Mark Titus, Freelance Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
Customs officials are shying away from responding to the allegations of a breakdown in the financial management of Jamaica Customs Department (JCD) documented in the Auditor General’s 2005/2006 report.
“It is not the time to make a response,” Hector Jones, Commis-sioner of Customs told The Gleaner last Wednesday. “We are presently doing an in-house examination, so we can establish how accurate these allegations are.”
“We have a responsibility to establish if these allegations are erroneous, as they sometimes are.”
“As a matter of fact,” he continued, “we have to go before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) before we can make any public comment.”
The annual report, which provides details from audits conducted on the financial transactions of public entities for the 2005/2006 period, pointed to numerous
discrepancies.
According to the report, approximately $61 million which was deposited as duties on temporary imports, remained uncleared in the related control register the stipulated three-month period had passed for these goods to be exported, or the deposited amount lodged as revenue.
The report also revealed that there was $67 million worth of temporary imports on record where there was no evidence that the necessary deposits were paid.
CPS not working
The auditor general was also of the opinion that the Cargo Processing System (CPS), which was implemented to assist the department to provide speedy and effective clearance of goods, as well as improve information available to decision makers and the wider tax administration, was not functioning in an effective and reliable manner nor achieving its objectives as a result of the non-compliance with information security policy, inadequate review of the system and lack of reconciliation of uncleared imports reports with physical goods.
Control weaknesses were also identified in the access to the electronic payment cashiers office, verification of e-payments and the fast-tracking clearance of imports. In most cases, the physical access to the office was not appropriately restricted and saw custom brokers reportedly being allowed to search through batches of endorsed entries to find their own documents. The department was advised that the office must be restricted to authorised staff only and that brokers should be allowed to search the department’s documents.
It was also revealed that during the period May 2005 to December 2006, there were 1,070 entries with outstanding payments of $223.7M for three months and over in the production database, this was in breach of the rules which instructed that in cases where related duties are not paid within three months of processing of import entries on the system, such entries should be automatically transferred to the archive database.
An examination of an archived entries report for the period January 2004 to December 2005, disclosed no evidence that any check was undertaken to ensure that the related goods were in for 738 of the entries valued at approximately $170.7M, therefore, the auditor general was reportedly unable to determine whether goods were paid for but payment was not entered on the system; goods were still in the custody of customs awaiting clearance; clearance of goods were made without payment or goods were auctioned by customs.
Other concerns
Other items of concern were the outstanding advances amounting to $16.5M, unauthorised debits from the salaries bank account amounting to $128,697 and understated credits of $89,931 and the failure of the management to create a system of accountability for the drivers and the use of the department’s motor vehicles.
When contacted, the auditor general, Adrian Strachan, was tight-lipped on the situation at the customs department.
“The report is plain enough;I don’t wish to elaborate on these concerns, as this will be going before the Public Accounts Committee,” he said.
When contacted, the auditor general, Adrian Strachan, was tight-lipped on the situation at the customs department.
