Source document: https://docs-lawep.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/1697724887032.pdf (Fiji)
Performance Audit on the Administration and Management of Bus Fare Assistance through E-Ticketing for the School Children, Elderlies and Persons with Disability OFFICE OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL – REPUBLIC OF FIJI Location : Level 8, Ratu Sukuna House 2-10 MacArthur Street Suva, Fiji Postal : P O BOX 2214, Government Buildings Address Suva, Fiji Telephone : (679) 330 9032 Email : info@auditorgeneral.gov.fj Website : www.oag.gov.fj OUR VISION Excellence in Public Sector Auditing OUR MISSION • To provide world-class, independent and objective value-adding audit services • To provide a working environment which allows our people to excel Letter to Speaker PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY ii REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI The Office of the Auditor-General – Republic of Fiji The Office of the Auditor-General is established as an Independent Office by the Constitution of the Republic of Fiji.
Its roles and responsibilities include carrying out performance audits to determine whether an entity is achieving its objectives effectively, economically and efficiently and in compliance with relevant legislation.

These audits are carried out by the Auditor-General on behalf of Parliament.

The Auditor-General must submit a report on performance audits carried out to Parliament.

In addition, a single report may include two or more audits.

This report satisfies these requirements.


The Office of the Auditor-General notes the impact of its reports to Parliament on the ordinary citizens and strives for accuracy and high-quality reporting including recommendations which are not only value-adding to the entity subject to audit but its customers and the general public as well.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN,EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY i REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Table of Contents Audit Overview ...................................................................................................................................................... iii List of Figures and Tables ...................................................................................................................................... iv EXECUTIVE SUMMARY .......................................................................................................................................... vi NA IVAKALEKA NI ITUKUTUKU .......................................................................................................................... viii कार्यपालक साराांश ..................................................................................................................................................... x Key Findings and Recommendations ................................................................................................................... xi SOQONI NI MACALA KEI NA VAKATUTU ........................................................................................................... xiv खोज के मुखाए पररणाम तथा सुझाए ................................................................................................................... xvi 1.0 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................................. 1 1.1 1.2 Background ........................................................................................................................................... 2 Reasons for the audit ............................................................................................................................ 3 2.0 AUDIT OBJECTIVE, SCOPE AND METHODOLOGY ........................................................................................... 4 2.1 The purpose of our audit ...................................................................................................................... 4 2.2 What we audited ................................................................................................................................... 4 2.3 How we audited ........................................................................................................................................... 5 3.0 ADMINISTRATION OF THE PROGRAM ............................................................................................................ 6 Theme 1: Legal and Policy Framework .............................................................................................................. 6 Theme 2: Standard Operating Procedure ........................................................................................................ 13 Theme 3: Service Agreement between Ministry of Education Heritage and Arts and E-Ticketing Service Provider for Students fare ................................................................................................................................ 15 Theme 4: E-ticketing Agreement for the Department of Social Welfare ....................................................... 17 Theme 5: Management of Feedback and Complaints .................................................................................... 19 Theme 6: Conflict of Interests .......................................................................................................................... 21 4.0 MANAGEMENT OF THE PERFORMANCE OF THE PROGRAM ....................................................................... 24 Theme 1: Reports from the E-Ticketing Service Provider ............................................................................... 24 Theme 2: Regular Monthly Reconciliation ...................................................................................................... 27 Theme 3: Initial Listing of Eligible Students .................................................................................................... 29 Theme 4: Exit by Elderly from the Bus Fare Concession Card ......................................................................... 31 Theme 5: Review of Transport Assistance Implementation for Senior Citizens and People with Disability32 Theme 6: Review of the Students Bus Fare Assistance ................................................................................. 35 Theme 7: School Zoning ................................................................................................................................... 37 Theme 8: Student Bus Fare Assistance Application Process ......................................................................... 41 5.0 DATA ANALYTICS............................................................................................................................................ 46 Theme 1: Data on Elderly and Fijians with Disability ....................................................................................... 46 Theme 2: Data on Students ............................................................................................................................. 52 6.0 APPENDICES ............................................................................................................................................ 55 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN,EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY ii REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Audit Overview Our audit was carried out to ascertain the efficiency and effectiveness of government’s Bus Fare Assistance program through E-Ticketing for the school children, elderlies and persons with disability.
Given the sustainable development objectives of the Fiji Government as prioritised in the National Development Plan, the provision of bus-fare assistance through e-ticketing is a government initiative targeted at providing and promoting ‘quality education for all’, ‘ social inclusion and empowerment’, ‘youth development’ and ‘women and gender equality’.

Education is generally regarded as one of the fundamental factors of development.
Countries continue to increase investments in human capital in order to achieve sustainable economic development.

Education enriches people’s understanding and improves the quality of life for themselves and the community in which they live.

Education improves productivity, creativity and promotes entrepreneurship and technological advances.
Such advancements promote economic and social progress and distribution of income.1 Bus-fare assistance through e-ticketing to school children from low income families attempts to ensure that all school children have access to quality education.

We also looked at the administration of the program in terms of how the program is administered through the various policies and framework which governs its operations.
However, the scope of this audit does not cover the acquisition of the services of the e-ticketing provider.

Our audit also covered the management of the program by examining the various functional roles undertaken by the Ministry of Education and Department of Social Welfare.

Through this, we looked at how the program is managed by these two entities.
Finally, our audit looked at the monitoring and reporting of the program and how the information maintained by the e-ticketing service provider is scrutinised, analysed and reported upon by the Ministry of Education and Department of Social Welfare.

1 Ilhan OZTURK 2001 THE ROLE OF EDUCATION IN ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT: A THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVE Çağ University, Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences, Department of Economics, Mersin, Turkey.
Email: ilhanozturk@cag.edu.tr PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY iii REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI List of Figures and Tables Number Name Figure 1.1 Students Provided with Busfare Assistance Initiative (2017-2019) Figure 1.2 The Elderly and Fijians with Disability Supported with Busfare Initiative (2017- 2019) Figure 3.1 Chronological Order of Bus Fare Assistance Programs Figure 5.1 Number of Elderly and People with disability Assisted Figure 5.2 ID Used for Registration Figure 5.3 Number of Students Assisted from 2017 to 2019 Table 3.1 Table 3.2 National Development Plan Policy and Strategies on Equal access to Education National Development Plan annual targets and total expected projected output Table 3.3 Policy based on a Socially Inclusive Fiji Table 4.1 Monthly reports provided to MEHA and DSW by the E-Ticketing Service Provider Table 4.2 Student application in FEMIS disapproved by Head of School Table 4.3 Student application approved by head of school staying in far zone area Table 4.4 Students with parents earning more than $16,000 threshold assisted by the program Table 4.5 Endorsed Applications of students with working parents Table 4.6 Endorsed Application of students whose parents were not employed Table 6.1 Students with unauthorised and unstamped applications Table 6.2 Students list not updated in FEMIS Table 6.3 Incidence of Students beyond the Required Zoning Policy Area-School 1 Table 6.4 Incidence of Students beyond the Required Zoning Policy Area-School 2 Table 6.5 Sample Of 148,893 Inactive Cards with Funds (Top 10 amounts) Table 6.6 Sample Of 87,294 Card Where Funds Were Incorrectly Transferred (Top 10 amounts) Table 6.7 Multiple Incorrect Transfers to IDs (Top 10 Transfers) Table 6.8 Multiple Different Card Numbers Assigned To Same Student ID Table 6.9 Cards Duplicated More Than Once Table 6.10 Duplicate Student IDs Present In the System Table
 6.11 Amount per MEHA vs Amount By Service Provider (Top 10 amounts) PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY iv REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Acronyms Abbreviation Meaning ACP DSW FRCS MEHA MoE MOU Annual Corporate Plan Department of Social Welfare Fiji Revenue and Customs Services Ministry of Education Heritage and Arts Ministry of Economy Memorandum of Understanding MWCPA Ministry of Women Children and Poverty Alleviation M Paisa E-ticketing service provider’s Money Transfer Service NDP PSEHA SDG SOP TAU VKB National Development Plan Permanent Secretary For Education, Heritage and Arts Sustainable Development Goals Standard Operating Procedures Transport Assistance Unit Vola-Ni-Kawa Bula PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY v REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Bus Fare Assistance program through electronic ticketing was implemented in 2017 to assist school students from low income earning families to attend school, the elderly and the disabled to be able to travel when required.
This program is aligned to the 5 Year and 20 Year National Development Plan.

E-transport assistance was implemented for fundamental reasons; firstly for students to reduce the financial burden on parents who are unable to afford transportation costs involved in sending children to school while at the same time enable students to gain access to quality education and promoting equality; secondly to recognise the contribution of senior citizens and disabled persons in the country.
A bid to support them and ensure that the elderly are able to commute at an affordable rate and also ensuring transport accessibility for the disabled.
The current stakeholders directly involved in the Bus Fare assistance program are the Ministry of Education Heritage and Arts (MEHA) who administer and manage student’s bus fare assistance and the Department of Social Welfare (DSW) of the Ministry of Women Children and Poverty Alleviation which administers and manages the elderly and disabled’s bus fare assistance program.

The external stakeholder is the sole service provider of e-ticketing service machines and top-up platforms.
The relationship between the Department of Social Welfare and the e-ticketing service provider is founded in an undated agreement which stipulates the duties and responsibilities of each party.

The Ministry of Education is yet to formulate a similar agreement with the e-ticketing service provider.

A total of 88,579 students received transport assistance vouchers in 2009 when it started while 80,879 elderly and disabled persons received 50% concession voucher in 2011.
In 2017, the e-ticketing process for bus fare was implemented and by Term 3 of 2019, a total of 66,674 students and about 51,444 2senior citizens and persons with disability received e-transport cards to utilise e-ticketing.

The elderly and disabled persons received full 100% assistance for their fare at the maximum value of $40 per month in 2018.

Students living in rural areas that have no bus services still use vouchers to travel on carrier, minibuses and punts.
Public funds amounting to $100m 3has been spent over 3 years since the assistance was delivered through the e-ticketing platform in 2017.

The Bus Fare Assistance program through e-ticketing has sufficient mandate under the constitution to enable it to be functional and effective in providing the required assistance to deserving school children, elderly and persons with disabilities.
However, we determined that policies and procedures implemented to support the Cabinet decisions are outdated and need to be reviewed as they were prepared for the voucher system before the e-ticketing system was introduced.
Similarly, the absence of an agreement between the external e-ticketing service provider with the Ministry of Education and undated agreement between the external e-ticketing service provider and Department of Social Welfare needs to be rectified to ensure that the interests of government are adequately protected.

Anomalies were found given the poor internal controls including lack of monthly reconciliations of records between the two government agencies and the e-ticketing service provider.
There is also a need to work towards mitigating risks identified which can cause overpayment.
These include the risk of over-payment of assistance through excessive top-ups, school fares paid beyond the school zones, payment of assistance to ineligible recipients, lack of declaration of interest by processing officers, 2 https://www.fbcnews.com.fj/news/family-members-only-visiting-their-elderly-for-monetary-benefits/ 3 Expenditure as extracted from FMIS on 25 Feb 2020 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY vi REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI and continued top-up of cards for deceased senior citizens.
The risk of fraud for unused balances in cards also exist.

Generally, the system has been effective in providing bus fare assistance through the e-ticketing platform.

However, utilisation of resources could be improved with an effective and accountable internal control system.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY vii REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI NA IVAKALEKA NI ITUKUTUKU A sevu na Veivuke ni Vodovodo ni Basi (Bus Fare Assistance program) ena tikite livaliva (electronic ticketing) ena 2017, mera vukei kina na gonevuli mai na matavuvale dravuadravua mera lai vuli, kei ira na qase kei na vakaleqai vakayago.
Qo e salavata kei na iTuvatuva ni Veivakatorocaketaki (National Development Plan) yabaki 5 kei na yabaki 20.

E vica na vuna lelevu a caka kina na veivuke oqo: matai, me mamada kina na icolacola vei ira na itubutubu e dredre vei ira na saumi vodovodo, mera rawata talega kina na gone kece na vuli vinaka, se ra vakailavo se sega; karua, mera dokai kina na qase kei na vakaleqai vakayago ena nodra yaga e noda vanua.
Kena inaki me tokoni ira, ka vakarawarawataka nodra veilakoyaki na qase ena ivodovodo era rawata, va kina vei ira na vakaleqai vakayago me rawa nira veilakoyaki.
Erau kauwai tiko ena Veivuke ni Vodovodo ni Basi na Tabacakacaka ni Vuli (Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts, MEHA), nodra itavi na qarava na veivuke vei ira na gonevuli, kei na Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba (Department of Social Welfare, DSW) ni Tabacakacaka ni Marama (Ministry of Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation) ka qarava na veivuke vei ira na qase kei na vakaleqai.

Dua talega na tabana mai tuba e kauwai kina, koya e qarava duadua na misini ni tikite livaliva kei na kedra tawani (top-up).
Na veimaliwai ni Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba kei na tabana ni tikite e yavutaki ena veiyalayalati e virikotori kina na nodrau dui itavi.

Se bera ni dua na veiyalayalati ni Tabacakacaka ni Vuli kei na tabana e qarava na tikite.

Se sevu e na 2009 na Veivuke ni Veilakoyaki (Transport assistance program) baleta na sala kece ni veilakoyaki, wili kina na basi, keria kei na boto.
Ni sa cava na 2015, sa 88,579 na gonevuli era sa vukei 100%, qai 20,036 na qase kei na vakaleqai e soli nodra ivola (voucher) me musu e na 50% e na 2011.

Ni sevu na veivuke ni vodovodo ni basi e na mua ni 2017, era le 51,109 na isevu ni itaba govenuli era vukei kina.

Ena ikatolu ni wasenivuli ni 2019, sa soli vei ira na le 66,674 na gonevuli kei na le 45,106 beka na qase kei na vakaleqai vakayago na tikite livaliva (e-transport card).
Ena 2018 a soli kina vei ira na qase kei na vakaleqai nodra ivodovodo taucoko, me yacova na $40 dua na vula.

Na gonevuli era vakaitikotiko ena vanua e sega kina na basi era se vakayagataka tikoga na ‘voucher’ mera vodo keria kina se minibasi se boto.

Sa yacova na $115m na ilavo ni matanitu sa vakayagataki ena tikite livaliva ena yabaki va me tekivu ena 2017.
Me vaka ni vakadonui na Veivuke ni Vodovodo ni Basi ena Lawatu (constitution), e dodonu me mana ka maqosa ena nodra vukei kina na gonevuli, na qase kei ira na vakaleqai vakayago.

Ia, keitou sa kunea ni kena ivakarau kei na icakacaka eso a vakaduri me muria kei na lewa ni Boseyaco era sa makawa ka dodonu me lesuvi, me vaka ni a vakarautaki me baleta na tikidua (voucher), qai sevu e muri na tikite livaliva.
E leqa talega ni sega tu na veiyalayalati ni tabana ni tikite kei na Tabacakacaka ni Vuli qai sega na tikinisiga ena veiyalayalati ni tabana ni tikite kei na Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba, ia na leqa qo me wali me taqomaki kina na matanitu de yaco na leqa.

Sa kune na leqa eso, vu mai na malumalumu ni qaqarauni, wili kina ni sega tu na veidutaitaki (reconcile) vakavula ni itukutuku vakailavo ni tabana e rua ni matanitu kei na tabana ni tikite.
E dodonu talega me sagai me wali na ririko eso sa kune ka rawa ni tini ena saumi ilavo vakasivia.

Qo e wili kina na kena saumi vakasivia na veivuke baleta ni tawani sivia na tikite, saumi vodovodo ni gonevuli ena taudaku ni yalava ni koronivuli (zone), nodra vukei na sega ni dodonu me vukei, sega ni tusanaki na kauwai (declaration of interest), kei na kena tawani tikoga na tikite ni dua sa mate.

E ririkotaki tale ga de tauri vakailavo na ilavo e vo tiko ena tikite.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY viii REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Kena isoqoni, sa mana na veivuke ni rawa kina na vodo basi ena tikite livaliva.

