U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government Here’s how you know

The .gov means it’s official.

Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you're on a federal government site.

The site is secure.

The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Hotline

Report Fraud, Waste and Abuse
November 09, 2009
  • Public and Indian Housing
2010-FW-0001
ig1060001.pdf

We audited the U. S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's (HUD) controls over Housing Choice Voucher program payments for deceased tenants and invalid Social Security numbers as part of the regional audit plan. In previous audits of public housing agencies (agencies), we identified problems with excess housing assistance payments for deceased tenants. We wanted to determine whether HUD monitored agencies' actions in response to its January 7, 2008, memorandum, informing them that they had paid rental assistance for deceased tenants, and the extent, accuracy, and impact of payments on behalf of deceased tenants. We also wanted to determine whether agencies paid rental assistance for tenants with invalid Social Security numbers.

HUD took the positive initiative to identify deceased tenants receiving rental assistance and notified agencies of this through a January 7, 2008 memorandum. HUD implemented the deceased tenants report within the Enterprise Income Verification system as a control for agencies to monitor deceased tenants. HUD also checked for invalid Social Security numbers. However, HUD did not monitor the agencies' actions in response to its memorandum. This would include whether the agencies received reimbursement for ineligible rental assistance payments made for deceased tenants and whether they corrected information submitted to HUD.

HUD did not retain documentation supporting its memorandum and, therefore, could not monitor agencies' responses to the memorandum. Further, because the deceased tenants report did not record the date of death for all deceased tenants, reconciling information and documenting improvement were difficult. Based on analysis of Public and Indian Housing Information Center system (PIC) data and the deceased tenants report, we estimated that agencies paid approximately $7 million in questionable payments on behalf of deceased tenants in single-member households. Also, agencies did not update the family composition on the form HUD-50058, in a timely manner, which resulted in incorrect information maintained in HUD's PIC system. However, agencies did check for invalid Social Security numbers before making housing assistance payments, and we did not find any reportable conditions.

We recommended that HUD improve its monitoring so that it can measure corrections to agency reported data maintained in HUD's PIC system and measure agency progress in limiting payments made on behalf of deceased tenants. Further, HUD should require agencies to support or repay its programs for questionable payments made on behalf of deceased tenants.