Transaction Audit Services: SML submitted 8 out of 15 reports between June 2018 and October 2019 – KPMG
The KPMG audit report has revealed that Strategic Mobilisation Ghana Limited (SML) only submitted eight out of 15 reports contracted by the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) under the Transaction Audit Services agreement between June 2018 and October 2019.
The report further asserted that GRA failed to institute systems to monitor whether SML had executed its duties.
Also, KPMG said GRA staff could not confirm whether the remaining seven reports were submitted by SML.
This was contained in the full audit report by KPMG submitted to President Akufo-Addo and made public on Wednesday, May 22, after pressure from anti-corruption civil society organisations.
According to KPMG, transaction audit services involve the validation of the assigned classification and valuation of imported goods for purposes of determining the importer’s declaration and the related taxes to be paid.
“Between 1 June 2018 and 2 October 2019, the transaction audit services required SML to conduct a reassessment of the classification and valuation of import transactions using the CCVR data and report the outcome to the Post-Clearance Audit (“PCA”) unit of GRA for the purpose of identification of mis-classification and mis-valuation by the GRA team.
“For this period, SML submitted eight (8) out of the expected fifteen (15) reports. GRA officials, however, could not confirm that the seven (7) outstanding reports were received, to evidence SML’s performance of the service,” the report said.
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Moreover, from October 3, 2019, the transaction audit service, according to the report, required SML to provide assurance over the importers’ declaration on Import Declaration Form (IDF) data and compare with classification and valuation performed by GRA to identify differences, if any.
KPMG noted that “per twenty-five (25) out of fifty-one (51) reports submitted, SML used the CCVR data for reassessments instead of IDF data for the audit as required by the change in contractual terms.”
SML explained that though they had severally requested to be granted access to interface its system with that of GRA’s, their request was yet to be granted.
“Consequently, SML continued to audit the CCVRs contrary to the service requirement to audit the IDF data before the issuance of the CCVR,” it added.
“We noted that GRA did not institute monitoring and evaluation processes to assess the performance of the service and hold its personnel and SML accountable for non-performance.
“Based on the analysis above, we noted that SML delivered partially on the service requirements. Given the observations above, GRA may not have obtained all the expected benefits from the service,” it stressed.