Ia, e rawa ni daumaka sara na vakayagataki ilavo ke toroi cake na itovo ni qaqarauni.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY ix REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI कार्यपालक साराांश ई-टिकटििंग के द्वारा बस के भाड़े की कार्यक्रम 2017 में स्कू ली छात्रिं, कम धन कमाने वाले पररवार तथा बूढ़े तथा टवकलािंग लरगरिं कर र्ात्ा की सहार्ता के टलए शुरु की गई थी । र्ह पााँच साल तथा बीस साल की राष्ट्र ीर् टवकास र्रजना के अटतररक्त है। कु छ मौटलक कारणरिं से ई-पररवहन सहार्ता लागू की गई थी; पहला स्कू ली छात्रिं के माता- टपता जर बच्रिं कर स्कू ल भेजने की खचय कर सहे नहीिं सकते उनकी आटथयक दबाओ कर कम करने के टलए तथा साथ- साथ में बच्रिं कर उत्तम्ता पढ़ाई तथा बराबरी देने के टलए; दू सरा बूढ़े नागररकरिं तथा टवकलािंग लरग की देश के प्रटत र्रगदान कर सम्मान देने के टलए। एक सुरटित र्रजना टजससे बूढ़े लरग कर सहार्ता दी जा सके ताटक वे कम मूल्य में घूम सके , तथा साथ में टवकलािंग लरगरिं कर सवारी टमल सके । बस टकरार्ा सहार्ता की कार्यक्रम के वतयमान टहस्सेदार टशिा मिंत्ालर्, टवरासत और कला (MEHA) जर बच्रिं के भाड़े की सहार्ता की प्रशासन तथा देख भाल करते है और मटहलाओिं, बच्रिं और गरीबी टनवारण मिंत्ालर् की सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग (DSW) जर बूढ़े तथा टवकलािंग लरगरिं के भाड़े की सहार्ता की प्रशासन और देख भाल करते है। बाहरी टहस्सेदार जर इस में शाटमल है वह ई-टिके टििंग की मशीनरिं तथा िरप-अप मिंच के एकमात् सेवा प्रदान करने वाले है। सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग ई-टिकटििंग के सम्बन्ध इस समझौता पर आधाररत है जर एक-एक टहस्सेदार की काम तथा टजम्मेदारी कर टनधायररत करती है। टशिा मिंत्ालर् ई-टिकटििंग की सेवा प्रदान करने वाले के साथ अभी करई समझौता पर नहीिं आई है। पररवहन सहार्ता कार्यक्रम हर र्ात्ा बस, के ररर्ा तथा पिंत जर 2009 में शुरु हुई थी कर शाटमल करता है। 2015 के अिंत तक , कु ल टमला के 88,579 छात्रिं कर 100% सहार्ता टमली जबटक 20,036 बूढ़े तथा टवकलािंग लरगरिं कर 2011 में 50% छू ि की वाउचर टमली। 2017 के अिंटतम भाग में बस के भाड़े की ई-टिकटििंग काम कर लागू की गई टजस में 51,109 छात्रिं कर पटहली बार सहार्ता टमली। 2019 की िेम 3 तक, कु ल टमला के 66,674 छात्रिं तथा 45,106 बूढ़े नागररक तथा टवकलािंग लरगरिं कर ई-पररवहन कर्ड यस ई-टिकटििंग कर
 इस्तेमाल करने के टलए टमली थी। टजस में बूढ़े तथा टवकलािंग लरगरिं कर 2018 में हर महीना $40.00 र्ाने की 100% सहार्ता टमली थी। बच्े जर देहाती इलाके में रहते है जहािं बस के सेवा नहीिं है वह भी वाउचर का इस्तेमाल करते थे। र्ह बच्े वाउचर के ररर्ा, टमनी बस तथा पिंत पर सवारी के टलए इस्तेमाल करते है। $115 टमटलर्न सावयजटनक धन टपछले चार सालर में ई-टिकटििंग मिंच के द्वारा सहार्ता के टलए खचय हुई है 2017 से। ई-टिकटििंग के द्वारा बस के भाड़े की सहार्ता की कार्यक्रम के पास सिंटवधान के नीचे र्रग्य स्कू ली बच्े, बूढ़े तथा टवकलािंग लरगरिं कर जरूरी सहार्ता प्रदान करने के टलए कार्ायत्मक तथा प्रभावी हरने के टलए पर्ायप्त अटधकार है। तथाटप हमने र्ह टवचार टकर्ा की जर नीटतर्ााँ तथा प्रटक्रर्ा कर के टबनि के फै सले कर टनधायररत करने के टलए लागू की गई थी वह कल ग्रस्त हर चुके है क्रिंटक, वह वाउचर टसस्टम के टलए बनार्े गए थे, ई-टिके टििंग की आरिं भ से पटहले। इसी तरह से करई समझौता टशिा मिंत्ालर् तथा बहार के टहस्सेदार के बीच में न हरना तथा सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग की बहार के टहस्सेदार के साथ की समझौता का करई तारीख नहीिं हरना सरकार के भलाई के टलए सुधार हरनी चाटहए। सरकार के दरनरिं एजेंसी तथा ई-टिकटििंग सेवा प्रदान करने वाले के बीच में कमजरर भीतरी टनर्िंत्ण के कारण खाटमर्रिं कर पीई गई थी। र्हााँ र्ह भी जरूरी है की काम टकर्ा जाए आने वाले सिंकिरिं कर ररकने के टलए टजससे अटधक भुगतान हर सकती है। इन सिंकिरिं में शाटमल है ज्यादा िरप-अप के कारण अटधक भुगतान, स्कू ली िेत् से ज्यादा स्कू ल भाड़े की भराई, अर्रग लरगरिं कर सहार्ता, टहत टक घरषणा की कमी, तथा मारे हुए बूढ़े नागररकरिं की कार् पर िरप- अप। कार् में बचे हुए पैसे कर धरके से इस्तेमाल करने की सिंकि। व्यापक रूप से, र्ह टसस्टम ई-टिकटििंग के माध्यम से बस के भाड़े कर प्रदान करने में काफी प्रभावी रही है। लेटकन, उत्तरदार्ी भीतरी टनर्िंत्ण प्रणाली से साधनरिं के इस्तेमाल कर सुधारा जा सकता है। PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY x REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Key Findings and Recommendations Coverage The audit on the Administration
 and Management of Bus Fare Assistance through e- Ticketing for school children, disabled and the elderly focusses on three areas; namely the ‘Administration of the Program’, ‘Management of the Performance of the Program’, and ‘Data Analytics’.
Key findings Administration of the Program • The Ministry of Education is yet to review its policy which was due for review in 2016 whilst the Department of Social Welfare is yet to develop a policy framework for e-transport services.
• The Ministry of Education is yet to review its Policy on Transport Assistance and Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) to include the responsibility of the e-ticketing service provider to outline the reporting responsibility as required under the Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014.

SOPs prepared by the Department of Social Welfare are yet to be endorsed by the Permanent Secretary.
• There is no formal agreement (Service Level Agreement) between the Ministry of Education and the e-ticketing service provider.

• Review of the agreement between the Department of Social Welfare and the service provider highlighted gaps in the agreement that needs to be improved.

• Although complaints are recorded by the Units within the respective Ministry and Department, there is no clear process on the manner in which feedback is to be provided to the complainant.
• Policies and processes for declaration of conflict of interest for officers involved in the program have not been developed by the Ministry and Department to manage any conflicts.

Management of the Performance of the Program • There has been an absence of acceptable data governance process where agreements are made to ensure that relevant information such as exception reports on the actual use of cards, travel patterns and behaviour of eligible students are captured and monitored.
• Regular reconciliation has not been carried out between the records kept by the Ministry and Department against the records kept by the e-ticketing service provider.

• The Department of Social Welfare does not have any mechanism within its processes which relates to exit of recipients from the bus fare assistance programs for senior citizens and persons living with disability.
• On 8 April 2020, the Monitoring and Evaluation Team of the Department of Social Welfare made eight recommendations as part of its evaluation of the program.

As at May 2020, the Department had only addressed one recommendation.

• Our review of the MEHA internal audit report in May 2020 revealed six findings that are related to the Bus Fare Assistance program.
For example, PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY xi REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI inconsistencies were noted in the approval and rejection of applications on bus fare assistance provided on the zoning of students based on their residential address even though the head of school considerably monitors this limit.
The TAU is working towards implementing the recommendations made in respect of these issues.

• A significant number of anomalies were noted in the student bus fare assistance application process which needs to be addressed by the Policy on Transport Assistance.

Data Analytics • Other forms of ID were also accepted by the e-ticketing service provider apart from the ID issued by the Department of Social Welfare.

In some cases, there were more than one user for one active ID.
• • Monthly loading on Exempt and Concession cards, in some cases, were more than the approved monthly amount of $40.

• There were also issues of funds being incorrectly transferred from one recipient ID to another.

• There were inconsistencies between the records maintained by the ticketing service provider and the Ministry of Education.
General Recommendations We recommend that the Ministry of Education reviews its Policy on Transport Assistance which was due for review in 2016 and also update the SOPs to address the risks associated with the Bus Fare Assistance program through e- ticketing, amend outdated information and incorporate the updated e- ticketing services application and guidelines.
Similarly, the Department of Social Welfare should develop a policy and finalise its SOPs which govern the operation of the Bus fare Assistance program for the elderly and persons with disabilities.

It is also recommended that the Ministry of Education enters into an agreement with the e-ticketing provider whilst the Department of Social Welfare should review the agreement with the e-ticketing service provider to ensure that the gaps identified in the current agreement is improved.
We also recommend that the processes of the Ministry of Education should be improved so that confirmation on income of parents of students applying for assistance under the program can be obtained from the Fiji Revenue and Customs Service.

Similarly, the Department of Social Welfare should ensure that arrangements are made with the Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages to obtain timely confirmations on the age of senior citizens applying for assistance and those that are deceased.
We also recommend that the zoning policy is strictly adhered to for bus fare assistance given to school students.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY xii REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI The Ministry of Education and Department of Social Welfare should also take necessary steps to ensure the timely implementation of recommendations relating to the program made by the internal audit team and its Monitoring and Evaluations team.
Finally, there is a need for the Ministry and Department to regularly reconcile their records against the records maintained by the e-ticketing service provider to ensure that any anomalies are rectified on a timely basis to avoid wastage of funds.

It is also recommended that the Ministry and Department obtain the detailed reports as required under the Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014.
Overall Conclusion The Bus Fare assistance program through e-ticketing for the school children, elderlies and the disabled have positively impacted the lives of many people.

Based on our findings in this report, the delivery of the program can be improved through the development and update of policy framework and SOPs by both the Ministry of Education and Department of Social Welfare.
Signed agreements which define the roles and responsibilities of the e-ticketing service provider and the government agencies involved in the delivery of the program would ensure that the interests of government are adequately protected.

Access to specific reports from the e-ticketing service provider can enhance the reconciliation process based on which payments are made.
Therefore, whilst the program has been beneficial for the targeted population, more effort is still needed in terms of the overall governance to further improve the delivery of the program.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY xiii REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI SOQONI NI MACALA KEI NA VAKATUTU Dikevi Na kena dikevi vaka daunifika na Qaravi ni Veivuke ni Vodovodo ni Basi ena Tikite Livaliva baleti ira na Gonevuli, Vakaleqai Vakayago kei na Qase e basogai tolu: ‘Qaravi ni Porokaramu’, ‘Qarauni ni Cakacaka ni Porokaramu’, kei na Dikevi ni Fika’ Kena macala Qaravi ni Porokaramu • Na Tabacakacaka ni Vuli sebera ni lesuva na kena polisi, ka lokuci me lesuvi ena 2016, ia na Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba se bera ni bulia na kena polisi baleta na porokaramu qo.
• Na Tabacakacka ni Vuli se bera ni lesuva na kena polisi ni Veivuke ni Veilakoyaki kei na iTovo Tudei ni Cakacaka (Standard operating Procedure,SOP) me okati kina na itavi ni tabana ni tikite livaliva me dau tukutuku, me vaka e lavaki ena kena lawa (Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014).

Na iTovo Tudei ni Cakacaka sa vakarautaka na Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba se bera ni vakadonuya na Vunivola Tudei.

• Sega tu na veiyalayalati (Service Level Agreement) ni Tabacakacaka ni Vuli kei na tabana ni tikite.
• Ni dikevi na veiyalayalati ni Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba kei na tabana ni tikite, a kune eso na tikina malumalumu ka dodonu me vaqaqacotaki.

• Dina ni a ciqomi na kudru ka vakai volataki ena kena tabacakacaka kei na Tabana, e sega tu na ivakatutu matata ni vakau ni kena isau vei koya a kudru.

• Sega tu na polisi se ivakarau ni tusanaki ni kauwai (conflict of interest) vei ira na vakalesilesi ni porokaramu ena Tabacakacaka se Tabana, de tubu na veibeitaki.
Qarauni ni Cakacaka ni Porokaramu • E sega talega na ivakarau tudei e ganita me vu ni veiyalayalati baleta na kena vakaivolataki ka qarauni na itukutuku yaga eso, me vaka na itukutuku ni vakayagataki tikite, veilakoyaki ni pasidia,kei nodra itovo na gonevuli.

• Sega tu ni caka na veidutaitaki (reconciliation) ni itukutuku vakailavo ni Tabacakacaka kei na Tabana, kei na itukutuku vakailavo ni tabana ni tikite.
• Na Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba e sega kina na ivakarau me baleta nodra sa Vakacegu mai na porokaramu na qase kei na vakaleqai vakayago.

• Ena 8 Epereli 2020, eratou a dikeva na porokaramu na Mataveivaqaqai (Monitoring and Evaluation Team) ni Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba, qai walu nodratou vakatutu.

Me yacova na Me 2020, sa cakacakataka na Tabana e dua walega na vakatutu.
• Neitou lesuva na itukutuku ni dikevi ni veika vakailavo ni Tabacakacaka ni Vuli ena Me 2020, a kunei kina e ono na leqa baleta ba Veivuke ni Vodovodo ni Basi.

E dua, a kune ni duidui tu na kedra ciqomi se sega na kere veivuke ni vodovodo ni basi ni laurai vata kei na nodra tiko se sega ena yalava ni koronivuli, dina ni dau yadrava na tabana qo o qasenivuli liu.

Sa saga tiko na Tabani Veiqaravi me cakacakataka na vakatutu ena vica na tikina qo.
• Vica toka na leqa a kune ena cakacakataki ni kere veivuke ni vodovodo ni basi, e dodonu me wali ena Transport Assistance Policy.

Dikevi ni Fika • A ciqoma na tabana ni tikite e so tale na mataqali ivakadinadina (ID), sega ni o koya walega a solia na Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY xiv REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI • E so na ivakadinadina (ID) e sega ni vakayagataka wale ga e lewe dua.

• E so vei ira na vakatikite ni Vakaleqai se Qase era sivita na ilavo yalataki ni $40 dua na vula.
• A kune talega ni so na ilavo e vakadewataki cala kina dua tale na ivakadinadina (ID) • Rau veiveicalati na itukutuku maroroi ni tabana ni tikite kei na itukutuku ni tabacakacaka ni vuli.
Vakatutu Raraba Keitou vakatura me lesuva na Tabacakacaka ni Vuli na kena polisi ni Veivuke ni Veilakoyaki, me a lesuvi ena 2016, qai vakavouya na itovo tudei ni cakacaka (SOP) me qarauni kina na ririko eso ni porokaramu ni Veivuke ni Vodovodo ni Basi ena tikite livaliva, veisautaka na itukutuku sa oti na kena gauna, ka vakavouya kina na sala ni kere tikite kei na idusidusi (guidelines).
Na Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba Talega me du ana kena polisi ka vakadeitaka na kena itovo tudei ni cakacaka (SOP) me baleta na porokaramu ni Veivuke ni Vodovodo ni Basi vei ira na qase kei na vakaleqai vakayago.

E vakaturi talega me dua na veiyalayalati ni Tabacakacaka ni Vuli kei na tabana tikite, ka me lesuvi na tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba na veiyalayalati kei na tabana ni tikite me wali kina na leqa sa kune ena nodrau veiyalayalati.
Keitou vakatura talega me toroi cake na cakacaka ni Tabacakacaka ni Vuli me tauri kina mai na Tabana ni Vakacavacava (Fiji Revenue and Customs Service) na ivakadinadina ni kedrau isau na itubutubu rau kere veivuke ena vukui luvedrau.

Me taura vaka talega kina na Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba na ivakadinadina ni nodra yabakai na kere veivuke ni qase, kei na nodra mate, mai na Valenivolavola ni Sucu, Mate kei na Vakamau (Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages).
Keitou vakatura talega me muria matua na lawa ni yalava ni koronivuli (zoning) baleta na Veivuke ni Vodovodo ni Basi vei ira na gonevuli.

Na Tabacakacaka ni Vuli kei na Tabana ni Veiqaravi Rararaba me vakadeitaka talega ni vakayacori taudonu na vakatutu ni porokaramu a vakatura na kena matavakadidike vakailavo (internal audit team) kei na kena matayadra (Monitoring and Evaluations team).
Kena itinitini, na Tabacakacaka kei na Tabana me dau veidutaitaka (reconcile) na nodratou itukutuku kei na nodratou na tabana ni tikite, me wali taudonu kina na leqa e kune, me kua kina na vakasabusabu.

E vakaturi talega me rau taura na kena itukutuku matailalai, me vaka e lavaki vakalawa (Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014) Soqoni Levu Na porokaramu ni Veivuke ni Vodovodo ni Basi ena tikite gonevuli,vakaleqai vakayago kei na qase sa mai yaga vei ira na lewe levu.
livaliva baleti ira na Keitou sa kunea ena ivolatuktuku qo ni rawa ni toroi cake na qaravi ni porokaramu ke vakatorocaketaki ka vakavoui na polisi kei na itovo tudei ni cakacaka (SOP) ni Tabacakacaka ni Vuli kei na Tabana ni Veiqaravi Raraba.

Me tiko na veiyalayalati sainitaki e virikotori kina na itavi ni tabana ni tikite kei na Tabacakcaka kei na Tabana ni matanitu e kauwai kina, me taqomaki kina na matanitu ka rawa na kena inaki.
Me taurivaki na itukutuku matailalai mai na tabana ni tikite me maucokona kina na veidutaitaki ni tukutuku e yavutaki kina na saumi ilavo.

