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The Comptroller of Puerto Rico issues a favorable opinion with exceptions on the internal and administrative controls of the Department of the Treasury-Central Administration.

The five-finding Report reveals that an officer received collections without having the proper appointment as auxiliary collector, which, under Regulation 25, is issued by the Secretary of the Treasury himself. In addition, since September 26, 2013, the Official Collector has not issued an official receipt for each amount collected, and when people requested it, she would then issue a non-official receipt. A similar situation had been pointed out nine years ago, in Audit Report DA-09-12 of 2008.

On the other hand, our auditors were unable to determine whether the accounts receivable related to non-tax debts were correct, since as of October 31, 2015, the Accounts Division of the Office of Finance did not maintain a record as required by Act 230 of 1974, the Accounting Act of the Government of Puerto Rico. This Division also did not make the three collection efforts as indicated by Regulation 44, Existing Non-Tax Debts in Favor of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, nor had it promulgated internal rules or procedures for granting payment plans.

The audit detected that, contrary to the Law, the employees of the Intelligence and Tax Fraud Area used, for more than two years, 29 motor vehicles 24 hours a day. In addition, it was identified that the Property Custodian did not reconcile the fixed asset records monthly and that the Internal Audit Office does not have an Audit Committee.

The Report comments that the Department paid $8.1 million in interest due to the delay in the payments of the refunds to the taxpayers of the returns filed in April 2015. In addition, 160 civil lawsuits for $69.5 million remained pending resolution by the courts.

The Report covers the period from July 1, 2012 to June 30, 2016.

See Audit Report DA-17-20

To view other published reports, visit our Audit Reports section.