'High non-compliance' with Fás tender procedures

AN INTERNAL audit report at training agency Fás, completed earlier this year, found there was "high non-compliance" with the authority's quotation and tendering procedures.

The audit of the authority's procurement unit and accounts payable section sampled orders worth €2.52 million out of total orders worth €19.48 million, in order to test whether a range of recommendations made in a 2004 report had been implemented.

The period covered by the 2008 report was January 2006 to March 2007. A copy of the report was released to Fine Gael following a Freedom of Information request and shown to The Irish Times.

The auditors found that some recommendations from the 2004 audit had been implemented, and a spokesman for Fás yesterday said procedures in procurement had been "strengthened significantly" since 2004.

However, the audit report found there was a continuing problem concerning compliance with Fás tendering procedures. "This is a repeat finding from the last audit and is unsatisfactory," the auditors wrote.

Fás procedures require a certain number of quotes or evidence of tendering to be on file with the procurement unit.

The audit found that, for orders worth between €5,000 and €20,000, for which procedures required that three quotes be on file, 65 per cent of the sample failed to meet the criteria.

"We are advised that the instigator of the order could have obtained quotes. It is a vital control that Fás procurement procedure be complied with where quotes are required. They must be obtained by procurement and kept on file."

Eleven orders with values over €20,000 were examined for their compliance with tendering procedures. "Four had been put out to tender while the remaining seven orders had no evidence of being tendered for and are still in query with procurement," the report stated.

The auditors were told the tendering documentation could be with the section where the order originated and, when one order was investigated, this was found to be the case. However, the auditors said procedures must be complied with and the documentation kept in the procurement department.

"The unavailability of tender documentation within the procurement department required by procedure is a cause for concern and should be regularised immediately."

The procurement unit, in its response to the report, said it believed the auditors' finding that compliance with procedures was unsatisfactory was "an unfair and inappropriate conclusion".

The unit argued that many of the orders which did not have the required number of quotes on file were orders from sole suppliers or "service specific suppliers" - suppliers of a service not supplied by other parties, thereby making it impossible to get other quotes.

It further argued that this was evident from the documentation that was available to the auditors.

"None of the findings were material to the maintenance of sound internal controls." Fás had a high requirement for documented procedures, the author of the response stated.