Sa macala gona ni sa mai yaga na porokaramu vei ira na vukei ena kena inaki, se vo tiko me vaqaqacotaki na kena yadravi me uasivi kina.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY xv REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI खोज के मुखाए परिणाम तथा सुझाए व्याप्ति र्ह लेखा परीिा ई-टिके टििंग के द्वारा बस के भाड़े की सहार्ता की शासन तथा प्रबिंध स्कू ल के बच्रिं, बूढ़े तथा टवकलािंग लरगरिं पर तीन िेत् पर टनधायररत थी , ‘ कार्यक्रम का शासन’, कार्यक्रम का प्रदशयन’, और ‘र्ािा की टवश्लेषण’। खोज के मुखाए परिणाम काययक्रम का शासन • • • टशिा मिंत्ालर् अपनी नीटत कर अभी भी आलरचना करने में बाकी है टजसकी सीमा 2016 में समाप्त हर गई है जब की सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग ई-पररवहन की नीटत की ढािंचा कर तैर्ार नहीिं कर पाई है। टशिा मिंत्ालर् अपने पररवहन सहार्ता नीटत और मानक सिंचालन प्रटक्रर्ाओिं (SOPs) की आलरचना करने में बाकी है टजसमें ई-टिकटििंग सहार्ता कर प्रदान करने वाले की टजम्मेदारी हर तथा उन टजम्मेदाररर्रिं की रूपरे खा दी जाए जैसे की सवयग्राही एलेक्ट्र रटनक अटधटनर्म 2014 की आवश्यकता है। SOPs जर सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग ने तैर्ार की है उसकर अभी भी स्थार्ी सटचव की समथयन टमलनी बाकी है। टशिा मिंत्ालर् तथा ई-टिकटििंग सहार्ता प्रदान करने वाले के बीच में करई आटधकाररक समझौता (सेवा स्तर समझौता) नहीिं है। • सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग तथा सहार्ता प्रदान करने वाले के बीच की समझौता की जािंच के बाद खामी टमली टजसे सुधारने की जरूरत है। • हालािंटक टशिा मिंत्ालर् और सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग के पृथक भागरिं में टशकार्त दजय की जाटत है, टकस प्रकार से टशकार्त दजय करने वाले कर कै से प्रटतपुटष्ट् दी जाती है उस टक करई स्पष्ट् प्रणाली नहीिं है। • कार्यक्रम में काम करने वाले लरगरिं कर अपनी व्यक्तक्तगत टहत की घरटषत करने के टलए टशिा मिंत्ालर् और सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग ने करई भी नीटत तथा प्रटक्रर्ा कर तैर्ार नहीिं टकर्ा है। काययक्रम का प्रदशयन • • स्वीकार्य र्ेिा की शासन की प्रटक्रर्ा अनुपक्तस्थत है जहािं समझौता बनाई जाती है टजस से सही जानकारी जैसे की कई की सही उपर्रग की टववरण, र्ात्ा की प्रटतरूप तथा र्रग्य छात्रिं की व्यवहार पर टनगरानी रखी जा सके । टशिा मिंत्ालर् तथा सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग की रखी हुई अटभलेख तथा ई-टिके टििंग सहार्ता प्रदान करने वाले के रखी हुई अटभलेख के बीच में टमलान नहीिं की
 जाती है। • सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग के पास ऐसी करई भी टक्रर्ा टवटध अपने प्रटक्रर्ा में बूढ़े तथा टवकलािंग लरग जर बस के भाड़े की सहार्ता की कार्यक्रम के प्रापक के बहार जाने से सिंबिंध नहीिं है। • 8 अप्रैल 2020 कर सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग के मरटनिररिं ग तथा इवेलुआइशन िीम ने अपने कार्यक्रम की मूल्यािंकन में आि सुझाए दी थी। मई 2020 तक टर्पािमेंि ने टसफय एक सुझाओ पर काम की थी। • हमारी मई 2020 MEHA की भीतरी लेखा परीिा की समीिा ने छ जािंच-पररणाम जर बस के भाड़े की सहार्ता से जुड़ी है कर सामने लाई। जैसे की, बस के भाड़े की सहार्ता की अजी कर स्वीकार र्ा अस्वीकार बच्रिं की रहने की जगह पर टनधायररत िेत् के PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY xvi REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI अनुसार की जाती है जब की स्कू ल के मुख्य अध्यापक इसकी टनगरानी रखते है। TAU इस टवषर् पर सुझाओ कर लागू कर रही है। • छात्रिं की बस के भाड़े की सहार्ता की आवेदन की प्रणाली में काफी ज्यादा सिंख्या में खाटमर्रिं पाई गई टजन कर पररवहन सेवा नीटत कर सुधारने की जरूरत है। मूलयाांकन टीम • ई-टिकटििंग के सहार्ता कर प्रदान करने वाले ने टवभाग से जारी की हुई ID के अलावा अन्य तरह की ID कर स्वीकार टकर्ा। • कु छ मामले में, एक सटक्रर् ID पर एक से ज्यादा उपर्रगकताय थे। • कु छ मामले में एकज़म्प्ट तथा करन्सेशन कड़स पर महीने की $40 मिंजूरी से ज्यादा रकम थी। • कु छ मामले ऐसे भी थे जहािं एक ID से धन दू सरी पर गलती से दाल दी गई थी। • टशिा मिंत्ालर् तथा टिके टििंग सेवा देने वाले के अटभलेख के बीच में असिंगटत थी। सामान्य सुझाओ y टशिा मिंत्ालर् कर हम र्े सुझाओ देते है की वह अपने पररवहन सेवा नीटत की समीिा करें जर 2016 में हरनी थी तथा अपने SOPs कर अपर्ेि करें ताटक बस के भाड़े की सहार्ता की कार्यक्रम से जुड़ी हुई खतरे कर ठीक कर सके , ई-टिकटििंग के द्वारा, पुरानी जानकारी कर बदले तथा नई टिकटििंग सेवाएिं की अजी और नीटत कर जरड़ सके । इसी तरह, सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग भी एक नीटत बनाए तथा अपने SOPs कर अिंटतम रूप दे जर बूढ़े तथा टवकलािंग लरगरिं की बस के भाड़े की सहार्ता की सिंचालन पर शासन करें । टशिा मिंत्ालर् कर र्ा भी सुझाओ दी
 जाती है की ई-टिकटििंग सेवा देने वाले के साथ एक समझौता बनार्े जब की सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग अपने ई-टिकटििंग सेवा प्रदान करने वाले के साथ की समझौता की समीिा करें ताटक जर भी खाटमर्ााँ टमली है उसे सही कर सके । टशिा मिंत्ालर् कर हम र्ा भी सुझाओ देते है की वह अपने प्रटक्रर्ा कर सुधारे ताटक जर बच्े कार्यक्रम के नीचे सहार्ता की अजी लगाते है उनकी माता-टपता की आमदनी फीजी राजस्व और सीमा शुल्क सेवा से प्राप्त की जा सके । इसी तरह, सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग कर चाटहए की वह जन्म, मृत्यु और टववाह रे गीस्टर के साथ व्यवस्था बनार्े ताटक जर बूढ़े नागररक अजी लगाते है उनकी उम्र सही समर् पर टमल सके तथा साथ ही में टजनकर सहार्ता दी जाती है उनकी मौत की भी समर् पर जानकारी टमल सके । हम र्े भी सुझाओ देते है की छात् की नीटत कर कड़ी तरह से लागू टकर्ा जाए बच्रिं कर बस के भाड़े की सहार्ता देते समाए। टशिा मिंत्ालर् तथा सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग कर अपने भीतरी टहसाब टकताब की जािंच, टनगरानी, मूल्यािंकन िीम के सुझाओ कर समर् पर लागू करने के टलए कदम उठाए जाए। आक्तखरी में, टशिा मिंत्ालर् तथा सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग कर टनर्टमत तौर पर अपने PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY xvii REPORT OF THE AUDITOR GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI अटभलेख और ई-टिकटििंग सेवा प्रदान करने वाले के अटभलेख की टमलान कर करने की जरूरत है ताटक करई भी त्ुटि समर् पर सुधारी जा सके टजससे अन-आवश्यक धन की बरबादी ना हर। र्ह भी सुझाओ दी जाती है की टशिा मिंत्ालर् तथा सवयग्राही एलेक्ट्र रटनक टकरार्ा टिकि अटधटनर्म 2017 के नीचे टवस्तृत अटभलेख कर हाटसल करें । सम्पूणय प्तनष्कर्य बस के भाड़े की कार्यक्रम ई-टिकटििंग के द्वारा स्कू ली बच्े, टवकलािंग तथा बूढ़रिं के टलए कई लरगरिं के जीवन में सकारात्मक प्रभाव लाई है। एक व्यापक अध्यर्न कर आर्रग र्ह टनधायररत करने के करटशश कर सकती है की कै से लरगरिं कर सहार्ता टमली है तथा आगे चल के कै से इस सहार्ता कर और मजबूत की जा सकती है। हमारे जािंच पर आधाररत जर इस अटभलेख में है, कार्यक्रम की टवतरण दरनरिं टशिा मिंत्ालर् तथा सामाटजक कल्याण टवभाग की नीटत की ढािंचा तथा SOPS कर अपर्ेि करने से और सुधारी जा सकती है।
 हस्तािर की हुई समझौता जर ई-टिकटििंग सेवा प्रदान करने वाले की तथा जुड़ी हुई सरकारी सिंस्थाओिं की भूटमका तथा टजम्मेदारी कर सही तरह से पररभाटषत करें वह सरकार की टहत कर सुरटित रखेगी। ई-टिकटििंग सेवा प्रदान करने वाले से सही अटभलेख टमलने पर की हुई भुगतान की टमलान प्रणाली कर और सुधार सकती है। इसटलए, जब की र्ा कार्यक्रम लटित जनसिंख्या के टलए लाभदार्क है, और मेहनत पूरे शासन पर जरूरत है कार्यक्रम कर और फलदार्क बनाने के टलए। PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, EDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY xviii REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI 1.0 INTRODUCTION The 2013 Constitution of the Republic of Fiji4 contains the right of every person to have reasonable access to transportation.
It further establishes the rights or persons with disability to have access to all places, public transport and information and the rights of every persons to early childhood education, primary and secondary education and further education.

In 2015, the Republic of Fiji adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development that is aimed at improving people’s lives economically, socially and environmentally.
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is a United Nations (UN) global initiative containing 17 sustainable development goals and 169 targets.

The 15 year Agenda came into effect from September 2015 following on from the expiry of the Millennium Development Goals (MDG).

In November 2017, the National Development Plan (NDP) was launched.

The plan reiterates the national vision of Transforming Fiji which promotes widespread improvement in society.
For example, more employment opportunities and a significant reduction in the levels of hardship, poverty and inequality.

The Bus Fare Assistance program through e-ticketing to students, elderlies and persons with disabilities is part of the governments’ action towards providing access to better education and creating more opportunities for children from poor families and freedom of movement for all to reduce hardship, poverty and inequality.
4 Constitution of the Republic of Fiji, Section 34 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 1 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI 1.1 Background Within a period of three years from 2017 to 2019, the number of Fijian students relying on government for bus fare assistance has increased significantly.
Figure 1.1: Students Provided with Bus Fare Assistance Initiative (2017- 2019) Bus Fare Assistance for Students s t n e d u S t f o r e b m u N 112,000 110,000 108,000 106,000 104,000 102,000 100,000 98,000 96,000 94,000 92,000 90,000 2017 2018 Year 2019 Source: Data provided by TAU A similar trend within the same time frame was observed for the elderly citizens along with Fijians living with disability.
Figure 1.2: The Elderly and Fijians with Disability Supported with Bus Fare Assistance Initiative (2017- 2019) Bus Fare Assistance for The Elderly and Disabled 90,000 80,000 70,000 60,000 50,000 40,000 30,000 20,000 10,000 - 2017 2018 Year 2019(Jan-Apr) Source: Data provided by DSW PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 2 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI This increased demand has placed additional pressure on resources available within government to deliver not only effectively but do so in an efficient and economical manner.
Through Private Public Partnership between government’s implementing agencies and the e-ticketing service provider, government was able to provide transport assistances through e-ticketing in 2017.

A total of 88,579 students received transport assistance vouchers in 2009 when it started while 80,879 elderly and disabled persons received 50% concession voucher in 2011.
In 2017, bus fare assistance through e-ticketing cards was implemented and by term 3 of 2019, a total of 66,674 students and about 51,444[1] senior citizens and people with disability received e-transport cards.

The elderly and disabled persons received full 100% assistance for their fare at the maximum value of $40 per month in 2018.

Students living in rural areas that have no bus services still use vouchers to travel on carrier, minibuses and punts.
Public funds amounting to $100m[2] has been spent over 3 years since the assistance was delivered through the e-ticketing platform in 2017.
1.2 Reasons for the audit Government’s commitment towards certain clusters of the population is in line with government’s commitment in the NDP on “Transforming Fiji” and the government’s pledge of “Leaving No One Behind”.5 This is also in line with the Sustainable Development Goals aim to end poverty, hunger and inequality, take action on climate change and the environment, improve access to health and education, build strong institutions and partnerships, and more.

In Fiji, action has already begun.


One such initiative is the government’s bus fare assistance for the school children, elderlies and persons with disability.

Our audit has been undertaken to look into the efficiency and effectiveness of the Bus Fare assistance program provided by government which is targeted towards school children, the elderly and persons with disabilities.
[1]https://www.fbcnews.com.fj/news/family-members-only-visiting-their-elderly-for-monetary-benefits/ [2] As at 25 Feb 2020 from FMIS 5 https://www.pacific.undp.org/content/pacific/en/home/presscenter/articles/2016/06/23/fiji-government-ngos-and-undp- workingin-partnership-to-fulfil-the-underlying-sdg-pledge-to-leave-no-one-behind-.html PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 3 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI 2.0 AUDIT OBJECTIVE, SCOPE AND METHODOLOGY 2.1 The purpose of our audit Our audit seeks to assess whether the Bus Fare Assistance program through E-Ticketing is being effectively managed, operated and monitored.
Specifically, it examines whether governance and contractual arrangements including frameworks for monitoring and evaluation, ensures the efficient operation of the Bus Fare Assistance program and effectiveness in reaching the intended beneficiaries.

Our audit covered the role of the Ministry of Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation and Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts in working with the e-ticketing service provider to oversee the successful implementation of the Bus fare assistance program.
The target population covered in our audit are as follows: ➢ for School Children: enable students (whose combined parent’s income < 16,000) gain equity and access to quality education facilities within their home zone schools6 (within 2km7 radius from the school).

➢ for Elderly and the disabled: empower underprivileged persons; reasonable access to transportation, food security and safe water, and social security schemes.
Sub-Objectives The following are the sub objectives of the audit: ➢ To examine the adequacy of the relevant framework, legislations, policies, plans, funding and conditions upon which the initiative was established.

➢ To determine the operational effectiveness and efficiency of the bus fare assistance program administered by MEHA and DSW.

These can be determined through the following: o o o Effectiveness of forward planning to advise the government soundly on the bus fare assistance program.
Effectiveness of controls to ensure the financial regularity of the bus fare assistance program.

Effectiveness of monitoring and reporting on the bus fare assistance program’s performance against government objectives.

2.2 What we audited This report focuses on the administration and management of the bus fare program by examining its implementation and actual operations of the units within the MEHA and DSW since November 2017.
6 Policy on Transport Assistance 2015 7 Policy on School Zoning PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 4 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI The Transport Assistance Unit (TAU) of the Ministry of Education Heritage and Arts administers the Bus Fare assistance to school children from low income earning families while the Department of Social Welfare (DSW) of the Ministry of Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation administers the bus fare assistances to the elderlies and persons with disabilities.
2.3 How we audited Audit techniques used for gathering evidence and conducting our audit included the following: I. II.

III.
III.

Interview of key personnel at the Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts, Department of Social Welfare and the key responsible personnel of the e-ticketing service provider; Documentary review of legislation, policies, development plans, strategies, reports, media articles, and Analysis of data gathered, key performance indicators, measurement of outputs and performance information systems.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 5 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI 3.0 ADMINISTRATION OF THE PROGRAM This section of the report examines the framework within which the Bus fare assistance program operates.
The report looks at the legal framework, policies and other governance arrangements in place through which the program is being administered and whether they are effective in terms of how the Bus Fare Assistance program is being delivered.

Theme 1: Legal and Policy Framework Audit Observation The constitution emphasizes the importance of education, equality and inclusiveness of people living with disability as a priority for social and economic development.
The National Development Plan has been developed in alignment to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).

Government initiative to assist the poor and those receiving social benefits has been further enhanced with the provision of transport assistance.

The processing of the transport assistance has been greatly improved with the introduction of e- ticketing in 2017 whereby recipients are issued electronic bus cards to access the assistance as compared to the use of vouchers between 2010 and early 2017.
The Policy on Transport Assistance for the MEHA which was approved in 2015 has not been reviewed.

It was developed before the introduction of the e-ticketing system and still refers to processes dealing with the issue of vouchers to students.

In addition, DSW does not have any policy on the provision of transport assistance to the elderly and people with disabilities.
Neither MEHA nor DSW conducted any risk assessment when the bus fare assistance through externally provided e-ticketing system was implemented.

Criteria A person with any disability has the right to reasonable adaptation of buildings, infrastructure, vehicles, working arrangements, rules, practices or procedures, to enable their full participation in society.

