Financial Audit: U.S. Senate Gift Shop Revolving Fund's Fiscal	 
Years 2002 and 2001 Financial Statements (27-AUG-04, GAO-04-906).
                                                                 
This report presents the results of our audit of the Senate Gift 
Shop's Statement of Receipts, Disbursements, and Fund Balance for
the fiscal years ended September 30, 2002 and September 30, 2001.
This report also contains our opinion on the effectiveness of the
Fund's related internal control as of September 30, 2002, and our
evaluation of its compliance with selected provision of laws and 
regulations we tested. We performed this audit at Congressional  
request.							 
-------------------------Indexing Terms------------------------- 
REPORTNUM:   GAO-04-906 					        
    ACCNO:   A11957						        
  TITLE:     Financial Audit: U.S. Senate Gift Shop Revolving Fund's  
Fiscal Years 2002 and 2001 Financial Statements 		 
     DATE:   08/27/2004 
  SUBJECT:   Financial statement audits 			 
	     Financial statements				 
	     Fund audits					 
	     Internal controls					 
	     Revolving funds					 
	     Accounting procedures				 
	     Accounting standards				 
	     Senate Gift Shop Revolving Fund			 

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GAO-04-906

Report to the Secretary of the Senate

August 2004

FINANCIAL AUDIT

U.S. Senate Gift Shop Revolving Fund's Fiscal Years 2002 and 2001
Financial Statements

Contents

August 27, 2004Letter

The Honorable Emily J. Reynolds Secretary of the Senate United States
Senate

Dear Ms. Reynolds:

This report presents the results of our audit of the Senate Gift Shop's
Statement of Receipts, Disbursements, and Fund Balance for the fiscal
years ended September 30, 2002 and September 30, 2001. This report also
contains our opinion on the effectiveness of the Fund's related internal
control as of September 30, 2002, and our evaluation of its compliance
with selected provision of laws and regulations we tested. We performed
this audit at your request.

As arranged with your office, we plan no further distribution of this
report until 30 days after the date of this letter. At that time, we will
provide copies of this report to the Chairmen and Ranking Minority Members
of the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration; the Senate Committee
on Appropriations; and the Senate Subcommittee on Legislative Branch,
Committee on Appropriations. This report will also be available on GAO's
home page at http://www.gao.gov.

If you or your staff have any questions concerning this report, please
contact me at (202) 512-9471 or Keith Thompson, Assistant Director, at
(202) 512-6328. You can also reach us by e-mail at [email protected] or
[email protected]. Key contributors to this report were Teressa Gardner,
Chanetta Reed, and Lindsay Saylor.

Sincerely yours,

Jeanette M. Franzel Director Financial Management and Assurance

To the Secretary of the SenateTransmittal Letter

We have audited the accompanying Statement of Receipts, Disbursements, and
Fund Balance for the Senate Gift Shop Revolving Fund for the fiscal years
ended September 30, 2002 and September 30, 2001. In our audit, we found

o the statements are presented fairly in all material respects, on a cash
basis;

o the Gift Shop had effective internal controls over financial reporting
(including safeguarding assets) and compliance with laws and regulations
as of September 30, 2002; and

o no reportable noncompliance with selected provisions of laws and
regulations we tested.

The following sections provide additional detail about our conclusions and
the scope of our audit.

Opinion on the Financial Statement

The Statement of Receipts, Disbursements, and Fund Balance and the
accompanying notes present fairly, in conformity with the cash basis of
accounting, the receipts, disbursements, and fund balance of the Gift Shop
Revolving Fund for the fiscal years ended September 30, 2002 and September
30, 2001. As described in note 2 of the accompanying statement, the cash
basis of accounting is a comprehensive basis of accounting that recognizes
transactions when cash is received and disbursed. This basis of accounting
differs from U.S. generally accepted accounting principles, which
recognize revenue when earned and expenses when incurred.

