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Strategic Objective
Improve the disbursement and collection of federal funds and reduce improper payments made by the U.S. government
Strategic Objective
Overview
Treasury forecasts the federal government’s fiscal needs; collects money due to the United States, including delinquent debt and federal revenues such as taxes, duties, loan repayments, and fines; and disburses payments owed by the U.S. government, including interest payments, Social Security, and Medicare benefits. In this role, Treasury executes billions of transactions each year. The safety, security, efficiency, and reliability of Treasury transactions are paramount to maintaining public trust and improving the management of the nation’s finances.
Over the next four years, Treasury aims to maintain exceptional daily operations for government collections, payments, debt collection, and financing as well as reduce improper payments made by the U.S. government.
Read Less...Progress Update
Treasury is entrusted with managing the nation’s finances, collecting money and making payments on behalf of the United States. Treasury also determines and executes a borrowing strategy that meets the federal government’s needs at the lowest cost over time. Furthermore, Treasury accounts for, and reports on, the U.S. Government’s finances to the American people. Sound financial management enables the continual operation of essential government services.
In May 2015, Treasury changed its cash management policy to hold a higher level of cash to cover one week of average disbursements in the case of events that limit market access, such as cyberattacks or natural disasters. This change was based on a review of policies, recommendations from the Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee, and an assessment of emerging threats.
The amount of college debt increased substantially in recent years, and the United States needs a world-class student lending system on par with its higher education system. To develop new solutions to this growing problem, the Department of Education partnered with Treasury to launch a pilot in February 2015 that allows Treasury to work directly with defaulted student loan borrowers. The pilot will yield valuable data and first-hand experience with the collections process, which should provide a better understanding of best practices and how to improve borrower outcomes.
Treasury also made strides in facilitating agencies’ compliance with the Improper Payments Elimination and Recovery Improvement Act of 2012 (IPERIA). In FY 2015, Treasury enhanced its systems to allow for real-time matching of payments against death and vendor data. In addition, the incorporation of Privacy Act-restricted data improved vendor data matching and reduced false positives by 99.8 percent. Treasury also improved its analytics capabilities and developed agency-specific reports that provide a particular agency or program within the agency a high-level summary of statistical observations that may contribute to improper payments. These reports provide a means to inform agency management about these observations and to determine whether or not the observations call for a more in-depth analytical project in partnership with the agency, to assess the issue, determine root cause, and develop internal control methodologies to eliminate the issue in the future.
Despite this progress, challenges inhibiting eligibility verification remain, specifically in gaining access to additional data sources that will help prevent improper payments. To help mitigate some of these challenges, the FY 2016 President’s Budget included a number of legislative proposals that would, if enacted by Congress, provide Treasury with additional tools to combat waste and fraud as well as greater authority to take actions that will prevent payment errors and improve compliance.