Everyone has the right to education; including (a) early childhood education; (b) primary and secondary education; and (c) further education.
The state must take reasonable measures within its available resources to achieve the progressive realisation of the right—(a) to free early childhood, primary, secondary and further education; and (b) to education for persons who were unable to complete their primary and secondary education.8 A person with any disability has the right— (a) to reasonable access to all places, public transport and information; (b) to use sign language, braille or other appropriate means of communication; and (c) to reasonable access to necessary materials, substances and devices relating to the person’s disability.
(2) A person with any disability has the right to reasonable adaptation of buildings, infrastructure, vehicle, working arrangements, rules, practices or procedures, to enable 8 Section 31 of the 2013 Constitution of the Republic of Fiji PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 6 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI their full participation in society and the effective realisation of their rights.
(3) To the extent that it is necessary, a law or an administrative action taken under a law may limit, or may authorise the limitation of, the rights set out in this section.9 A policy is a formal statement of a principle that should be followed in an organisation.

It is a written declaration of policy decisions which sets the direction or strategy for how the organisation should approach and address something.
Risk Management is the systematic application of management policies, procedures and practices to the task of identifying, analysing, assessing, treating and monitoring risk.

It is not just about identifying risks, it is about learning to understand and weighing the level of risk or the criticality of the risk.

Criticality is obtained by combining the likelihood of being exposed to a risk and the consequences of the risk.
All section/unit heads shall be responsible for incorporating risk management identifying and determining appropriate actions to address operational and business continuity risks within their jurisdictions in accordance with MEHA policies and procedures.

The MEHA shall recognise that risk management is an integral function of an effective service delivery and is not an isolated activity.
All section/unit heads shall demonstrate a high level of awareness, acceptance and support risk management.10 into their standard management practices by Evidence and its Analysis Cabinet in its special meeting held on 13th December 2009, approved the Ministry of Education’s submission on the proposed Implementation Strategy of the Transport Assistance to Students.11 Cabinet agreed on the following: (i) (ii) the criteria for eligibility to the transport assistance for students in 2010 as proposed under section 4.0 (A,B and C) of the memorandum; and the memorandum.
implementation strategy as proposed in section 5.0 and 6.0 of the Since the implementation of the Transport Assistance program in 2009, vouchers and coupons were the medium used to disburse the assistance when students board school buses, RSL carriers as well as the use of punts for school trips.

In 2017, government initiated and implemented a more robust and innovative means of disbursing the bus fare assistance through the electronic bus fare ticketing system.
This was enabled though the Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014.

The Act requires the use of e-ticketing cards by all commuters which is to be swiped in all buses through e-ticketing machines.

Electronic ticketing is limited to bus services only within areas that catches the telephone networks, students using RSL carriers and punt are still using vouchers and coupons till to date.

Refer to the graph below for the chronological order of the bus fare assistance program.
9 Section 42 of the 2013 Constitution of the Republic of Fiji 10 http://www.education.gov.fj/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Risk-Management-Policy-2015-Final.pdf 11 Cabinet Paper CP (09) 334 of 13 December 2009 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 7 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Figure 3.1: Chronological order of Bus Fare Assistance programs • Start of Bus fare subsidy program for school student using coupons and voucher • Starting of 50% bus fare concession for elderly and free travel for people living with disabilities • Initial launching of e-ticketing system • Mandatory/ compulsory ticketing system for all passengers • Full concession on monthly allowance for elderly and people living with disability • Launch of e-ticketing kiosk for self topups at various bustands and vodafone outlets • Continuation of the free e-ticketing serivces for school students,elderly and disable 2009 2011 Novemb er 2011 October 2017 October 2018 7th April 2019 2019 In 2017, government enacted the Omnibus Electronic Fare Ticketing (Budget Amendment) Act 2017 which makes reference to the Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014 as the principal Act.
The principal Act regulates the use of electronic cards by all citizens including subsidized students, nonsubsidized students, senior citizens and people living with disability.

The government’s plan and actions are aligned and implemented in accordance to the Sustainable Development Goals; Goal 1 to reduce poverty, Goal 4 to provide quality education for all and Goal 10 to eliminate inequality.

Part 3.1.5 of the NDP emphasises on the theme Quality Education for all.
Quality education for all is essential to create a more skilled and adaptable workforce and create a knowledge based society.

Further discussions state that with the free-education initiative, free bus fares and free textbooks, enrolment numbers have increased significantly.
More teachers have been recruited, and continuous hiring of quality teachers will continue to improve the teacher to- student ratio for rural and urban areas.14 Under the NDP Goals and Policies, Goal Number 2 emphasises on ensuring every Fijian student has equal access to education at all levels including the provision of assistance towards students bus fare.

The extract below from the NDP includes strategies such as continuation of free education initiatives and bus fare subsidy.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 8 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Table 3.1: National Development Plan Policy and Strategies on Equal access to Education Policies Strategies Ensure every Fijian Student has equal access to education at all levels.
Continuation of free education initiative, bus fare subsidy, free textbooks, toppers scholarships and tertiary loan scheme.

infrastructure, Improve learning materials for all schools.

facilities and Timely provision of textbooks and building grants to schools.

Provision of access for the physically Updating of challenged students.

the Information Fiji Education Management System (FEMIS) to cover all aspects of school information.

Development of an e-library or virtual library for all citizens.
Source: Fiji NDP12 The NDP has annual targets and total expected output projected to be achieved under the bus fare assistance program over a 5 year plan.

This also includes annual targets for number of students to be assisted.

In the NDP extract below, it was targeted to provide transport assistance to 88,579 students in 2017-2018 period and thereafter 90,000 students each year.
Table 3.2: National Development Plan annual targets and total expected projected output Total Programme Output Expected Annual Targets 2017 - 2018 2018 - 2019 2019 - 2020 2020 - 2021 2021 - 2022 Lead Agency Quality Education 88,579 90,000 90,000 90,000 90,000 448,579 MEHA Free bus fare scheme (No.
students assisted) Source: Fiji NDP13 of Under part 3.1.7 of the NDP on Social inclusion and empowerment, the policy statement requires the promotion of a caring environment where everyone is safe and protected and its strategies include implementation, monitoring and review of legislations relating to the principles on the Convention on Rights of Older Persons and Convention on Rights of Persons with Disability and 12 5 year and 20 year National Development Plan Theme 3.1.5_Education_”Quality Education for all”, Pg 36.
13 5 year and 20 year National Development Plan Theme 3.1.5_Education_”Quality Education for all”, Pg 37.

PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 9 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI other relevant international instruments.

The table below is an extract from the NDP Part 3.1.7 on Social Inclusion and Empowerment.
Table 3.3: Policy based on a Socially Inclusive Fiji Goal: A socially inclusive Fiji and empowered Fijians.

Policy Promote a caring environment where everyone is safe and protected.

Strategies • Strengthen data gathering for baseline studies and analyses of the needs of children, elderly, people with disabilities and assessments of poverty.

• Review state social protection systems for the protection and care of vulnerable groups.
• Review and, if needed, enhance education, employment, trade, fiscal and other government policies as they impact vulnerable groups and social empowerment programs.

Implement, monitor and legislation relating to the principles and provisions of the Convention on the Child, Convention on the Rights of Older Persons, Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability and other international instruments.

the Rights of relevant review • • Encourage in-family support for the elderly.
Under the NDP’s Social Inclusion and empowerment program, the following were discussed for the next 5 years commencing from 2017: • Government will ensure that every Fijian is provided with the basic amenities of life.

• Social inclusion programs such as the poverty benefit scheme, welfare graduation programme and social pension scheme will be maintained.
• Targeted assistance will be provided to the vulnerable, including children living in poverty, children in orphanages and foster care, people with disabilities and special needs, and the elderly.14 A Risk Management Policy was approved in January 2015 by the Minister for Education to provide procedures and guidelines to all sections of the Ministry with a standard process to identify, analyse, evaluate, mitigate and monitor the key strategic and operational risks impacting on the MEHA’s vision.
The aim is to manage the risks involved in order to maximise opportunities and minimise negative outcomes.
With the delivery of the bus fare assistance to eligible students now transferred from the manual ticketing system onto the e- transport platform in 2017; the operating environment and risks have also changed not only at certain risks points within the Ministry/Department but also an entirely new basket of risks externally with the engagement and interaction of systems and procedures practised by the external e-ticketing service provider.
Discussions with the MEHA on 13 March 2020 revealed that the e-ticketing service provider had refined and revised its procedures when deficiencies in reporting were observed during the audit conduct phase in February 2020 for the last school term of 2017, school terms in 2018 and first two 14 5 year and 20 year National Development Plan _3.1.7_Social Inclusion and Empowerment Paragraph 3_Pg 49 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 10 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI terms of the year 2019.
By the last term of 2019, the e-ticketing service provider was able to provide an increased level of detailed reports when compared against those facilitated for preceding terms.

The Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts also developed and implemented the Policy on Transport Assistance in 2015, which plays the dual role of systematic policy guidelines and standard operating procedures for the management of the student bus fare assistance program.
The various role of the officers involved in processing bus fare assistance are described in the policy, which include the role of school heads, transport assistance officers and the MEHA.

The Policy on Transport Assistance has a review timeline of one year.

The first review which was due on 20th January 2016, has not been carried out.

The policy therefore has not been updated although it is still being used by the Ministry for the management of bus fare assistance.
Audit noted the following components which indicate that the policy needs to be updated: • The policy still recognises students whose parents earn below $15,600 as eligible students for bus fare assistance while new amendments in the bus fare assistance application has raised the threshold to $16,000.

• The policy is predominantly voucher and coupon driven, it recognises them as primary transaction modes instead of the e-ticketing platform, hence deliberations based on e- ticketing platform was lacking.
• The policy does not make provision for the proof of assessment made by the Transport Assistance Officer (TAO) to sign on the student bus fare applications after completing their assessment.

The audit noted that MEHA has not carried out any verification or independent confirmation of income declared by parents.

On the other hand, the Department of Social Welfare is yet to develop and implement a specific policy framework to guide the Bus fare Assistance program for the elderly and disabled.
The department is using a draft standard operating procedure to guide the overall processing of applications, responsibilities of departmental staffs and the approving authorities.

Causes The audit noted that the bus fare assistance program through e-ticketing was expeditiously implemented without proper planning and no proper assessments were done at the Ministry level.
Therefore, the two units within MEHA and DSW that is responsible for the management of the bus fare assistance program through e-ticketing had a lot of work to do in implementing the program as the current practices were yet to be incorporated into the existing policy which facilitated the use of coupons and bus fare vouchers.

Risk assessment within the MEHA in particular by the Transport Assistance Unit was not undertaken to capture subsequent changes in the actual operations of the bus fare assistance.
The change occurred when the delivery of the assistance was transferred from manual system to the e transport platform provided by the e-ticketing service provider.

The Policy on Transport Assistance was approved by the Minister for Education in January 2015 while the review date for the policy was 20th January 2016.
The Policy on Transport Assistance was PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 11 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI not reviewed nor was any risk assessment carried out to determine the risks associated with the provision of e-ticketing services by an external service provider.
Delay in review of the Policy on Transport Assistance to amend and update it with current changes was attributed to the absence of formulated review schedules by the MEHA management.

Similarly, the absence of a policy framework at Department of Social Welfare is an oversight of the Department’s management whereas the draft SOP was designed to cover dual roles as a policy guideline and standard operating procedure.
Effect The delay in review of the MEHA’s Policy on Transport Assistance has adversely affected the smooth operation and management of the Bus Fare Assistance program as the policy still refers to the use of coupons and bus fare vouchers instead of e-transport cards.

The two processes are quite different and e-ticketing systems is more complex as it also involves the engagement of an external e-service provider.
The updated policy guidelines and procedure which is relevant and necessary to guide the operation is missing.

On the same note there is absence of policy guideline to guide the Department of Social Welfare’s operations, that outlines specific policy measures and cover areas of authority.

Given the lack of guidance and procedures to deal with the new e-ticketing system, both agencies did not carry out any checks on the operations of the external e-ticketing service provider.
Reconciliations on the use of grants by recipients were also not carried out.

Good Practices MEHA has commenced review of the Policy on Transport Assistance and were consulting their concerned stakeholders.

The Ministry was targeting July 2020 for its approval and implementation.

DSW has also committed to developing their policy which could be used as guidance for other assistance they provide.
Expected Benefit A review of the TAU policy framework will ensure that relevant and appropriate guidelines are developed that supports the management and operation of the student’s bus fare assistance program.

Similarly, development of Department of Social Welfares’ policy framework will ensure that policy measures, processes and procedures of the Department’s bus fare assistance is properly governed in line with the government’s objectives.
Furthermore, the updating and review of the risk assessment for the TAU and DSW will enable them to identify gaps such as lack of guidelines and procedures and devise mitigation plans.

Recommendations • The Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts should review the policy framework for the program and align it to e-ticketing mode which is currently being used.
• The Ministry of Education and the Department of Social Welfare should update their risk assessment to incorporate risks associated with bus fare assistance through e-ticketing.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 12 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI • The Department of Social Welfare should develop a policy framework that covers specific policy measures in relation to bus fare assistance provided to elderly and persons with disabilities and cover areas of authority not necessarily covered by the SOP Theme 2: Standard Operating Procedure Audit Observation Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) for bus fare assistance in the Ministry of Education and the Department of Social Welfare should be updated to prevent, detect and rectify unusual events that indicate unwarranted practices from the users of the assistance.
In the case of Ministry of Education, there is no separate SOP.

However, processes and procedures are incorporated within the Policy on Transport Assistance which is yet to be updated.

The Department of Social Welfare has drafted a SOP but there is no clear indications as to when it would be finalized.

Criteria A procedure provides detailed mandatory steps (sometimes in the form of a checklist) which can be followed to achieve a recurring task or comply with a policy.
These can include step-by-step instructions or statements stating what needs to be done.

A procedure informs employees how to carry out or implement a policy.

Procedures usually contain written instructions in logical numbered steps and are also commonly known as SOPs in the public sector.
A solution provider must provide the: a) Ministry of Education with access to the data, including the reports generated from the data, on subsidized students; and b) Department of Social Welfare with access to the data, including the reports generated from the data, on subsidized senior citizens or persons with disabilities.15 Subject to subsections (1), (2) and (3), solution providers must ensure that the data and reports: a) are accessed by authorised persons of the various organisations and that secure logins are provided for the access of such information; and b) include, but are not limited to the following – i. ii.
iii.

iv.

v. vi.

vii.

viii.
all classes of passenger details; all classes of passenger travel details and bus card usage; revenue and loading reports; loading statistics and reports; top up reports on all passengers; omnibus registration number and identification reports; blacklist and bus card status reports; reports of bus cards readers; 15 Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014, Section 19(3) PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 13 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI ix.
such other information as may be prescribed by Regulations.16 Evidence and its Analysis The Ministry of Education does not have a specific SOP for student bus fare assistance program.

However, the Policy on Transport Assistance is used for its standard operating procedures.

The policy was prepared to play a dual role as a policy guideline while also detailing procedures for the management and operation of the bus fare assistance program.
Review of the Policy noted that it only deals with internal stakeholders and does not cover the role of the external stakeholder which is the e-ticketing services provider.

This has led to the absence of reporting between the Ministry and the e-ticketing service provider as required under the Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014.

This has resulted in differences between the records of the Ministry and the e-ticketing service provider as proper reconciliations were not done.
Review of the draft Standard Operating Procedures for the Department of Social Welfare indicated that the draft is yet to be finalised and endorsed.
Although the Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014 enables the Ministry/Department to request for other reports in addition to those provided by the e-ticketing service provider, these provisions have not been applied.17 Causes A specific SOP for student’s bus fare assistance program was not prepared as the Policy on Transport Assistance includes detailed standard operating procedures that the Ministry is referring to for the management of the program.
Furthermore, the management of the Department of Social Welfare has not endorsed the draft SOP for bus fare assistance.

Effect The non-revision of SOP/TAU policy to include external stakeholders have resulted in non- fulfilment of obligatory engagement with the e-ticketing service provider to provide exception reports and issues pertaining to management of student bus fare assistance program.
On the same note the non-endorsement of the Department of Social Welfare’s SOP increases the risks of non- compliance that can hold the Department accountable for any mismanagement in providing social welfare services.

Good Practices The Ministry of Education had informed audit that a review was currently being undertaken for the Policy on Transport Assistance and the Ministry was in the process of consulting with stakeholders.
The Ministry also mentioned that it has drafted its Standard Operating Procedures for transport assistance.

The revised Standard Operating Procedure will include requesting the e-ticketing service provider to provide detailed reports for each month including exception reports as requested by MEHA.
The Ministry is targeting the end of July 2020 for the policies to be approved 16 Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014, Section 19(4) 17 Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014, Section 19 sub section 3 - 4 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 14 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI and implemented.
18 A copy of the draft Policy on Transport Assistance and draft Standard Operation Procedures was provided to audit.

19 Expected Benefit Having policies and procedures that are up-to-date and aligned to applicable legislation would ensure consistency in application and remove any confusion or bias.
This will assist the Ministry of Education and Department of Social Welfare in educating the target recipients of the assistance and expectations from other stakeholders including the e-ticketing service provider.

Recommendations: • The Ministry of Education should review the Policy on Transport Assistance to include, amongst other things, the e-ticketing service provider as external stakeholder.
• The Department of Social Welfare should ensure that approval of the Standard Operating Procedures is obtained as soon as possible and to include analysis and evaluation of e- ticketing data Theme 3: Service Agreement between Ministry of Education Heritage and Arts and E-Ticketing Service Provider for Students fare Audit Observation Contract agreement plays an important role because it is useful in assigning the terms and conditions of services which is to be provided by the contracted party.
It was noted during our audit that since the start of the program, the Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts (MEHA) still does not have any agreement with the external e-ticketing service provider for the bus fare assistance scheme for eligible school students.

