United States Government Publishing Office publisher pbl distributor dst United States Government Accountability Office General Government Division author aut Government Organization text government publication eng GAOREPORTS Legislative Agency Publications gao legislative 2010-08-12 U.S. Government Printing Office 2000-09-29 monographic deposited born digital 20 p. GA 1.13:GGD-00-185 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GGD-00-185 P0b002ee18039150d f:gg00185 DGPO 2010-08-12 2011-03-28 GAOREPORTS-GGD-00-185 machine generated eng fdlp REPORT GAOREPORTS-GGD-00-185 GGD-00-185 Immigrants Naturalization Fees Treasury accounts Cost control Interest Immigration information systems Federal agency accounting systems INS Immigration Examination Fee Account INS Computer Linked Application Information Management System INS Program for Excellence and Comprehensive Tracking Letter Report GGD Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on: (1) extent to which the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) made timely deposits of the fees that it collected from aliens who applied for benefits; and (2) potential costs to the government if INS fee deposits were not timely.<p/>GAO noted that: (1) because the data maintained by INS was not complete, GAO was unable to fully determine the extent to which INS complied with Department of the Treasury regulations requiring that receipts totalling $5,000 or more be deposited on the same day if they were received prior to the deposit cutoff time, or the next day if they were received too late to meet the cutoff time; (2) INS maintained initial application acceptance processing data for its four service centers, which handled about 75 percent of the applications received; (3) however, INS did not maintain such data for its 33 district offices, which handled the remaining 25 percent of applications received; (4) in fiscal year 1999, INS service centers did not generally make timely fee deposits; (5) whereas Treasury requires that fees totalling $5,000 or more be deposited on the same day or the day after they are received, INS took, on average, at least 12 additional days beyond Treasury's time requirement; (6) GAO estimated that the resulting interest cost to the government, or the cost for interest incurred on debt or other obligations, was about $640,000 in fiscal year 1999; (7) GAO estimates are conservative because GAO did not have data on certain phases of the fee deposit process--such as the amount of time that applications remained unopened in service center mailrooms--that may have caused additional delays in the time taken to deposit fees; (8) any additional delays would have increased the amount of interest cost to the government; and (9) INS' contract of application processing services provided the contractor with more time to make fee deposits than is allowed by Treasury regulations. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GGD-00-185/html/GAOREPORTS-GGD-00-185.htm https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GGD-00-185/pdf/GAOREPORTS-GGD-00-185.pdf GAO/GGD-00-185 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GGD-00-185 Letter Report GAO/GGD-00-185; Immigration Benefits: INS Not Making Timely Deposits of; Immigrants Naturalization Fees Treasury accounts Cost control Interest Immigration information systems Federal agency accounting systems INS Immigration Examination Fee Account INS Computer Linked Application Information Management System INS Program for Excellence and Comprehensive Tracking Volume 102 Page 2186 102 Stat. 2186 Volume 110 Page 3009 110 Stat. 3009 Public Law 100-459 Public Law 104-208