Issue - meetings

The committee is requested to note performance against the audit plan for 2020/21

The Chairman invited Mr James to introduce the report. 

Mr James reported that five audits had been completed since the last meeting of the Committee, and drew Member’s attention to the report which provided the details of the results of the audits.

With regards to the Audit Plan, Mr James assured the Committee that the audits deferred from 2020/21 due to staff sickness and redeployment would be included in the Audit Plan for 2021/22.  The plan had been prepared to consider risk, value and system complexities and it was envisaged that a large proportion of that plan would be undertaking the key financial systems work, with the remaining time taken up with annual activity and the audits considered high risk or had not previously been audited.  The current position following the debt recovery audit had been prepared by Miss Standing, the Divisional Manager for Revenues, Benefits and Customer Services, and internal audit were satisfied with the progress being made.  Miss Standing would provide a further report later in the year.

On the matter of retrospective purchase orders, Mr James confirmed a policy had been put in place in January 2020, and 54% of purchase orders had been raised late during the period of April to October 2020.  This had not previously presented as an issue, as this was the first time this audit had been carried out and follow-up work would be undertaken to ensure the situation had improved.  Mrs Belenger confirmed the policy would have been enforced but during the lockdown period, invoice processing had to be completed manually, and remote working had resulted in it not being possible to do so, but progress was now being made.

With regards to the disposal of IT equipment and a lack of records that data had been removed from the hard drives, Mr James responded that this matter would require information from the IT manager.  The company used for the destruction of laptops carried out testing and a rebate was provided on those which were identified with the potential to be usable.  In relation to whether IT equipment could be passed on to charitable organisations supporting residents, Mr Ward confirmed he would investigate this suggestion with the IT manager.

The Committee agreed to note the report.