Criteria A written contract or agreement must be entered into with the approved bidder for the supply of the goods, services or works tendered.
Legal advice must be sought on the draft contract or agreement.20 Evidence and its Analysis After enquiring with the TAU of Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts, it was revealed that no formal agreement exists between the Ministry and the e-ticketing service provider for the delivery of the Bus Fare Assistance Program to eligible students.
During the last quarter of 2017 calendar 18 Ministry’s unsigned comments e-mailed to audit on 12/05/20 19 Provided via e-mail on 19/05/20 20 “Consideration and Evaluation of Tenders”, Ministry of Education Finance Manual 2017, Pg 8.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 15 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI year, the e-ticketing card system was expeditiously implemented.

The policy on bus fare assistance for school students was also not amended to cater for the change in method of providing the assistance from coupon and vouchers to e-ticketing cards.
Similarly, internal control mechanisms for the new e-ticketing system was not developed.

The Ministry continued to place total reliance on the system of the external e-ticketing service provider to distribute the assistance to beneficiaries.

Causes Limited consultation and poor project management can be attributed for the oversight of failing to sign agreements with vendors especially for the IT related matters.
Effects The absence of an agreement between the Ministry of Education Heritage and Arts and the e- ticketing service provider will make it difficult to create, identify, outline and agree on roles and responsibilities of the two parties.

When these have not been clearly done, unrealistic expectations and misunderstandings can arise.
Good Practices The Ministry of Education informed audit that they were in the process of drafting an agreement from the point of view of the Ministry and would consult their stakeholders with the e-ticketing service provider being the main stakeholder.
We were also informed that the responsibilities of both the e-ticketing service provider and the Ministry will be clearly outlined in the agreement which will be aligned to the revised Policy on Transport Assistance and the Standard Operating Procedures21 Audit was provided with a draft copy of the revised Policy on Transport Assistance, draft Standard Operating Procedures and the draft Memorandum of Understanding between the Ministry and the e-ticketing service provider at the time of the audit.22 Expected Benefits The benefits of having an agreement are as follows: ➢ Provides effective communication and good record keeping.
➢ Serves as a guide for duties to be performed by concerned parties.

It will provide a clear understanding of what is expected from each other.

➢ Clearly demarcates line of duties and terms and conditions between the two parties.

Recommendations The Ministry of Education should enter into an agreement with the safeguard the interest of government and users of the bus fare assistance.
e-ticketing service provider to 21 Ministry’s unsigned comments e-mailed to audit on 12/05/20 22 Provided via e-mail on 19/05/20 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 16 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Theme 4: E-ticketing Agreement for the Department of Social Welfare Audit Observation The contract agreement that was signed does not contain the date on which it was signed even though the Department of Social Welfare entered into an agreement with the e-ticketing service provider for the bus fare assistance program for the elderlies and persons living with disability.
The agreement is yet to be renewed for extension after expiry in October 2019.

The agreement plays an important role because it is useful in assigning the terms and conditions of services which is to be provided by the contracted party.

The agreement also provides other details such as duration of the contract, the services which is to be rendered and other relevant factors.
Criteria A written contract or agreement must be entered into with the approved bidder for the supply of the goods, services or works tendered.

Legal advice must be sought on the draft contract or agreement.23 Clause 2 of the agreement read as follows: 2.
TERM 2.1 Initial Term The initial term of this agreement commences on the Commencement Date24 and continues for an initial term of 12 months (‘Initial Month’) 2.2 Extension of Initial Contract The Government may extend the Term: (a) until ………..October 2018 by giving written notice to the Supplier at any time before the end of the initial Term; or (b) to such other date as agreed between the parties25 In the Bus fare Assistance e-Ticketing agreement, the supplier agrees that the supplier will send automated senior citizen and persons with disabilities card usage reports on a particular day of the month (as nominated by the Government).26 Evidence and its Analysis It is commendable that as part of its socially responsible goals, the e-ticketing service provider has been providing the e-ticketing platform to carry out its duty to facilitate movement for senior citizens and persons living with disability.
23“Consideration and Evaluation of Tenders”, Ministry of Education Finance Manual 2017, Pg 8.
24 Commencement Date as October 2018 25 Agreement between the Ministry of Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation and E-ticketing service provider, Section 2 (2.2) (a) and (b) 26 Agreement between the Ministry of Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation and E-ticketing service provider, Section 2 (3.1) (d) PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 17 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI The Permanent Secretary for Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation signed the agreement with the Chief Operating Officer and the Company Secretary of the external e-ticketing service provider to enable the provision of bus fare assistance through e-ticketing to the elderlies and persons with disabilities.
Review of the agreement noted that it does not specify the date on which the agreement was signed by the two parties.

Instead the agreement specified the commencement month as October 2018 for a period of 12 months with no date clearly identified.

As at the date of the audit27, it was noted that the agreement has not been renewed after expiring in October 2019.
Even though the contract has provision in clause 3.1 for the Ministry to request and be provided reports in the manner it requires for its monitoring and evaluations, the Ministry has not submitted its request on reports for monitoring and evaluations each month.

Causes Having monitoring and evaluation function in a system is an important component of good governance and it assists in improving the system.
Incomplete and ambiguous agreements poses a high risk that conditions within the agreements would not be fully complied with.

The agreement in relation to DSW was not properly checked by the signatories as the commencement and end date for the contract was not clearly stated.

Effects Not having a specific date under the signature will make it difficult to determine the exact date the agreement became effective (“effective date”).
The absence of a particular date on the commencement date section will make it difficult to identify when the obligations of the e- ticketing service provider commences.

Not extending the contract in writing can end up creating misunderstanding between the parties as resources dedicated from either parties to the program can change over a certain period of time.
Provision of services without an agreement is risky as there is no binding agreement for the service provider to continue with the provision of the service.

Good Practice The DSW has commenced the review of the agreement and is using the audit findings to improve its management of the system.

Acceptance of the audit finding by the DSW management is a positive step towards improving the administration and management of the Bus Fare Assistance program.
27 As at 21 November 2019 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 18 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Expected Benefit Including critical dates in agreements can assist the Ministry to better manage the services provided.

Obtaining reports every month will strengthen monitoring and evaluation of the program and also reduce risks of fraud and misappropriation.
Recommendations • DSW should review the agreement to ensure that any gaps noted in the agreement are addressed, vetted for legal compliance and renewed.

• Monthly reports should be obtained for monitoring and evaluation.

Theme 5: Management of Feedback and Complaints Audit Observation Both the MEHA and DSW keep records of complaints from the general public including comments received in relation to any issues they experienced or observed.
However, there is no documented procedure on the manner the complaints would be managed by the two agencies and response provided to the complainant on any actions taken.

Criteria The immediate priority is to ensure effective, efficient and accountable delivery of Ministry and Department outputs, i.e.
the delivery of public services and implementation of public programmes and projects under the 5-year and 20 year National Development Plan and measuring national development targets, which are aligned to regional and international indicators like the SDGs.28 The objective of bus fare concession cards is to assist senior citizens and disabled persons in their travel when using bus as their mode of transport.29 Government is committed to providing an accountable and transparent service as such all the social welfare clients have the right to enquire about their cases.30 Therefore, in the execution of our service delivery, whether through telephones, e-mails, fax, letters, minutes, and or face to face, MEHA officers shall strive to offer excellent customer services that are friendly, efficient and accurate at all times.31 During 2019 and 2020, MEHA will establish School Support Hubs and District School Support Centres.
These will focus on improving support services to schools, rather than having administrative and control function.32 MEHA provides the structures, human resources, budgets, and administrative and management support to ensure that the quality of service delivery is maintained at a high level.
28 5 year and 20 year National Development Plan, Section 4.0, Page 134 29 Objective of Busfare/Taxi Fare Concession Cards- http://www.mwcpa.gov.fj/index.php/social-welfare/otherassistance.html 30 Minister’s Statement 2012- https://www.fiji.gov.fj/Media-Centre/News/MINISTRY-COMMITS-TO- EFFICIENTSERVICEDELIVERY 31 Customer Service Policy 2013 Policy Objective 1 32 MEHA Strategic Plan 2019-2023 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 19 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Evidence and its Analysis Although complaints are recorded by the Units within MEHA and DSW, there is no procedure on how to deal with the complainant up to providing feedback to complainants.
Although the policy33 has dedicated two paragraphs on complaints, outline of the procedures on how to process each complaint has not been documented.

Therefore, it is not clear as to what role each player plays from head of schools to District Education Officer before moving the issue through the TAU Unit.

There is no feedback or survey done to assess how the Unit had performed with respect to handing complaints from its users.
DSW maintains a book for recording of any issues or complaints with respect to any feature of the program that the general public wishes to raise.

However, there was no evidence to indicate that actions were taken on the compliant and feedback was provided to the complainants.

We were also not able to determine if any survey was carried out to determine the efficiency and effectiveness of the complaints system.
DSW also indicated that most complaints are made through telephone calls or they show up at their office.

Causes Proper care in handling complaints and feedbacks from the point of receiving, recording through to resolving them has not been exercised by either Units in the two Ministries.

Lack of documented procedures or SOPs to deal with complaints is an indication on the priority of customer care and service in both agencies.
Another contributing factor highlighted by the DSW is absence of an IT system which can automate its critical processes in order to improve service delivery.

Apart from the accounting function, all processing in DSW is carried out manually.

No budget has been provided for the acquisition of a computerised system.

Effects Customer satisfaction can diminish if their concerns are not handled properly and timely feedback is not provided.
There is a high possibility that critical operational matters affecting customers are not identified and rectified.

Good Practices The MEHA informed the audit that there is a section in the revised draft Policy on Transport Assistance titled “Complaints on Transport Assistance” which incorporates the engagement of customers and outlines details relating to handling of complaints and providing feedback to improve services.
This was to be aligned to the draft Standard Operating Procedures.34 The revised draft Policy on Transport Assistance and draft Standard Operating Procedures was provided to audit.35 33 Policy on Transport Assistance 34 Ministry’s draft comments e-mailed to audit on 12/05/20 35 Provided via e-mail on 19/05/20 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 20 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Expected Benefit An effective feedback system helps to identify opportunities for valuable engagement by providing means to allow their users to create insights and facilitate views from sources outside of the two Ministries.
At the same time helps civil servants better understand the needs of students, senior citizens and people with disability.

A computerised data base will greatly improve automation of the many manual processes currently done which would also greatly enhance and improve the services provided by MEHA and DSW.
Recommendations • MEHA and DSW should improve their engagement with customers in handling of complaints and providing timely feedbacks at the same time addressing any operational issues identified through the complaints.

• MEHA and DSW should consider automating its complaint management system and other critical operations which are carried out manually.
Theme 6: Conflict of Interests Audit Observation The audit did not find any documentary evidence to confirm that officers of both MEHA and DSW that are engaged in the delivery of the program had declared any conflict of interest that may exist or which can compromise the public service values and their roles and responsibilities when providing services to the targeted beneficiaries.
Criteria The values and principles of State Service include: a. high standards of professionalism, including professional ethics and integrity; b. being free from corruption; c. efficient, effective and economic use of public resources; d. prompt response to requests and questions from the public, and delivery of service to the public, in a manner that is respectful, effective, impartial, fair, and equitable; e. accountability for administrative conduct; 36 Evidence and its Analysis Upholding integrity and values in public service is crucial.
Especially for staffs of both the MEHA and DSW as they are officials serving the public, the vulnerable and weak.

Dealing with government assistance also has risks such as fraud which needs to be carefully managed and mitigated.
36 Constitution of the Republic of Fiji Section 123 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 21 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Discussions with the system analyst in DSW revealed that the Officers have not signed any declaration of conflict of interest.
This ethical element is captured, transferred to each of its officer and acknowledged when he or she signs his or her contract.

Similarly, the teachers in schools have not signed any forms to declare any conflicts of interest that may arise when assessing application for assistance that comes from the students.

Documentation of policies and procedures on values and conflict of interests are important in order for positive actions to take place.
The Permanent Secretary for Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation expressed similar sentiments and noted this as one of her initial observations upon assuming office.

She also emphasised the need to undertake awareness on conflict of interest in the Ministry to promote an efficient implementation and understanding from all officers.
Causes Lack of awareness and understanding on the need to document policies and procedures for values and conflict of interests and actions taken for it is the main stumbling block in upholding integrity and values in public service.

Lack of awareness and understanding of values and conflict of interests can be strengthened through training and workshops organised for staff to freely discuss and be able to fully identify actual and potential conflicts and how to mitigate them.
There have been no refresher training to the TAU at the start of this program.

Whilst the contract renewal is reviewed at a minimum of three years, not having an annual declaration for conflict of interest signed by staffs will not help in maintaining the level of values expected in public service.

Effects Absence of policies and procedures or guidance on values and conflict of interests within MEHA and DSW can lead to conflict of interest not being promptly detected and mitigated.
These may also lead to increase in cases of favouritism, nepotism and fraud.

Some examples of such incidents are discussed below.

Officers assessing an application can manipulate the form if he or she knows (not excluding obtaining incentives) the applicants to ensure that it is processed first from those that have been submitted earlier.

In addition, processing officers who are known to the relatives or friends of an applicant that does not qualify for the assistance can get their applications approved.
This means that the assistance is left open to misuse from students whose parents earn more than the maximum level of combined annual income.

Failure to recognise conflict of interest can give the impression that the Ministry/ Department is not being prudent and could potentially lead to decisions being subjective which can be challenged by applicants.

This can damage reputation and undermine public confidence in the MEHA and DSW.
Good Practices The Ministry of Education has included conflict of interest in the revised draft Policy on Transport Assistance under a section on “Fraud and corruption in relation to Transport Assistance” which requires that all officers involved in the application and processing of Transport Assistance to sign PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 22 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI a Conflict of Interest declaration.37 A copy of the revised draft Policy on Transport Assistance and draft Standard Operating Procedures was provided to audit38 Expected Benefits Implementation of the policies, procedures and/or guidelines on values and conflict of interest can assist in greatly improving the integrity and reputation of the MEHA and DSW.
Recommendation It is recommended that policy and process for declaration of conflict of interest and values should be developed and implemented by the MEHA and DSW in their respective processes.
37 Ministry’s unsigned comments e-mailed to audit on 12/05/20 38 Provided via e-mail on 19/05/20 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 23 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI 4.0 MANAGEMENT OF THE PERFORMANCE OF THE PROGRAM This part of the report focuses on the actual delivery of the program through the efforts and actual work carried out by the respective Units within the MEHA and DSW.
Accordingly, issues discussed forthwith are identified with how the assistance have been delivered.

Theme 1: Reports from the E-Ticketing Service Provider Audit Observation Reports provided by both the MEHA and DSW from the e-ticketing service provider for our review was not of the desired quality (including various formats) of reports as required under Section 19 of the Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014.
It was noted that MEHA has not received any exception reports from the e-ticketing service provider to be included as part of the 23 monthly reports since the bus fare program was transferred over to the e-transport platform in October 2017.

Similar observation was also noted for the Department of Social Welfare where monthly reports provided for senior citizens and people with disability only stated the amount loaded into each card for each month.

Criteria A solution provider must provide the: a.


Ministry of Education with access to the data, including the reports generated from the data, on subsidised students; and b.
Department of Social Welfare with access to the data, including the reports generated from the data, on subsidised senior citizens or persons with disabilities.39 Subject to Section 19, subsections (1), (2) and (3) solution providers must ensure that the data and reports: a. b. are accessed by authorised persons of the various organisations and that secure logins are provided for the access of such information; and include, but are not limited to the following i. all classes of passenger details; ii.
all classes of passenger travel details and bus card usage; iii.

revenue and loading reports; iv.

loading statistics and reports; v. top up reports on all passengers; vi.

omnibus registration number and identification reports; vii.

blacklist and bus card status reports; viii.


reports of bus card readers; 39 Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014, Section 19(4 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 24 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI ix.
such other information as may be prescribed by Regulations.40 Under Output 1 of the Annual Corporate Plan for 2017-2018, the Ministry of Education had identified monthly reports on students receiving bus fare assistance as one of its sub output.
The contract agreement provides the following clauses which states the obligation of the e- ticketing service provider: ✓ ✓ ✓ properly advise its officers, employees, agents and contractors regarding the requirements for transactions utilising the senior citizens and persons with disabilities fare subsidies and ensure that these requirements are followed;41 exercise all reasonable care and skill in the performance of its obligations under this agreement and comply with all relevant laws and regulations in the conduct of its business;42 notify the Government immediately of any malfunction or discrepancies in the use of the senior citizen and persons with disabilities fare subsidy services or any suspicious transaction activity 43 Data Governance is the exercise of decision making and authority for data-related matters.
It is a system of decision rights and accountabilities for information related processed, executed according to agree upon models which describes who can take what actions with what information and under what circumstances using what methods.44 Evidence and its Analysis Review of reports received by TAU on 11 December 2019 revealed that the e-ticketing service provider did not provide any exception reports on the actual use of blue student cards to indicate travel behaviour patterns and of each eligible student.
MEHA also did not request for any such report.

Table 4.1 provides the types of reports generated for each month since November 2017.

