United States Government Publishing Office publisher pbl distributor dst United States Government Accountability Office author aut Government Organization text government publication eng GAOREPORTS Legislative Agency Publications gao legislative 2010-08-12 U.S. Government Printing Office 2004-08-05 monographic deposited born digital 53 p. GA 1.13:GAO-04-988R https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GAO-04-988R P0b002ee18038ee06 f:d04988r DGPO 2010-08-12 2011-03-28 GAOREPORTS-GAO-04-988R machine generated eng fdlp REPORT GAOREPORTS-GAO-04-988R GAO-04-988R Internal controls Laboratories Program abuses Questionable procurement charges Credit sales Federal procurement Fraud GOCO Inventory control Procurement records Property and supply management Government purchase cards Correspondence A11461 The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) located in Richland, Washington, is a government-owned, contractor-operated Department of Energy (DOE) national laboratory. The Battelle Memorial Institute manages the lab under a costreimbursable contract with DOE. Battelle is paid a management fee to operate the lab and is reimbursed for all allowable costs charged to the contract. During the fall of 2002, the Federal Bureau of Investigation began investigating two Los Alamos National Laboratory employees for alleged misuse of lab credit cards. Other allegations of theft and misuse of government funds at Los Alamos soon followed. In light of the problems identified at Los Alamos, GAO was asked to review selected procurement and property management practices at two NNSA and two DOE contractor labs, including PNNL. This report summarizes the information provided during our June 14, 2004 briefing to staff of the House Committees on Science and Energy and Commerce on these issues as they relate to PNNL. Specifically, we reviewed PNNL's purchase card program and property management practices to determine whether (1) internal controls over the lab's purchase card (Pcard) program provided reasonable assurance that improper purchases would not occur or would be detected in the normal course of business, (2) purchase card expenditures made under the contract properly complied with lab policies and other applicable requirements and were reasonable in nature and amount and thus were allowable costs payable to the contractor under the contract, and (3) property controls over selected asset acquisitions provided reasonable assurance that accountable assets would be properly recorded and tracked. Our review covered selected transactions that occurred during fiscal year 2002 and the first half of fiscal year 2003 (October 1, 2001, through March 31, 2003), which were the most current data available when we requested the data for our review. This report also includes four recommendations for action--three related to actions needed to be taken by PNNL and one related to action needed to be taken by the DOE contracting officer for PNNL. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GAO-04-988R/html/GAOREPORTS-GAO-04-988R.htm https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GAO-04-988R/pdf/GAOREPORTS-GAO-04-988R.pdf GAO-04-988R https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GAO-04-988R Correspondence GAO-04-988R; Pacific Northwest National Laboratory: Enhancements Needed to Strengthen Controls Over the Purchase Card Program; Internal controls Laboratories Program abuses Questionable procurement charges Credit sales Federal procurement Fraud GOCO Inventory control Procurement records Property and supply management Government purchase cards