Ensure that duties are separated appropriately.
Ensuring that duties are separated appropriately within your unit is particularly important when resources are limited. No one person should have complete control over any transaction, and each person's work should be a complementary check on another's work.
Why is this so important? It ensures the integrity of our financial information by correcting errors and omissions as well as deterring improper activities such as fraud and misuse. The costs of improper activities are quite high. Even losses of a few hundred dollars result in recovery costs of tens of thousands of dollars from investigations, employment actions, grievances, lawsuits, recruitments and training. An ounce of prevention can go a long way.
Make sure your system users are properly trained and understand the appropriate policies and the importance of their roles:
- Document Initiators are expected to prepare transactions accurately and appropriately, in compliance with policies and procedures.
- Fiscal Officers/Approvers review documents for compliance with university policies and procedures, then approve or disapprove.
- Appropriate staff perform the monthly review of the Ledger and acknowledge the validity of the charges and credits.
- See PPM Section 330-11 for more information
Don't let separation of duties and internal controls break down because resources are limited. If you have any questions, please contact Controls & Accountability.