Table 4.1: Monthly reports provided to MEHA and DSW by the E-Ticketing Service Provider Month MEHA Dept.

of Month MEHA Dept.
of Social Welfare Social Welfare No No No No No No No Nov-17 No Jan-18 No Feb-18 No Mar-18 No Apr-18 No May-18 No Jun-18 No Jan-19 Feb-19 Mar-19 Apr-19 May-19 Jun-19 No No No No No No No No No No No No 40 Electronic Fare Ticketing Act 2014, Section 19(3) 41 Agreement between the MWCPA and the e-ticketing service provider, Section 4 (4.1) (a) 42 Agreement between the MWCPA and e-ticketing service provider, Section 4 (4.1) (c)) 43 Agreement between the MWCPA and e-ticketing service provider, Section 4 (4.1)(f) 44 https://profisee.com/data-governance-what-why-how-who/#a11 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 25 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Month MEHA Dept.
of Month MEHA Dept.

of Social Welfare Social Welfare No No No No No Jul-18 No Aug-18 No Sep-18 No Oct-18 No Nov-18 No Jul-19 Aug-19 Sep-19 Oct-19 Nov-19 No No No No No No Amount loaded for each card Amount loaded for each card Amount loaded for each card Amount loaded for each card Review of reports provided by DSW indicated that only the amount loaded into each card for that particular month was shown.
The report did not indicate the amount used; the amount redeemed and the balance available for each card throughout the 23 months since the commencement of the e-ticketing mode of assistance.

Causes There has been no clear guidelines on the types of reports to be provided by the e-ticketing service provider to MEHA and DSW since the program delivery was transferred to the e-transport platform in October 2017.
Furthermore, the MEHA did not develop Standard Operating Procedures to guide the Unit when working with reports provided by the e-ticketing service provider.

As a result of reports not being provided, regular reconciliation was not carried out by the funding agencies on the transfer of funds by the e-ticketing service provider to beneficiaries of the e- ticketing Bus Fare Assistance program.
Effects Independent analysis and verification have not been made by the Ministry on the payments and top up of cards by the e-ticketing service provider.

Any difference that may arise between records of each user kept by the e-ticketing service provider and that of each Ministry has not been identified and rectified.

Therefore there is a high risk of fraud, errors and omissions in the payments made to the e-ticketing service provider.
Data analytics carried out during audit confirmed that in some instances the loaded amounts were more than the maximum approved limit.

There was continuous acceptance of a wide range of identification cards for applications with more than one active card having references to the same identification.
Section 5 of this report, under Themes 1 and 2 comprehensively details these findings with respect to differences noted when comparing data sets amongst the e-ticketing service provider and those of the two Ministries.

Good Practices As at the time of the audit SOPs were still being developed by the MEHA and DSW.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 26 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI It was noted that the DSW45 had just started to receive detailed reports from the e-ticketing service provider including cards that have been blocked as well as those that have duplicates.

In addition, the Department have now been provided access for funds tracking.
The Ministry of Education had informed audit that reports from the e-ticketing service provider will be incorporated in the draft Service Level Agreement.
This section of the agreement is aligned to the revised draft Policy on Transport Assistance and the draft Standard Operating Procedures whereby the type of reports to be provided by the e-ticketing service provider will be clearly outlined.46 This is currently in draft stages as consultations with the e-ticketing service provider was yet to be undertaken.
A copy of the draft Policy on Transport Assistance and draft Standard Operating Procedures was provided to audit.47 Expected Benefit The clear understanding and communication of reports expected or required by the Ministry/Department and the e-ticketing service provider would be beneficial for monitoring, analysing and reconciling of data for quality feedback to management to assist in decision-making.
For example, having a Service Level Agreement would improve data governance, processes for data quality practitioners to establish procedures for data quality control, which enables the identification of emerging data issues and the workflows for remediation.48 Recommendations • The MEHA and DSW should sign a service level agreement which includes reporting requirements with the e-ticketing service provider.
• The MEHA and DSW should obtain the required reports and ensure that procedures are in place on how to use the information in the reports and when exception reports should be obtained.

Theme 2: Regular Monthly Reconciliation Audit Observation We noted that regular reconciliations has not been carried out by the MEHA to reconcile its records against the records kept by the e-ticketing service provider through its electronic fund transfer payment platform.
Similarly, the DSW did not reconcile funds used against the funds that have been loaded into each card including the balances available in each card.
45 Comments received during Audit exit meeting with MWCPA on 28 April 2020 46 Ministry’s unsigned comments e-mailed to audit on 12/05/20 47 Provided via e-mail on 19/05/20 48 https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/computer-science/data-governance-process PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 27 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Criteria Each agency must have in place a cost effective system of internal controls which safeguards money and property against loss; avoids or detects accounting errors; and avoids unfavourable audit reports.49 The Accounting head of an agency is responsible to the Permanent Secretary for the effective design and operation of internal controls across the agency.50 Evidence and its Analysis Enquiries carried out during audit51 with the Senior Accounts Officer revealed that reconciliation has not been carried out between the records kept by MEHA and the e-ticketing service provider since Nov 2017 till end of Term 1 for 2020.
The e-ticketing service provider has facilitated the Ministry with an electronic fund transfer system which allows the Ministry to keep track of the funds which have been disbursed to the students.

Although the electronic fund transfer system allows the Ministry to extract data relating to assistance provided in excel format there has been no periodical summarised statement at each month or end of each term from which reconciliation could be carried out.
Since the assistance was offered through the e-transport platform in 2017, no reconciliation has been carried out by the DSW with respect to 51,44452 records to compare against the records maintained by the e-ticketing service provider.

Causes There has been no Standard Operating Procedures approved by the MEHA to guide the officers within the TAU Unit when receiving, evaluating and monitoring reports received from the e- ticketing service provider.
The Department of Social Welfare is yet to appoint someone as the reconciliation officer to carry out reconciliation for the program.

Effects In the absence of regular reconciliations, the MEHA and DSW will not be able to proactively identify differences in the use of funds beyond conditions that have been approved.
For instance, MEHA and DSW will not be able to trace the use of funds that takes place when each card is used after 5pm or before 6am for school children or higher than average use of cards for each elderly citizen.

49 Finance Instructions 2010 Part 10 Internal Control, s59(1) 50 Finance Instructions 2010 Part 10 Internal Control, s59(2) 51 As at 19/05/2020 52 As per file for loading in January 2020 provided on 8 Jan 2020.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 28 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Good Practices The MEHA had informed audit that requirements for monthly reconciliation is now incorporated in the Standard Operation Procedures which is currently in draft stages and will be implemented once it is approved.53 A copy of the draft Policy on Transport Assistance and draft Standard Operating Procedures was provided to audit 54 Expected Benefit Proper reconciliation procedures would ensure that there is better awareness on the part of staffs who manage or administer the program.
There would also be better management of funds including control on funds used to enable prudent accounting of public funds for students and elderly together with people with disability.

Recommendation Standard Operating Procedures should be approved as soon as possible so that internal controls on use of public funds can be improved and any loss or misuse detected on a timely basis.
Theme 3: Initial Listing of Eligible Students Audit Observation There was no evidence to indicate during our audit that proper independent verification was carried out on the income of parents for students who have been assisted under the Bus Fare Assistance program either at the Ministry or school levels.
Criteria All students whose parents’ combined salary or income of $16,000 and below are eligible to apply for assistance.55 Evidence and its Analysis The TAU does not have any documentary evidence that supports the assistance provided to each student in the listing of beneficiaries.

It was noted that these are kept at respective schools with the school head teachers.

The approval given by schools is based primarily on the submissions and declarations of students and parents about family income.
No independent verification of income is carried out.
53 Ministry’s unsigned comments e-mailed to audit on 12/05/20 54 Provided via e-mail on 19/05/20 55 Policy on Transport Assistance Clause 2 Approved by Minister on 21 January 2015 has been revised from $15,600 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 29 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI A review of application forms kept by two schools have been discussed in detail under Theme 8: Student Bus Fare Concession Application Process.
Causes There are no established procedures in place to confirm the combined annual income of parents prior to approving applications under the program.

Supporting documents indicating level of income earned submitted together with the application forms at school level are not independently verified with a third party.

These includes salary slips and statutory declarations.
Effects The lack of independent checks on declared income by parents at school level increases the risk of misuse of the assistance under the program by students whose parents have a combined income that is more than the approved threshold.

Good Practices Audit was informed that the IT Unit of MEHA has commenced discussion with Fiji Revenue and Customs Services (FRCS) to verify the household income eligibility of parents for students assisted under the program.
The Ministry has also reviewed its transport assistance application form which now has new provisions whereby the TIN of parents/guardian is to be filled in order to facilitate the data sharing and verification process with FRCS.

In the absence of TIN, a signed statutory declaration form will act as a confirmation of income56 .
A copy of the revised transport assistance application form was provided to audit.57 Expected Benefit An effective verification process will enable the Ministry to properly justify the listing for all the students that are currently being assisted through the program.

This will ensure value for money as the assistance is only provided to those students that really need the assistance.

Such controls will also reduce the risk of abuse of the program.
Recommendation MEHA should enter into an agreement with FRCS to obtain regular confirmation of parents of students assisted under the program.

Following confirmation, students who do not fall within the defined category should be excluded.
56 Ministry’s unsigned comments e-mailed to audit on 12/05/20 57 Provided via e-mail on 19/05/20 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 30 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Theme 4: Exit by Elderly from the Bus Fare Concession Card Audit Observation E-ticketing bus cards for elderlies and disabled persons are topped up with $40 credit every month.
However, the audit noted that the current process did not have any control mechanism in place to stop direct reimbursement of e-ticketing bus cards for beneficiaries when they are deceased.

Criteria The proper management of expenditure is fundamental to ensuring value-for-money in delivering services to the community.

Having cost-effective internal controls within the purchasing and payments system plays an important part in ensuring that waste of funds, over-expenditures and corruption do not occur.
58 Evidence and its Analysis The DSW does not have any procedure or guideline to cease reimbursement of e-transport cards for senior citizens and people living with disabilities when they are deceased.

Discussions held with the Senior System Analyst and Assistant Director revealed that currently there are no agreements with the Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages.

This will make it difficult to keep track of deceased beneficiaries who are assisted under the program.
In the absence of such controls, there is a high risk of assistance being continued to be provided to deceased beneficiaries which can also encourage persons who have access to the bus cards to continue to use the assistance provided without being detected resulting in wastage of funds.

Good Practices The MWCPA59 on 28 April 2020 revealed the need for life certification of elderlies that are still living.
The Director of Social Welfare highlighted that the total registration included those living in the rural and maritime areas hence these members present a challenge when trying to classify those that are not active as no longer needing the assistance.

There were some cards that are not frequently used as they would not be using the e-transport cards.
Whilst verification of these beneficiaries could be carried out at village levels through the Turaga-ni-Koro, communication challenges has been identified by the department as an obstacle for this process.

However, this can be rectified if the department liaises through the i-Taukei Affairs Board which deals directly with all provinces and Turaga-ni-Koro.
Since exception reports could now be provided by the e-ticketing service provider, genuine applicants who continue to live would find the time and resources to visit the Department and confirm themselves as they are still able to travel and make use of the transport assistance.

The department was considering a time frame of five years as the periodical cycle for life certification of current beneficiaries.
58 Ministry of Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation, Finance Manual 2017 Part 2: Expenditure, p 10 59 Exit Meeting Minutes dated 28/04/20 with the Ministry of Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 31 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Causes Adequate resources for the program in terms of personnel have not been approved thus hindering the DSW’s ability to carry out proper exit of senior citizens from the program.
Due to the high pace in which the program was implemented, the Department had gone straight to providing the bus fare assistance program so that it could facilitate the beneficiaries through the bus cards.

Effects Not having proper procedures and controls for the exit from the bus fare assistance program will make it difficult to track e-cards which is not required to be in circulation and can lead to wastage of taxpayer funds.
In addition, funds can be unnecessary held in the accounts of deceased beneficiaries.

Expected Benefit Having an agreement with the Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages to advise the DSW upon the death of a recipient will help track those cards which are not supposed to be in circulation.

Proper management of accounts of deceased recipients will reduce wastage of funds due to abuse or non-utilisation of the assistance provided under the program.
Recommendations DSW should consider using life certification of beneficiaries or other methods such as confirmation from to Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages to ensure that deceased beneficiaries are promptly detected and assistance provided is withdrawn.

DSW should also consider using its existing database for social welfare beneficiaries to detect such cases and vice versa.
Theme 5: Review of Transport Assistance Implementation for Senior Citizens and People with Disability Audit Observation Out of the eight recommendations made by its Monitoring and Evaluation Team, DSW has implemented only one recommendation with the remaining seven yet to be firmly resolved.
Criteria The findings of the survey and the positive responses supports the continued use of the bus fare assistance program being implemented with tighter controls, enforcement, proper checks and balance in place with regular monitoring and evaluation.60 60 Busfare Concession Program Monitoring and Evaluation Report Conclusion-Pg.
19 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 32 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Evidence and its Analysis As part of its annual action to improve the implementation of the program, the Department of Social Welfare produced a report prepared by its Monitoring and Evaluation Team in 2018.
The report made eight recommendations as follows: (i) After comparing the two data sets, it has been noted that both sets are not reconciling, there seems to be more cases registered with DSW as compared to the payment list submitted by the e-ticketing service provider, a difference of 17,412 cases.
This is quite a significant number so attempts must be made to find out the reason for these inactive cases because these numbers will continue to distort the figures, not giving the accurate picture of those actually assisted under this program.

(ii) On the same note strategies must be developed and reviews conducted to identify those recipients that have passed away so that cases can be closed in the system.
(iii) In regards to the different ID cards used in the issuance of the electronic bus fare cards, the only valid ID card to be used is the one issued by the Department, which is a photo ID with yellow colour for elderly and red for disabled persons.

The e-ticketing service provider must ensure that their entire staffs issuing the electronic cards are made aware of this requirement.
(iv) For ease of reconciliation, the e-ticketing service provider to provide the Department of Social Welfare with the monthly top up list, however, prior to that they must ensure that the data is updated and cleaned before submission.

(v) Beneficiaries should produce their Social Welfare Bus Fare ID cards when using the bus services.

This will need to be discussed with the relevant stakeholders.
(vi) In regards to the information relayed by LTA on the abuse of the system, there is a need for the Committee to be setup to look into this.

This will comprise of relevant stakeholders to monitor the progress of this program, likewise, develop strategies to minimize the abuse of the system.

Committee to include MWCPA, Fiji Bus Operators Association, LTA & e-ticketing service provider.

The committee to meet on a monthly basis and then phase out into a quarterly meeting.
The committee to have a Terms of Reference (TOR) for better management and validation of processes.

(vii) Due to the volume of information that needs to be reconciled, a dedicated officer is required to be appointed to carry out these monthly data reconciliations.

(viii) Cards need to have expiry date and photo identification.

The Department has positively addressed the third recommendation with remaining seven recommendations representing work in progress and yet to be completed.
No specific date has been set for full implementation of recommendations.

Feedback from the Department to each of the above is as follows: • The e-ticketing service provider is only updating active cards.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 33 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI • The MWCPA data is accumulated from 2011 and are yet to conduct consistent reviews and termination of especially deceased cases.

• There may also be applications that had met the eligibility criteria cases and had obtained the cards.
However, they are unable to use it in the Maritime areas or just keeping it as a form of ID.

• Ministry rarely receives information specifically on the deceased cases under this program.

One of the strategies as highlighted by the district offices is to check against the list of deceased cases for other programs like Social Pension Scheme.
• The e-ticketing service provider has informed all its stores to use the MWCPA Bus fare ID cards to generate the electronic card for the recipients under this program.

• The e-ticketing service provider provides the list of cards topped up on the 1st day of the month.

Further discussions will be held to obtain the list of all cards topped up during the month.

It was highlighted in one of the meetings with Land Transport Authority and yet to be discussed with the Fiji Bus Operators Association.
• • Committee yet to be established.

• Officer to work on reconciliation yet to be appointed.

• Card expiry with photograph is yet to be discussed with the relevant stakeholders.

Causes There has been no thorough evaluation of the program in its implementation phase to ensure that an all-inclusive impact of the program is captured given limited economic resources.
Effects An absence of a thorough review would result in the following: • Compromises accountability and the department’s commitment to improving its services to the senior citizens and people with disability.

• Contribute to lack of actions on current opportunities to improve workflow in providing • services to the senior citizens and people with disability.
Leads to the inability to identify and work on actions in its operations that provides the most value to its clients and is not realistic (creating superficial approach given the program objectives and its limited resources i.e.

budgetary allocations).

• The Department would not be able to identify areas of learning which would in turn be applied to any of its current or upcoming programmes.
Good Practices The MWCPA is working closely with the e-ticketing service provider and Land Transport Authority to deliver this program efficiently and effectively.

The MWCPA ensures that only eligible applications are approved.

