by the Financial Management and Audit Act,” he wrote.
As a result, the report added, the figures provided to the Treasury of money that the IRD collected were unreliable.