The Office of the Comptroller of Puerto Rico issued a qualified opinion on the operations of the Coronavirus Relief Fund of the Department of Health. A qualified opinion is issued when the instances of noncompliance, individually or in the aggregate, are significant but not pervasive.
“Although this report includes several situations related to the management of the COVID-19 funds, we recognize the effort of the officials and employees of the Department of Health to address the challenges and difficulties that this situation brought,” stated the Comptroller of Puerto Rico, Yesmín M. Valdivieso, regarding the audit.
The single-finding Report reveals deficiencies related to the acquisition, disbursements, and receipt of goods and services by the Department. Following the declaration of a state of emergency due to the COVID-19 pandemic on March 12, 2020, the Department received $30,314,738 in state funds and issued 82 purchase orders for $28,921,141. With the purchase orders, cleaning and disinfection materials, medical equipment, medications, COVID-19 detection tests, reagents for the tests, and others were acquired.
From the examination performed, the auditors identified purchase orders without the clause on penalties in case of late deliveries, without the delivery date of the materials purchased, and without the recommendation of the auxiliary administrator of Acquisitions, nor the authorization of the bidding officer of the General Services Administration (ASG) as stipulated in Act 73-2019 and Circular Letter ASG 2020-07. In addition, some purchase orders were made with the incorrect form and the files lacked evidence of having obtained quotations from at least three suppliers. This situation deprived the Department of considering offers from other suppliers, different goods and quantities contrary to those needed could have been acquired, and the ASG was deprived of determining whether the goods and services were proper to the emergency.
The audit also detected that in 35% of the purchase orders the goods were received up to 12 weeks after the agreed date, in 15% the goods were received by officials without the ASG receiver appointment, and in 40% no evidence was found of the receipt of the goods. This situation caused the Department not to have evidence of the receipt of the goods and could have resulted in the loss of materials or equipment received.
The Report points out that the Department paid in advance 100% of two purchase orders for $3,667,500 to acquire tests to detect COVID-19, instead of the 60% requested by the supplier in the quotation. In addition, the Department paid $17,550 for hand sanitizers that were not received, and no evidence was found of having claimed from the supplier for the goods not received. This Report covers from January 1, 2019 to June 30, 2021.
See Audit Report DA-23-02.
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