The e-ticketing service provider issues e-transport card using the MWCPA bus fare ID card and the LTA team conduct spot checks and confiscates cards that are used by those that are not eligible to receive it.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 34 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Expected Benefits Having a review would bring about improvements in accountability and strengthen the Departments commitment to improving its services to senior citizens and persons with disability.
Recommendations It is recommended that the DSW: • Should continue with its current efforts in reviewing the recommendations by addressing the remaining recommendations as noted by Monitoring and Evaluation team.

implementation of the its • Review the program to include updates or refinements as part of continuous improvement.
Theme 6: Review of the Students Bus Fare Assistance Audit Observation The audit noted that the Transport Assistance Unit was yet to take appropriate action on the findings of the Internal Audit team of the MEHA for assistance provided under the Transport Assistance Program.
Criteria Each month, the Accounting Head must provide a signed and dated report to the Permanent internal audit Secretary to advise the current status of any unresolved external or issues.61Accounting Heads muse ensure all officers of the agency who are responsible for particular controls are aware of their responsibilities, including the need for managers to regularly rotate duties between staffs to a maximum of 3 years, where practical, to minimise and detect the possibility of fraud.
These internal checks must be made in addition to any that are carried out by internal audit.62 Evidence and its Analysis A review of the draft Internal Audit report covering the year 2018 to Quarter 3 of 2019 revealed that six out of the 12 findings were related to the use of cards.

They are listed as follows: 1.

2.

3.

4.

Abuse of e ticket cards.

Control of subsidised cards.

Staff establishment.

Risk of loading ineligible students at input stage.
61 Finance Instructions 2010 Section 60(b) 62 Finance Instructions 2010 Section 61 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 35 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI 5.

6.

Proper documentation at input loading stage with schools.

Clear articulation of eligible conditions.


Update from the TAU revealed the following actions taken to address the above findings: New TAU organisation structure has been approved but a copy was yet to be A 15-minute interval before second tap from the same card is allowed.

Limiting time when cards could be used term wise to term dates and daily from 1.

2.

6am to 5pm.

3. provided for audit review.

4.

5.

6.

Ministry has signed a MOU with FRCS but a copy was yet to be provided to audit.
Currently with Head of respective school.

Currently with Head of respective school.

The report also focused on safety of transport but there were no reports for certain trips where bus with students inside have been involved in accidents.

Causes The findings of the Internal Audit team have not been given due consideration by the management of MEHA.
Effects Risk and control exposures highlighted in the report prepared by the Internal Audit team have not been addressed by the management of MEHA which can lead to wastage of funds and continued abuse of the program.

Good Practices The audit was informed that the Ministry was currently reviewing and drafting its Policy on Transport Assistance, Standard Operating Procedures and Service Agreement with the e-ticketing service provider.
The Ministry was also working with refining and making changes to FEMIS Transport Assistance reports and aligning it to the required reporting of the draft Standard Operating Procedures.

The Ministry was also liaising with the e-ticketing service provider to align and merge its data reporting structure to FEMIS reporting.

63 Expected Benefits Having a review done would bring about the improvement in accountability; enhances the Ministry’s commitment to improving its services to students in future.
Current remedial actions will be an inspiration to improve workflow and identify actions in its operations that enhances its value to the future of Fiji.

It will also capture realistic scenarios to match the program objectives within its limited resources.

This will also help to identify areas of learning which would in turn be applied to any of its current or upcoming programmes.
63 Ministry’s unsigned comments e-mailed to audit on 12/05/20 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 36 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Recommendations It is recommended that the MEHA: • Should ensure that recommendations in reports prepared by the Ministry of Economy’s Internal Audit and Good Governance team are implemented on a timely basis; and • Review the program to include updated or refinements as part of continuous improvement Theme 7: School Zoning Audit Observation A decade after the Cabinet 64approval, students have been accepted and enrolled in schools outside of the 2km school zone.
Funding of the program could be minimised if the Bus Fare assistance program enforces the school zoning policy requirements.

More money is paid out when bus fare assistance to students are not restricted as per the school zoning policy.

Criteria School home zone refers to a zone or area between residences of students or children located within 2 kilometres radius from the school.
Urban schools are schools located in the urban, suburban and peri-urban areas less than 15 km from the nearest urban centre.65 It shall be the responsibility of the PSEHA, in concurrence with the Honourable Minister for Education (hereinafter referred to as HME) to approve and determine the school home zones with clear boundaries for schools under the enrolment scheme.

The PSEHA shall define the school home zone geographically for each urban and secondary school to clearly demarcate school boundaries.
Such boundaries shall be furnished to each respective school so that it can be included in their enrolment scheme.
This approval for school zoning to be done was seen as complementary to balancing limited resources to the right of parents to educate their children as per their wishes.66 All schools shall formulate an enrolment scheme, aligned to the school home zone scheme as formulated by the MEHA, which shall outline a home zone with clearly defined boundaries that must be approved by the Permanent Secretary for Education.67 In rare cases, attending out of zone schools shall only be approved under the discretion of the Minister or Permanent secretary for Education.68 64 Cabinet Special meeting held on 13th December 2009, Cabinet Paper CP (09)334 65 Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts, Policy on School Zoning in Fiji_3.0 Definitions, Page 3 66 Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts, Policy on School Zoning in Fiji_6.1 Enrolment Scheme, Page 6 67 Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts, Policy on School Zoning in Fiji_5.0 Policy, Page 5 68 Policy on Transport Assistance, Section 6.11, Page 6 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 37 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Evidence and its Analysis In 2010, a Cabinet approval was given to the Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts for school zoning with the underlying principle that zoning will ensure that schools are adequately inhabited and there will be no overcrowding in schools as free choices in school environment will be restricted.
As clearly defined in the school zoning policy that the primary purpose of developing the policy is to provide a framework to guide the Ministry of Education, Heritage & Arts (MEHA) to address access, quality and equity in all schools in Fiji.
The primary purposes of school home zoning constitute the following as below: (a) To avoid overcrowding, or the likelihood of overcrowding, at the school; and (b) To ensure that the selection of students for enrolment at the school is carried out in a fair and transparent manner; and (c) To enable the MEHA to make the best use of existing network of schools and educational resources; (d) To improve the performance by all schools and ensure equal distribution of high, average and low achieving students in all schools; (e) To ease traffic congestion and reduce travelling costs incurred unnecessarily by parents; (f) To enable proper and fair administration of provision of transport assistance to students; (g) To remove social stratification such as parents occupation, socio economic status, ethnicity and religious affiliation and encourage parents within the same zone to work together to improve the school.69 All parents/guardians of students/children who opt to enrol their children “outside their school home zone” as per section 6.3 may not receive any transport assistance from MEHA.70 A student’s application form dated 27 May 2019 which was reviewed during the audit indicated that it was not approved by the Head of School on 10 June 2019.
Application to attend the school was rejected as bus fare coverage and travelling time would be expected to be high.

Audit verification with the FEMIS database noted that the student’s name was listed as eligible and approved for student bus fare financial assistance.

Table 4.2: Student application in FEMIS disapproved by Head of School ID Number VF Number 832589 19815846027 Galoa Serua Home Address Head of School FEMIS Record Approved Verification and Approved loaded with bus fare assistance.
Inconsistency was noted in this instance where an assistance was provided as shown on FEMIS even though the Head of School records show that the application had not been approved.

69 Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts, Policy on School Zoning in Fiji_1.0 Policy Objective, Page 2 70 Policy on School Zoning in Fiji Approved by Minister for EHA in September 2017.
Section 6.9.3 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 38 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Since the schools are isolated in the city boundaries far from large residential areas, the school needs to have its own demarcating policy to demarcate the acceptable zoning of residential areas accepted to attend its school.
Table 4.3: Student application approved by head of school staying in far zone area VF Number ID Number 1034291 1046032 888233 974467 833413 0547351242(3) 772652330 19889290771 24073578346 2156383002 1 Residential zone to location of school (km) 27km 27km 23km 20km 46km Other instances of students assisted beyond the required school zone can be found in Table 6.3 and Table 6.4 under the Appendix section.
On the other hand the policy outlines the following 10 exceptions that enable students to enrol out of the zone schools.

The acceptable provisions for which students is allowed to enrol in out of zoning schools include the following: (a) The schools offers a program or subject combination that is not offered by the near zoning schools.

(b) The student is enrolled in to a special program offered by the school such as special vernacular languages such as Vosa Vaka-Viti, Hindi, Urdu, Tamil, French or others.
(c) The PSEHA has agreed and directed with the concurrence of the Minister that the student be enrolled in to the school; or (d) Preference of certain combination that are not offered by the school in the student home zone.

(e) Preferences for vernacular subject such as Hindi, Na Vosa Vaka Viti, Urdu, Tamil, Telugu, Chinese languages such as Mandarin, French or Cantonese which may not be offered by a school within the school home zone.
(f) One or both of the child parents is a teacher at the same school (g) One or both of the child parents work within the school zones (h) One of the child biological sisters or brothers are enrolled or teaching in the same school.

(i) One or both of the child parents are school board members or school board employees.
(j) Under special circumstances if a student require transfer from another school, the head of the school in which student wishes to enrol, agreed by agreement with the head of student previous school, to enrol the student, and the PSEHA endorses the proposal.71 The exceptions listed above are susceptible to manipulation enabling students from outside the 2km area to enrol in schools beyond the distance identified in the policy.
71 Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts, Policy on School Zoning in Fiji_1.0 Policy Objective, Page 2 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 39 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Causes The lack of enforcement of school zoning and poor controls and checks on the application processing has led to the non-compliances to the Policy on Transport Assistance and procedures discussed above.
Effects The above exceptions has contributed to the primary objective of the zoning policy not being met.

Consequently, the practice of enrolling students in schools out of their home zones contradicted the expected economical goal of accessing the same level of quality education at the nearest school.

A sample of 2 schools within the Central Division revealed that more than 90% of the students receiving the assistance travelled daily to schools beyond the 2km school zoning policy.
Generally, the seven primary purposes of the zoning policy have not been completely met as a large number of students continue to be assisted to attend schools outside the zoning policy.

Good Practices We noted that it will be ideal for applications to have fields in the application form to factor in changes that have taken place during the school year.
These include change of school; change of address; distance to nearest school by the shortest trafficable route; lodge by group that is by family instead of being on a one by one basis; include advocate details (respond to questions from TAU on behalf of the applicant); signed passenger student code of conduct to influence behaviour when riding buses; informing eligible students of processing time for each application when the form is completed.
Expected Benefits Enhance the integrity level of declaration from parents and their students contributing to the Ministry not only being able to meet its original policy objectives but do so in an economical manner.

Integration of the school zoning policy with the Policy on Transport Assistance will allow the benefits of school zoning to accrue and at the same time save excessive assistance currently being paid which in some cases have not been properly authorised.
Recommendations • MEHA should consider integrating the requirements of the school zoning policy into the Bus Fare Assistance program so that objectives of policies can be realised and the reduce expenditure incurred in funding of the program • MEHA should also review applications for assistance outside zoning area and remove applicants which do not meet the criteria.

.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 40 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Theme 8: Student Bus Fare Assistance Application Process Audit Observation There is no provision in the Policy on Transport Assistance or its accompanying form for the Transport Assistance Clerk to sign and confirm that s/he has scrutinised and vetted the form before submitting it to the head of school.
Furthermore, the policy does not have any provisions for an independent or third-party confirmation of the income source declared by parents.

Criteria All students whose parents’ composite salary/income of $16,00072 or less is eligible to apply for assistance.

It is mandatory for the applicants to provide all requested information in the Transport Assistance Application form.

Salary slips of working parents shall be attached with the form.
For applicants whose parents are without salary slips, a statutory declaration form shall be filled, witnessed by the relevant authorities and supported by the applicant’s school teacher.

Head Teachers / Principals shall carefully scrutinise the application forms and endorse them only if all the information are in order and complete.
Application forms shall be distributed to all eligible students on the 1st day of school and shall be completely filled and returned to the school head by the end of the 2nd week of term.73 Subsidised Fare A student qualifies for 2 coupons if he or she travels on a direct bus or school bus, and 4 coupons if the child changes buses to and from school of the correct stage as per the approved list.

The maximum fare per trip is $0.80c; parents will have to pay fare exceeding $0.80c per trip.
At no time may a child be given more coupons than what has been assessed as per approved list.

Head teachers and Principals shall adhere to this.74 All students who wish to be assisted has to apply using the bus fare assistance application forms and submit them to transport assistance officer in their respective school, who shall stringently vet applications before submitting it to the head of school for approval.
In rare cases, attending out of zone shall only be approved under the discretion of the Minister or Permanent secretary for Education.

E-ticketing Card In cases where the smart cards is not recognized by the bus machines, students are kindly requested to note the message from the machine and lodge the problem to the school.
Schools should be notified immediately in cases where the card goes missing.75 Evidence and its Analysis Since the implementation of the bus fare assistance program, changes have emerged that has enhanced and developed the program to align it with the government’s initiative of technological 72 Revised to $16,000 from $15,600 73 Policy on Transport Assistance, 6.0 Procesure_6.1 Application, Page 3 74 Policy on Transport Assistance, Section 6.11, Page 6 75 Policy on Transport Assistance, Section 6.12,p 6 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 41 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI improvement.
These also coincide with the three intended objectives of the program introduced in October 2017 which is to: (a) ensure improved collection of revenue and reduce fare evasion and the risks for passengers carrying cash; (b) remove revenue losses for omnibus operators and the State; and (c) Prescribe conditions and enforcement powers in relation to the use of bus cards and bus card readers.
In 2017, the government through the MEHA implemented e- transport cards for students travelling by bus, while those using carriers and boats transportation in rural areas are still using coupons, as network connection and installation of machine is a challenge.
There is no provision in the Policy on Transport Assistance with its accompanying form template to request each transport assistance clerk to sign on it to show that he or she has scrutinized and vetted the form before submitting it to the head of school.

The Policy on Transport Assistance and the application template does not make provision for an independent or third party confirmation of the income source declared by parent’s e.g.
Application forms for student whose parents are earning fixed annual income are not verified with other stakeholders such as FRCS through the parent’s TIN number and FNPF to confirm the actual gross salary from FNPF deductions.

In addition, no provisions existed to enable each transport assistance officer or head of schools to demand for declaration of other sources of income of parents apart from the employment income declared.
Not all the clearly marked sections and fields on each form were completely filled.

This included complete data not entered in to FEMIS, data entry checked as well as student ID number and student e-transport number.

These are important fields that identify each student and determined whether a student’s information have been included in FEMIS transport assistance modules or not.
Audit visited two prominent schools in the Suva district from 17th to 19th January 2020 to assess how the applications have been processed.

The audit verified the processing of bus fare assistance applications and secondly noted the subsequent approval procedures to harness the processes and procedures.

The audit noted that some applications were not properly assessed, not approved according to the policy guideline during field visits.
It was noted that application for assistance of some students whose parents earned more than the $16,000 income threshold were approved.

Refer to table below for examples.

Table 4.4: Students with parents earning more than $16,000 threshold assisted by the program Student ID No.
Income E-transport Card No Parents Recalculated 1034291 0547351242(3) 16,725.28 Parents Income Declared 16,000 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 42 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Student ID No.
1046032 1083959 E-transport Card No 772652330 Parents Income Declared 16,000 19930570452 15,000 Parents Recalculated Income 16,725.28 16,244.80 Recalculations carried out during audit revealed that income declared in the applications do not correspond with the supporting evidence provided as proof of annual income.

It was also noted from the field visits that applications were approved although evidence supporting the information stated in application forms was not attached.
Applications for a number of students whose parents were employed were endorsed by the head of school without payslip or other evidence of income.

Similarly, applications for a number of students whose- parents were not employed were endorsed by the head of school even though statutory declaration forms were neither filled nor witnessed by authorized officers.76 Table 4.5: Endorsed Applications of students with working parents Student ID No.
E Transport Card No Working Parents Declared Parents Income Payslip Attached 753740 19921 1001197 1213149 1118612 0547576842(9) 873721 959195 925866 0548052906(3) 0551957482(5) 19823708532 yes yes yes yes yes yes 10,000 15,000 5,000 11,090 8,000 10,400 no no no no no no Table 4.6: Endorsed Applications of students whose parents were not employed Student ID No.
E Transport Card No Non- Working Parents 974282 Not known 1084379 NF 2156854282 Not known 5481270980 0547576842(9) yes yes yes yes Declared Parents Income (Casual Income from Informal employment) 8,000 1,500 n/a 5,000 Statutory Declaration attached and witnessed by relevant Authorities no no no no Application and scrutinized endorsed yes yes yes yes Our review also noted that Heads of School did not endorse or stamp some applications forms before these were entered in to FEMIS.
The FEMIS showed that these students have been approved to receive the assistance.

Refer Table 6.1 in Appendices showing instances where this deficiency was observed.

76 Administrative Officer, Education Officer, Medical Officer, Welfare Officer, Justice of the Peace, Labour Officer, Roko Tui, Provincial Administrator or Minister of Religion.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 43 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI The non-endorsement of application forms indicates non-compliance to the Policy on Transport Assistance.

Therefore not all applications approved and loaded in the FEMIS database have been completely endorsed and verified.
Records in the FEMIS were not updated with names of the students that have been assisted under the bus fare assistance program.

When reconciling the FEMIS records to the schools record quite a few numbers of students were yet to be updated in FEMIS.

Refer to table 6.2 under Section 6 of this report for details of students name not updated in to FEMIS.
Causes Periodical review of the policy was not been carried out .This includes related forms such as the template for application forms and internal checklist document by the MEHA.

Approval of bus fare assistance applications for students whose parent’s income is more than the $16,000 threshold indicates the lack of thorough assessment and absence of independent recalculation of parents’ income using the payslips submitted.
The endorsement of unsupported application forms indicates that applications were not properly scrutinised prior to approval.

Non-verification of details in each form had resulted in approval of applications forms that have not been properly supported by a payslip and statutory declarations.

