To receive and consider the report of the Head of Finance.
Minutes:
Documents Considered:
· Report of the Head of Finance
Issues Discussed:
· The report provides advice and updates on the work and performance of the corporate fraud team.
· The report also identifies any significant system weaknesses which have been identified.
· The Committee will also be asked for comments regarding the team’s future work. The report also details improvement work which has been undertaken.
· An e-learning training module on fraud management for officers and Members is being developed, to be implemented from Q3 which will be mandatory training.
· SWAP has undertaken a fraud risk assessment, which is currently being analysed. Following this some detailed areas of work will be undertaken on key risk areas.
· Questions:
Question |
Response |
P51 – Data matching – what impact do you expect from that and in what areas |
There is not much data across Council available for the fraud team to use as yet. The Council every two year runs a data matching exercise. The new licence now allows this to be done with current data sets on a more regular basis. After that we can have a better quality data matching exercise to spot significant frauds or data errors. This has not been rolled out fully, but we are starting to see some aspects of better quality data coming through and spotting frauds earlier.
The fraud hub gives an opportunity to match data sooner as well as the ability to draw in additional data sets to widen what the team does. |
Is there a de-minimus limits in relation to fraud work and how are investigations prioritised. |
The team does a scoping of the initial analysis and decide whether there is enough evidence to take an investigation forward. The trend is not to look at low level overpayments, or low level frauds. However, there is no set limit as such e.g. sums under £500 would not be considered but the Council would look to recover these overpaid sums. |
What is the policy in terms of communicating this activity, sharing awareness in terms of good practice and deterrents.
Are we bringing any income into the Council by sharing expertise with other authorities or by the team working for other organisations. |
Advertising and publicising the work of team is done which can be a deterrent. There is also engagement with services and communicating outwardly.
In terms of the commercial side – a commercial aspect has been developed, and the team has been working with Councils in England and we are looking to develop and share commercial offerings with others to develop a fraud impact, prevention, process and system. |
What was the strategic approach and operating model that is used by the team. It would be good to have some assurance about a strategic report in future. Mandatory training is good news as is the SWAP report.
P49 table – current status and values - is there an opportunity to develop that table. At the end of the year it would be worth knowing of the recoverable payments how much was recovered and what value of income has been saved. |
At the strategic level particular attention has been paid to fraud over the past two years. One service fraud case is ongoing and brought fraud to the fore. The Senior Leadership team and Executive Management Team have supported the team, revising policies and giving the message of zero tolerance to fraud. We are waiting for the training module to become available and there will be a need to increase the internal communications to Members and staff. Awareness raising has been undertaken with senior officers and Members. |
Outcomes:
Noted.
Supporting documents: