Financial management

DoD has a longstanding reputation as the only federal department that can’t pass an audit. That same reputation is inhibiting the sort of recruitment it needs to help solve the problem.

Although unresolved audit recommendations are growing, they’re mainly the result of deeper examinations, according to DoD’s inspector general.

David Norquist, the deputy secretary of Defense, said the nascent audit process — expensive as it is — is largely paying for itself already.

Although the Pentagon resolved more than 500 findings from last year’s audit, so far, auditors are identifying financial management problems faster than DoD can fix them.

The Department of Homeland Security released two solicitations seeking industry help to consolidate and modernize as many as 22 legacy financial management systems for a fifth time in the last 15 years.

IT at the Department of Veterans Affairs took center stage on Capitol Hill Tuesday, as the House Veterans Affairs Committee held two hearings in attempt to better understand the agency’s long list of challenges.

The Pentagon and its inspector general said recent discoveries of tens of millions of dollars in uncatalogued parts offer concrete evidence of the audit’s direct connection to military readiness.

If you have a Thrift Savings Plan account what did you do in December when the high-flying stock market, after wobbling a couple months, dropped big time? Financial planner Arthur Stein has some ideas on today’s episode of Your Turn.

In an interview, one of the Pentagon’s top auditors says most of the weaknesses uncovered by its first financial audit weren’t a surprise. But there’s reason for optimism.

A “disclaimer of opinion” was a foregone conclusion for Pentagon’s first financial audit before it even started. Now the focus turns to what the Defense Department will do with the findings.