Such approvals inspire boldness to partake in fraud and collusion between the assessing officers and parents.
Lack of regular updating of school file records into the FEMIS has resulted in differences in information reflected in school records when compared with the records generated from FEMIS.

Effects The lack of review of the Policy on Transport Assistance and template and the lack of strategic direction have led to the above provisions not being integrated in to the Policy and related application template.
Including applications of parents earning above $16,000 creates additional demand not only on direct funding but also on related administration costs.

The Transport Assistance Unit within the Ministry of Education loads eligible student’s details for bus fare assistance in to the e-ticketing system based on the FEMIS records.
Lack of procedures to guide the processing of applications and loading of reimbursements of assistance could result in improper procedures being undertaken in the provision of assistance to students.

Good Practices The Ministry had informed audit that the draft Standard Operating Procedures section on “Application process for transport assistance” outlines the duties and responsibilities of the School Administration Officers and School Heads.
It requires that the School Administration Officer (or similar) to conduct checks on all applications to confirm the forms have been filled correctly and PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 44 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI that the documentation provided is complete.

Any incomplete forms without the required documentation will be returned to the applicant.
If all is in order, the School Administration Officer will sign the application form to confirm this is ready to be passed to the School Head.

It also requires the School Head to review all applications and if they are satisfied all information is correct, they will endorse and stamp the application.

The Ministry’s IT Section is in process of verifying the incomes in liaison with FRCS.
The Ministry further stated that the eligibility for transport assistance is mostly for those students whose families are in the informal employment sector.

However, the Ministry will consider obtaining parent’s contracts as basis of determining the annual incomes feedback on this will be obtained as well during the consultation process for the policy.
77 A copy of the draft Policy on Transport Assistance and draft Standard Operating Procedures was provided to audit78 Expected Benefits Proper processing of applications for assistance will ensure that each request for assistance is processed consistently and transparently.

This can be brought about if there are sound controls in place for the program.

It also contributes to identifying areas of improvement to reduce risk of abuse of the program.
Having a more systematic and controlled operation would improve efficiency in the operation and better service delivery in updating student records in FEMIS to reliable top up of e-transport cards.

Recommendations The Ministry of Education should consider reviewing the Policy on Transport Assistance and application form to incorporate the following provisions: • Transport assistance officer to sign off applications after checking and vetting them.
• The Transport Assistance Officers vetting and checks of applications to include recalculation of total income of parents and checking attachment of the required documents including the parents TIN and other sources of income.

• Confirmation of students information updated on FEMIS.
77 Ministry’s unsigned comments e-mailed to audit on 12/05/20 78 Provided via e-mail on 19/05/20 PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 45 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI 5.0 DATA ANALYTICS This part of the report focuses on data analytics of information in the records maintained with the Ministry of Education and DSW together with the data collated from the e-ticketing service provider.
This analytic approach is done for comparison purposes to obtain a viewpoint highlighting issues found when examining data integrity and integration.

It also seeks how records can be further improved to allow for more reliable and accurate reporting for decision making purposes.
Theme 1: Data on Elderly and Fijians with Disability Depicted below is the total population of the Elderly and People with Disability for the years 2011 to 2019 that were assisted by the Department of Social Welfare (DSW) under the Bus Fare Assistance program.
Figure 5.1: Number of Elderly and People with disability Assisted Bus Fare Assistance by DSW S E I R A I C I F E N E B F O R E B M U N 180,000 160,000 140,000 120,000 100,000 80,000 60,000 40,000 20,000 - TIME Elderly Persons with disabiltity Total Audit Observation Scrutiny of the data on Bus Fare Assistance Program revealed the following observations that can be summarised as follows: PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 46 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI 1.
Other forms of ID was being accepted by the e-ticketing service provider apart from the normal ID issued by the DSW.

We noted use of incorrect ID Type for registration of card users.

Concession & exempt card holders should be registered using Social Welfare ID.

However, during the audit we noted the use of birth certificates, drivers licence and many other IDs for registration purpose.

2.

There were more than one user for one active ID.

There were more than one card 3. assigned to the same ID.
In some cases, Monthly loading on Exempt and Concession Cards was more than the monthly approved limit of $40.

4.

We also noted instances where funds were being incorrectly transferred to incorrect cards.

Further details are provided in the discussion below.

Evidence and its Analysis Forms of Acceptable Id for Registration We noted the use of incorrect ID type for registration of card users.
Although concession & exempt card holders should be registered using Social Welfare ID, we noted that other non-social welfare cards (birth certificates, driver’s license and many other IDs) were used for registration purpose.

Figure 5.2: ID Used for Registration Source: OAG analysis based on information from service provider.
As shown in the pie chart above, the Social Welfare ID Cards issued by the DSW accounted for 88% of the applications registered while the remaining 12% made up of 19 other forms of secondary identifications.

Further review of the other IDs accepted for registration revealed that the Ministry has allowed for 19 different secondary types of IDs when processing around 93,003 applicants.

These included the following: 1.

Voter registration 2.


Driver’s License PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 47 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI 3.

FNPF Card 4.

Passport 5.

Birth Certificate 6.

FIRCS 7.

Others 8.

FNPF/FRCS Card 9.

Student ID 10.

Photo 11.

Citizenship Certificate 12.

Employee ID 13.

Reference Letter 14.

Marriage Certificate 15.

Police ID Card 16.

VKB Certificate 17.


Military ID Card 18.

Extract Proof of Registration (Vola-ni-Kawa Bula) 19.

Payslip Same ID with More Than One Active Card We identified events where more than one active card was registered to the same ID.

Further review of the ID number noted that more than one card was activated for three ID users.
ID_NUMBER CARD NUMBER STATUS 2769 2769 58 58 70 70 13932779468 23248171086 18918045545 5162864531 1382139739 5163266777 ACTIVE ACTIVE ACTIVE ACTIVE ACTIVE ACTIVE Loading More Than Maximum Amount Our audit found that monthly loading on Exempt and Concession Cards in some cases were more than $40 in a month and funds were loaded more than once within a particular month.

These observations were noted when reviewing cards loaded for the months of April, June, August and December during 2019.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 48 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI April 2019 The range of amounts topped-up was between $40.04 to $1,442.72; one particular card was topped- up 37 times with the total top-up amounting to $1,442.72; $80 was the most common amount when 37 cards were topped-up twice within the same month.
June 2019 The range of top up recorded over the approved amount was from $40.04 to $80; one particular card was topped- up three times with the total top-up amounting to 237.33.

Top-up amount of $45 was the most common amount where four cards were topped-up twice.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 49 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI August 2019 The range of amounts recorded was between $42 up to $80; with two amounts ($42 and $43) recording the highest number of the amount topped-up.
December 2019 When the amount of $80 was removed the range was from $40.01 up to $110.00; the amount of $40.68 recorded the highest number of top-up when 62 different cards were topped-up twice.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 50 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI It was further noted that the amount of $80 was recorded as highest number of top-up where 5,144 different cards were topped-up twice as shown in the graph below.

Causes The primary reason for the issues highlighted above is the lack of proper control over the program.
Moreover, regular reconciliation has not been carried as this task has not been assigned to a responsible staff.

Accuracy has not been maintained on records retention with card numbers not streamlined to match the number of recipients.

The total number of active cards should be equal to the number of recipients that currently receive the assistance.
At administration level, the Standard Operating Procedures has not been finalised to clearly specify the activities and acceptable level of input, process and performance from officers assigned to the program.

Effects The contract agreement with the e-ticket service provider has been breached whereby only $40 should be topped up on to the Concession & Exempt Cards.

It would be difficultly to identify the Social Welfare recipient since registration details have been incorrectly entered into the system.
The Department will effectively account for any change when beneficiaries no longer need the assistance reducing the risks of leakages within the assistance.

There is high risk of misuse of funds and fraud as the same recipient will be receiving more when compared to other recipients.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 51 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Analysis carried out on the four months revealed that a total of 26,091 top ups with related value of $1,652,027 have been incorrectly funded.

Expected Benefits Better management of data can result in better monitoring of outcomes of the program.
It also allows for better accountability to facilitate better decision-making when information from data is accurate.

This will also ensure efficiency of the program by allocating limited resources available to achieve program output as identified in its objective.

Recommendations • The DSW should carry out monthly reconciliation on the amounts loaded onto the cards of Welfare recipients against the amount used.
• Registration accuracy is a very significant issue, therefore the DSW should work with the e-ticketing service provider to identify incorrectly registered recipients and rectify the issue.

• The DSW should identify the cards that need to be blocked.

It must constantly make sure that no recipient has more than one active cards registered to their name.
Responsible party as per the agreement should be made accountable for amount(s) that have been incorrectly loaded these amounts should be refunded back to the correct party.
Theme 2: Data on Students Details of students that were assisted on the Bus Fare Assistance program through e-Ticketing is depicted below: Figure 5.3: Number of Students Assisted from 2017 to 2019 Source: OAG analysis based on information from TAU PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 52 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Audit Observation A detailed comparison carried out on data as of 6 February 2020 between records maintained by the e-ticketing service provider and that of the Ministry highlighted the following gaps in data governance as indicators for areas of improvements: 1.
A total of 148,893 Inactive cards have balances totalling $2,972,684.40.

Refer to table 6.5 under Appendix 6.0 for details 2.

A total of 87,294 cards with funds that were incorrectly transferred amounted to $745,318.73.

The card holders of the new cards are not same as the previous card holder.

Refer to table 6.6 under Appendix 6.0 for details 3.

Validation of correct top-up could not be established as we were not provided with the relevant data needed to carry out this test.
The data provided was incomplete.

In the absence of required data, audit was unable to determine the manner in which the Ministry determined that the correct amounts were topped- up and how reconciliations are carried out.

Data detailing the movement of funds within each card is not provided to MEHA.

Instead the Ministry relies solely on data maintained by the e-ticketing service provider.

Please refer to table 6.7 under Appendix 6.0 for details of incorrect transfers.

4.
4.

Duplicate student ID was noted on active student cards although a student should have only one subsidized card registered under their names.

Refer to table 6.8 under Appendix 6.0 for details.

5.

Duplicate card numbers were also noted.

Refer to table 6.9 under Appendix 6.0 for details.

6.

The audit noted incomplete & missing data since MEHA is yet to update & maintain complete data sets.

7.

The audit also noted incomplete data for student details.
Due to incomplete data it was not possible to carry out reconciliation for amounts topped-up as MEHA did not disclose the total amount that is supposed to be topped-up on the student cards.

8.

The audit noted improper registration and incorrect ID numbers being registered on to the system.

Student ID numbers were not properly recorded including instance of duplicates noted within the service provider system.

E.g.

one particular student ID number was recorded 214 times.
Refer to table 6.10 under Appendix 6.0 for details 9.

Proper data management is not practiced by MEHA.

The annual fare estimated by MEHA is not equal to the total amount topped up by the service provider.

10.

The MEHA data shows the amount to be loaded onto the cards for 2019 should have been $11,486,032 while the total value loaded for 2019 by the e-ticketing service provider was $4,984,000 indicating an excess amount of $6,502,032.
Refer to table 6.11 under Appendix 6.0 for details PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 53 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI The issues noted above points out that these two data sets have not been properly matched off or if done but not so in a complete manner.
All differences noted between the records kept by the service provider and those kept by the TAU of MEHA should be identified, interrogated, validated and cleared.

Evidence and its Analysis Please refer to tables 6.5 to 6.11 reflected in Appendices 6.0 for further details of the audit findings.

Recommendations • MEHA and DSW should work with the e-ticketing service provider to cleanse data by respective parties.
• Data governance framework including expected level of data quality should be included in the agreement between the MEHA and DSW and the e-ticketing service provider.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 54 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI 6.0 APPENDICES Table 6.1:: Students with unauthorised and unstamped applications VF Card No Year Student ID Card Application Stamped and Signed 89221 1076617 786783 882658 978909 901290 NF 1001197 NF NF NF 888458 NF 873721 978861 NF 881341 892407 963809 959195 925866 19400257010 2156791562 2404600090(7) 21560236586 1992803013 (9) 1983329925(8) 2156808938(3) None NF 1982589733(3) NF 2156217002(3) 0547576842(9) 0548052906(3) 01151437173 NF 1939588549(4) 1939083845 0547189722(2) 0551957482(5) 19823708532 1004 1004 1004 1002 1301 1105 1105 1301 1102 103 1303 1002 1003 1001 1104 NF 1004 1002 901 1303 1303 No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No Table 6.2: Students list not updated in FEMIS Student ID Card 740736 755464 756199 756424 756424 762216 773549 789889 789889 793578 815149 816703 816707 820218 827314 827314 831467 838289 842361 VF Card No 24073933384 unknown 13937530189 18587334980 18587334980 5477881122 19823746292 18587443948 18587443948 unknown 1154602138 19395884372 19398107730 21568451625 21562742508 21562742508 1940052035 7724790980 19939090296 Year 1301 1302 1301 unknown 1202 1301 1203 1303 1303 1206 1103 1106 1106 1006 unknown 1201 1203 1104 1006 Updated in FEMIS No No No No No No No No No No No No No No unknown No No No No PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 55 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Student ID Card VF Card No 5481192580 1150661013 6010185863 6010185863 19813027141 unknown 2151993863 4954054930
 7732599308 19927109819 1157257815 5171775579 21563316427 21560287944 19829305978 19828839894 5164001975 unknown 19827190612 unknown 5472787620 2155947418 19832776850 18899144424 unknown 19890163736 13937978347 5476505861 5476099469 19927704379 Year 1003 1006 unknown 1202 1302 906 1006 1002 1104 1005 1005 1006 1001 1005 1103 1102 1206 903 904 904 1304 906 1102 1102 1004 1302 1303 1205 1004 1002 Updated in FEMIS No No unknown No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 56 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Table 6.3: Incidence of Students beyond the Required Zoning Policy Area-School 1 SCHOOL 1 Student School class Zoning Policy (KM) Travelled (KM) Excess KM PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 57 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI SCHOOL 1 Student School class Zoning Policy (KM) Travelled (KM) Excess KM 83
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 58 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI SCHOOL 1 Student School class Zoning Policy (KM) Travelled (KM) Excess KM PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 59 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI SCHOOL 1 Student School class Zoning Policy (KM) Travelled (KM) Excess KM 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154
PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 60 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI SCHOOL 1 Student 172 173 School class 12 11 Total for School 1 Zoning Policy (KM) Travelled (KM) 2 2 3.9 3.7 Excess KM 1.9 1.7 1,929.50 Table 6.4: Incidence of Students beyond the Required Zoning Policy Area-School 2 SCHOOL 2 Student School class Zoning Policy (KM) Travelled (KM) Excess KM PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 61 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Student School class SCHOOL 2 Zoning Policy (KM) 36 37 38 39 40 41 42
SCHOOL 2 Zoning Policy (KM) Total for School Travelled (KM) Excess KM PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 62 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Table 6.5: Sample Of 148,893 Inactive Cards with Funds (Top 10 amounts) STUDENT_ID CARDNUMBER STATUS Balance as at 6th Feb 2020 ($) 835434 963242 1006780 856361 806945 848528 910898 1156196 914889 867794 19813868908 24044900900 19403120850 19499445542 21568184747 05474514980 21562718185 05477725864 19892613332 19398923896 Inactive Inactive Inactive Inactive Inactive Inactive Inactive Inactive Inactive Inactive 6,289.35 4,035.87 3,170.37 2,819.81 2,704.84 2,295.61 2,174.49 2,116.19 2,079.35 1,948.83 Table 6.6: Sample Of 87,294 Card Where Funds Were Incorrectly Transferred (Top 10 amounts) STUDENT_ID Aparty79 Number Card Bparty80 ID_Number Bparty Number Card Amount ($) 1,022.52
1,634.14 1,463.97 1,419.43 1,082.52 1,022.52 914.10 656.99 616.77 603.69 Table 6.7: Multiple Incorrect Transfers to IDs (Top 10 Transfers) B_Party ID Number Number of transfers 41731600513 1705409 134775908 407000000000 830393 710134 125700409 17060100 1084519 38430700045 2150 1489 1407 949 777 762 732 729 655 582 Table 6.8: Multiple Different Card Numbers Assigned To Same Student ID Student ID Number Of Different Card 74286 1 na 779922 Numbers Student ID Is Assigned To 14 53 116 214 79 Aparty refers to the primary card holder 80 Bparty refers to the secondary card holder PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 63 REPORT OF THE AUDITOR-GENERAL OF THE REPUBLIC OF FIJI Table 6.9: Cards Duplicated More Than Once Cards Numbers Number of Duplicates 23261957643 23262527403 24050304583 19817303944 19502293061 19498919307 19812323145 18892786825 19493720742 05518139786 13932832580 07728590345 01162390932 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 Table 6.10: Duplicate Student IDs Present In the System.
Student ID Number Count Of Card with Same Student ID 779922 na 1 74286 000000 214 116 53 14 14 Table 6.11: Amount per MEHA vs Amount By Service Provider (Top 10 amounts) E Transport Card Number 13927966989 19800983942 19391308533 21562541702 18893924904 19815820741 23258449323 19811808260 19830457172 23257026924 Card Numbers Annual Fare as per MOE Total amount topped Up by VF Difference PERFORMANCE AUDIT ON THE ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT OF BUS FARE ASSISTANCE THROUGH E-TICKETING FOR THE SCHOOL CHILDREN, ELDERLIES AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITY 64