ZKA identifies shortcomings in public sector wage management system

The National Audition Office (ZKA) today has published the Information Technology auditing report “Plagan Management System”.

This audit aimed at assessing whether there is an effective environment of control that ensures that the system for wage Management (Payroll) supports the wage process, as well as provides accurate, reliable, comprehensive and timely data.

The results of the audit show that the Treasury has not established appropriate organisational structures for the proper functioning of the system, and the process of work was not based on strategic objectives to support this system by risking it not to meet its goal of managing salaries for the public sector.

In the absence of adequate strategic procedures and plans, the Treasury risks failing to achieve the organisation's prior goal and changes in the processes for realisation of wages are not achieved. “The deployment of the TI division and the wage division in the wrong position, the inadequacy of tasks, as well as the lack of a clear organisational structure, make the wage process not transparent and accounting, also jeopardises the failure of its goals and the fulfillment of its” needs, said the audit report.

The wage management system also has no record of processes and no sufficient control of the changes made in this system. This increases the risk of error, unwanted or accidental changes in the system.

The audit has pointed out that the application checks placed on the wage system are not enough to support the wage process. App checks had been lacking since the establishment of input data, wage processing, and information safety checks in this system.

Also in the wage system, areas for registering work experience had no necessary introduction checks established. The system does not enable registration of individual categories for public officials, as well as identification of cases with the status of two primary salaries in the system. Mangai has also been identified in the performance experience where the additional experience of work is not calculated in the month in which the criteria of one year are fulfilled, as well as the calculation of additional work experience is done for a year less than you deserve and is not in line with the years in the system. This defect had begun to appear since 2018.

According to the findings of this audit, the Treasury had not drafted a procedure for managing and monitoring the accounts of the wage management system users, there are full access of the same officials on the app and on SMP databases, and there are no mechanisms for monitoring the activities of these users. This may affect increasing the risk of not identifying possible mistakes or abuses.

Since the wage management system pays all employees in the public sector in the Republic of Kosovo, and that around 30% of state budget spending and managed an average of 88,000 (833,000) salaries per month, General Auditor Vlora Spanca has said the results of auditing have highlighted that the process of execution of wages and the system managing this process need improvement, with the aim of increasing efficiency and accuracy of data. Therefore, it has recommended responsible institutions to take the necessary steps to ensure that the system used for wage management contains required standards by effectively managing their distribution.

In order to address issues about TI governance, TI operations and app checks, as well as the wage process in general, through this audit report the National Audition Office has provided 19 recommendations for the Ministry of Finance, Labour and Transfers.

The complete information technology auditing report “