Opinion on Internal Control

The Gift Shop maintained in all material respects effective internal
control over financial reporting (including safeguarding assets) and
compliance as of September 30, 2002, that provided reasonable assurance
that misstatements, losses, or noncompliance material in relation to the
financial statement would be prevented or detected promptly. Our opinion

is based on criteria established in the Comptroller General's Standards
for Internal Control in the Federal Government.1

Compliance with Laws and Regulations

Our tests for compliance with selected provisions of laws and regulations
disclosed no instances of noncompliance that would be reportable under
U.S. generally accepted government auditing standards. However, the
objective of our audit was not to provide an opinion on overall compliance
with laws and regulations. Accordingly, we do not express such an opinion.

Objectives, Scope, and Methodology

The Gift Shop management is responsible for (1) preparing the Statement of
Receipts, Disbursements, and Fund Balance in conformity with the cash
basis of accounting; (2) establishing, maintaining, and assessing internal
control to provide reasonable assurance that the objectives of internal
control are met; and (3) complying with applicable laws and regulations.

We are responsible for obtaining reasonable assurance about whether (1)
the Statement of Receipts, Disbursements, and Fund Balance is presented
fairly in all material respects, in conformity with the cash basis of
accounting and (2) whether management maintained effective internal
control, the objectives of which are the following.

o Financial reporting: Transactions are properly recorded, processed, and
summarized to permit the preparation of the Statement of Receipts,
Disbursements, and Fund Balance in conformity with the cash basis of
accounting, and assets are safeguarded against loss from unauthorized
acquisition, use, or disposition.

o Compliance with laws and regulations: Transactions are executed in
accordance with laws and regulations that could have a direct and material
effect on the Statement of Receipts, Disbursements, and Fund Balance.

We are also responsible for testing compliance with selected provisions of
laws and regulations that were determined to have a direct and material
effect on the Gift Shop's Statement of Receipts, Disbursements, and Fund
Balance for the fiscal years ended September 30, 2002 and September 30,
2001.

In order to fulfill these responsibilities, we (1) examined, on a test
basis, evidence supporting the amounts and disclosures in the Statement of
Receipts, Disbursements, and Fund Balance; (2) assessed the accounting
principles used and significant estimates made by management; (3)
evaluated the overall presentation of the Statement of Receipts,
Disbursements, and Fund Balance; (4) obtained an understanding of internal
control related to financial reporting (including safeguarding assets) and
compliance with laws and regulations; (5) tested relevant internal
controls over financial reporting (including safeguarding of assets) and
compliance and evaluated the design and operational effectiveness of
internal control; and (6) tested compliance with selected provisions of
the following relevant laws and regulations:

o 2 U.S.C. S: 121d, relating to the establishment of the Senate Gift Shop
and Revolving Fund, including deposit of sales receipts and disbursements
from the Fund,

o 2 U.S.C. S: 109, relating to preference to purchase American goods,

o 2 U.S.C. S: 68, relating to the approval of disbursements, and

o the Antideficiency Act, relating to the disbursement of revolving fund
assets.

We did not evaluate internal controls relevant to the effectiveness and
efficiency of the Gift Shop's operations. We limited our internal control
testing to relevant controls over financial reporting and compliance.
Because of inherent limitations in any system of internal control,
misstatements due to error or fraud, losses, or noncompliance may
nevertheless occur and not be detected. We also caution that projecting
our evaluation to future periods is subject to the risk that controls may
become inadequate because of changes in conditions or that the degree of
the compliance with controls may deteriorate.

With respect to our tests of selected provisions of laws and regulations,
we did not test compliance with all laws and regulations applicable to the
Gift Shop, therefore, we caution that noncompliance may have occurred and
not been detected by the tests we performed. Accordingly, the scope of our
tests of noncompliance may not be sufficient for other purposes.

We performed our audit in accordance with U.S. generally accepted
government auditing standards.

Management's Comments and Our Evaluation

We provided drafts of this report to the management of the Gift Shop and
representatives of the Office of the Secretary of the Senate for review
and comment. They agreed with the contents of this report.

Jeanette Franzel Director Financial Management and Assurance

August 17, 2004

Financial Statement

(194392)
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