Commission on the Deaf and Hearing Impaired insignia. Courtesy of CDHI.
An audit of the Commission on the Deaf and Hearing Impaired found certain interpreters overbill the agency which leads to higher costs for clients who use their services.
The Auditors of Public Accounts said interpreters employed by the commission use labor grievances to protect themselves when they submit overstated claims for hours or mileage.
The commission employs part-time sign-language interpreters to do work for clients. The clients reimburse the state for the interpreters’ services.
“Whenever an interpreter submits an overstated claim involving service, wait or travel time, there exists a risk that not only may the employee be overcompensated, but that all such charges billed directly to the customer will also be overstated,” the auditors wrote in their report. “Additionally, higher costs could also be passed on indirectly to the universe of all customers in the form of an inflated billable service rate, as that rate would be based on overstated underlying cost data.”
According to the audit, the contract with the labor union, a P-2 bargaining unit of AFSCME, does not address certain issues, such as how interpreters should calculate their mileage reimbursement.
“All questionable claims should continue to be challenged and documented,” the audit recommends. “Additionally, all such claims should be systematically recorded, categorized and aggregated to support a statement of potential cost savings that would result from addressing the various deficiencies of the existing P-2 Bargaining Unit labor agreement contract.”
The Department of Social Services, which oversees the commission, told the auditors problems in the contract cannot be addressed until 2016. The Department of Administrative Services is pursuing negotiations before the formal contract renewal.
Auditors also found CDHI has failed to collect $140,013 it has been owed for more than five years.