4.8 We recommended and the Municipal Accountant agreed to:
a. Immediately complete the reconciliation of all bank accounts and ensure
that all valid reconciling items identified in the BRS are properly adjusted
in the Municipality’s books;
b. Strictly comply with Sections 3.2 and 3.3 of COA Circular No. 96-011,
which require timely reconciliation and adjustment of the General Ledger
within 10 days from receipt of the bank statements;
c. Establish and enforce internal control procedures, including setting fixed
monthly deadlines for the preparation and review of BRS and requiring
prompt investigation and resolution of all reconciling items; and
d. Coordinate with the concerned offices to expedite the retrieval of
supporting documents and perform the necessary analyses to validate and
clear long-standing reconciling items.
4.9 The Municipal Accountant mentioned that Management had already assigned
personnel from both the Municipal Accountant’s Office and the Municipal
Treasurer’s Office to reconcile their records. The primary discrepancies seemed
to be related to receipt transactions and bank memo entries.
Unreconciled difference between Cash Local Treasury account against cashbook balance
5. The accounts Cash Local Treasury, Advances for Operating Expenses and
Advances for Payroll accounts showed unreconciled difference of ₱(1,202,851.92),
₱(167,591.72), and ₱(907,644.16), respectively, against the cashbook balance,
inconsistent with Section 143 (A.7) of the Local Treasury Operations Manual
(LTOM), 2nd Edition, thus reliability of the cashbook and General Ledger (GL)
balances could not be relied upon.
5.1 Section 143 (A.7) of the LTOM, 2nd Edition states that an accountable officer
shall maintain his/her cashbook and such other records, or their equivalents as may
be prescribed by the agency’s operating procedures and reconcile with the
accounting records at least quarterly, unless the agency requires a more frequent
reconciliation.
5.2 A review of the Municipality’s accounts as of December 31, 2024, revealed that
there was no proper reconciliation between the cashbook and the balance recorded
in the Cash Local Treasury, Advances for Operating Expenses, and Advances for
Payroll ledgers maintained by the Municipal Accountant. This discrepancy
resulted in differences amounting to ₱(1,202,851.92), ₱(167,591.72), and
₱(907,644.16), respectively. The details are as follows:
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