A $5.1 billion United States Postal Service credit card program for fuel purchases made by more than 400 mail-carrying contractors is “not manageable” and lacks needed protections against “fraud, waste and abuse,” according to a government watchdog.
The Postal Service has issued 12,000 Voyager credit cards used by contractors to buy 1.6 billions gallons of diesel fuel to carry the mail since 2005, the USPS inspector general said in a report made public Friday.
The program is an extension of a General Services Administration program used in other federal departments and agencies.
Multiple IG reports since 2005 have documented an estimated $489 million in questionable purchases made possible because USPS officials failed to “establish adequate controls over the program and safeguard the cards against fraud, waste, and abuse,” the report said.
In addition, Postal Service leaders failed to “establish an infrastructure to manage the program, including systems and resources to monitor activities.”
As a result, there is no way for Postal Service officials to determine whether purchases made using the Voyager cards actually went toward delivering mail or to non-postal purposes.
Besides encouraging waste and fraud, the Voyager credit card program is likely wasting fuel as well because under the program the Postal Service pays all of the costs, so “there is no incentive for contractors to conserve fuel,” the USPS IG said.
The USPS IG recommended that postal service officials discontinue the Voyager program entirely by converting it to one based on a price indexing model.
Go here to read the full USPS IG report.
Mark Tapscott is executive editor of the Washington Examiner.
